by Robert Wilkinson
Following up on the general meaning and function of the "Inferior Conjunction" between the Sun and Mercury, today we explore specifics of the Inferior Conjunction of March 14-15 at 25 Pisces. This “fusion of life and mind” will impact the rest of the retrograde period, and many weeks after.
As I offered in earlier articles, an Inferior Conjunction is when Mercury (mind) conjuncts the Sun (life) while retrograde. This indicates that signals, messages, and ideas from either outer sources or subconscious sources will fuse with the life principle, setting the tone for the lessons involving how our minds are relating to our lives during the next four months. Since Mercury is retrograde, the degree of the inferior conjunction shows how our lives will merge with our perceptions and bring forth a new understanding of our light.
The Sabian Symbol for the Inferior Conjunction
The Sabian Symbol we’ve been given for the 25th degree of Pisces is "The purging of the priesthood.” In the The Astrology of Personality, where Rudhyar uses the original Dr. Jones' class notes on the symbols, 25 Pisces is said to be a symbol of “ability periodically to cleanse from all selfish dross the channels for spiritual service,” “true vision,” and “Soul reformation.”
In The Astrological Mandala he offers that this degree is one of “the power of the Soul to intervene in the personal life and to induce necessary catharses.” He states this symbol is about eliminating negative ego attitudes and “dogmatic rules and habits which not only have become empty of inner meaning, but very often have been perverted by the demands of the … emotional nature, and by the … rationalizing intellect.”
He goes on to say that “a purging or catharsis is needed to restore not only fresh and creative spontaneity, but even more the contact with the Soul and the God-ordained dharma.” He tells us this is part of the “final consummation of the process” of actualizing some potential that requires “moments of crisis and purification.” He says it falls in the Span of Protection, and is the final degree in the emotional-cultural level of the Scene of Perpetuation in the Act of Capitalization.
Dr. Jones says this degree symbolizes “the penalties that await whatever may fail to prove its worth,” where we must demand “an absolute integrity for (our) spiritual or immortal insights,” and not tolerate those who fall short of our ideals “in those who elect to be custodians of (our) higher and invisible treasures.”
He states that we must “approach the problems of (our) own regeneration through a dramatization of potentials (we) recognize but cannot altogether instrument,” while not “tolerating their depreciation.” He offers us the keyword REFORMATION. We are told that when positive, the degree is "revolt against all superficial exaltation of human nature.”
So we enter a time where Life is moving forward as Mind looks back on past purifications, or current purifications needed because of past tendencies. This is a time to allow our Soul to come forth unimpeded by personality and egoic considerations. This should help us renew our contact with our Higher Self, and eliminate old rules and habits that have no place in our future. In any case, we will all come out purified in major ways over the next 4 months!
Looking Back, Looking Forward
Just remember that all Mercury RX phenomena take a while to unfold, often during a subsequent RX period. Things that happen during a retrograde seem to have a way of moving forward at future retrograde. Right now we’ve all received some sort of blessing since December 2017, as well as seen new dimensions of who we are. This Inferior Conjunction will bring echoes of past eras when Jupiter, Uranus, and Chiron were in this sector of Pisces, as well as portents of the future of the time when Neptune will transit this part of Pisces.
What’s extraordinary about this Inferior Conjunction is that Jupiter is at 24 Sag, promising “beatitude” and happiness as a result of this fusion of Life and Mind. Mercury is square its ruler, releasing tremendous energy related to the good fortune and happiness promised by Jupiter’s Sabian Symbol. This is reinforcing the new “idea” coming forth in collective social consciousness, so focus on your place of greatest service, whether in the inward world of Being or the outer world of doing.
Use “binding circumstances” to demonstrate your freedom of movement, pruning back those activities you need to. Get over your preconceptions, and you will find that which will bring you honor over time. Purify everything you need to, whether physical, emotional, or mental. This prepares you to enter a new phase in late April.
So we enter a time of the fusion of life and mind that offers us new insights about past and present ghosts, motives, harvests, and “the movie of our life.” There is great good fortune promised by this conjunction, but remember it is still “the end of the end before the beginning.” This time is one of accelerated growth with the need to allow our natural spontaneity to come up so we may quicken the launch of our quest, though we may not be clear where we’re going for a little while.
This Inferior Conjunction can fuse hindsight and life experience to see how new forms of light, life, and perspectives are coming forth showing us a new potential future. The next four months are a time to embrace new ways of managing transitions into the future already formed by seeing the past differently, revisioning the key emotional elements of those experiences.
A benefit of Inferior Conjunctions is they offer us views of how we prepared in the past for current attitudes and ideals, or conversely, through the retrograde lens see how past attitudes and ideals led us to where we’re at right now. When Mercury gives us a backward look or alternative view and understanding of something from the past, it also in a strange way prepares the ground for the future when other planets cross this degree.
That implies that those things we launched which individualized us in 2010 when Jupiter and Uranus was in this zone will be seen in a different light, or we will see how those events led us to where we are now. Furthermore, those awakenings and expansions are directly related to how Chiron mentored us in 2016-2017. Its influence continued because it went SD at 25 Pisces in December 2017, setting the platform for “healing into our Higher Self” since then. This retrograde weaves our spiritual evolution through reflections on all that has been purified since then, and all that requires purification through the next Inferior Conjunction on July 21 just before the Sun enters Leo.
Aspects in Play
Remember that in any celestial event, forming aspects show the future and closely partile separating aspects show what’s activated now. In an Inferior Conjunction, the Sun and Mercury conspire to bring separating aspects back into play, with forming aspects activated now and in the future when Mercury goes direct.
This Conjunction is a curious thing. There are almost no Lunar aspects, making the Moon in Cancer a standalone force unto itself. This is a time to check up on how we’re managing things, or the management tools at our disposal, eliminating all we no longer need, being willing to go beyond the known and familiar with “warmth of character.” Venus is square Mars, so see how you can reconnect with the planetary Mother, and experience “the joy and power of new beginnings.” Part the curtains veiling the unknown next step, and trust that your heart warmth will radiate your integrity, attracting you to friends and allies, and them to you.
Mostly these next few months will require a tremendous amount of faith to overcome some dualities, and in transcending them we will acquire techniques of mastering future situations where those dualities are an issue. Get to the core of the issue, be clear about the practical needs to adjust the situation as best you can, and rise to the challenge by accepting the mantle of power.
Elements, Dispositor Backdrops, and the Jones Pattern
The chart of the Inferior Conjunction shows a “balanced imbalanced” distribution, with 1 planet in Fire, 4 in Earth, 1 in Air, and 4 in Water. This makes for a time of “pragmatic feelings,” or experiential grounding, with not much inspiration or sense of interactivity, except to show us how to manage our energies to bring good fortune into our lives.
The balance between earth and water keeps it grounded and fluid at the same time. The Moon in Watery Cancer is the key to expression, since it’s outside the occupied spam and in its home. As the conjunction is also in Water, that element is the most prominent at this time. That makes this fusion of Life and Mind operate in a Distributive Experiential mode.
In this chart, we have four “final dispositors” for all the other energies. We have the Moon in Cancer, ruling itself; we have Jupiter in Sagittarius, ruling the Sun, Mercury, and Neptune (in this world); we have Saturn, ruling Venus, Mars, Uranus, and Pluto, and as always , Neptune as a “standalone” Spiritual ruler in Pisces. Jupiter continues to be highly influential along with Saturn in the next few months, since they’ve been trading rulerships of the inner planets during the time they have transited Sag through Pisces.
This Inferior Conjunction occurs during this period where we will have a “Bucket” Jones pattern. I discuss the Jones patterns at work in each Lunation article, so if you want to know more, please refer to the New and Full Moon articles in the archives between Feb and May when we have this pattern. Or use the site google box. In this one, the Moon is the handle, or nozzle, focusing all the other planetary energies, so expect a time of testing and getting out beyond the known and familiar. Be stimulated to receptivity to higher forces, and you could expand your spiritual capacity to an unsuspected degree!
So What’s Been Going On, and What Will Happen From Here?
I’ve explained this “two-step” process of Inferior Conjunctions followed by Superior Conjunctions alternating with each other in previous articles. The last few weeks we’ve been under the influence of the last Superior Conjunction at 10 Aquarius on Jan 29, 2019. That “fusion of life and mind” marked the beginning of Mercury getting out in front of the Sun. The period since then has brought us a new understanding of why we no longer accept certain roles, and some things are not “as popular” with us as they used to be. We were able to bring a different understanding of our power to make a larger contribution to the period just passed, and plan anew based in what we left behind beginning June 2018.
Now, at the Inferior Conjunction, we’ve reached the end of the direct influence of that conjunction, and now will go into a process where we will purify our personality so our Soul may shine through. This one “purges” our life of impurities, and prepares us for the good fortune coming via the other planetary positions. It may be a memory of people or experiences, whether past betrayals or echoes of closures not understood at the time or even just flashes into how our experience is related to the generic human condition.
While Mercury is still slow in speed, from here it gradually speeds up, and when it goes stationary direct, will continue to speed up until it outraces the Sun at the next Superior Conjunction. So while up to now, Life has been catching up to Mind, after the next Superior Conjunction Mind will again outraces Life, exploring ideas and perceptions of experiences yet to occur.
So the Inferior Conjunction marks the point when Mind is being absorbed by Life, or Life takes on the results of subconscious or collective ideas returning to source. For the next short period, Mercury will still be slow in speed and retrograde as the Sun moves forward, putting distance between it and Mercury. Then Life gets as far from Mind as it can, Mercury goes stationary direct, and begins to speed up preparing for the first step anew in a different part of the zodiac. The “pulses” of the Inferior and Superior conjunctions of the Sun and Mercury constitute an entire field of research unto themselves. I explain this process in greater detail in A New Look at Mercury Retrograde.
Mercury, or Hermes, the “Guide of Souls”
All Mercury retrograde periods teach us about how Mercury functions. Mercury’s duality is “Life/Death,” so we can get a new look at how our consciousness and responses are either creative, destructive, or both, to cite the venerable Kabalistic Arhat Paul Foster Case. Mercury is where we learn if our mental processes are creating chaos and disorganized scattered conditions through ambivalence, and thus come to see how to use discernment to coordinate various functions to bring forth perfect knowing how to do whatever needs to be done.
As the backdrop to how our mind and life relate to each other, perhaps we can learn how to deal with Mercurial energies in ourselves or others from a different angle of view, organizing or reorganizing or ideas, perception, interpretations, and way of communicating. As this Inferior Conjunction falls in Pisces, it should provide us new ways to understand, communicate, or interpret the signs and signals of our past as we dream the image of our future which will come forth in the very near future!
All in all, the coming 4 months will bring interesting returns, reflections, and rehearsals of how and what we’ve already dealt with in the realm of learning to use Pisces energy productively. This includes all the usual Pisces themes, such as generating compassion, allowing forgiveness to bless you to release the past creating the psychic space to move forward unencumbered by old ghosts. Keep everything fluid, see how it’s all part of the generic human condition, and remember purification happens all kinds of ways.
So the new views, understandings, and reinterpretations shown by this Inferior Conjunction should be considered in the light of the house in which this retrograde and inferior conjunction is happening. We can see our ideas from a different angle, find a new focus, and make progress in some form of transforming initiative that will be the source of much information and activity in the next few weeks. Wherever you have late Pisces will bring a fusion of Life and Mind.
Once the Inferior Conjunction happens, whatever has seemed delayed, postponed, or dragging along will move forward soon. This can bring forth a greater holistic vision of how events and people are connected, as well as why we must rethink some things, people, and plans.
Generally, the 11 days before the inferior conjunction (fusion) of mind and life is a good time to take a new look at how you can bring out your inner wisdom by adjusting to a future vision or broader perspective that's opening for you. It's also good for getting a new point of view regarding what your imagination is willing to consider and how to coordinate your life to reorganize it productively.
It's great for intuitive flashes, insights into the larger collective consciousness and unconsciousness, and seeing how you're being led to see elements of your Soul you may not have recognized before now. So think back on what's happened in the past couple of weeks, and find a new way to view how those things may symbolize the future somehow.
Just remember during retrogrades, especially Mercury retrograde, that often things that don't turn out one way lead directly or indirectly to other things somewhat related manifesting down the road. It's as though nothing should be taken at face value, and often what we do or think during Mercury retrograde creates odd echoes in the future that take different shapes, or different functions related to the original intention.
A New Look At Mercury Retrograde
Because we’ll still be dealing with Mercury retrograde through March 28 (and to some extent for the 2 weeks after that while Mercury is still in its shadow zone), if you haven’t already, you should get a copy of the 2nd edition of A New Look At Mercury Retrograde. It offers in-depth information about Mercury retrograde in the various signs and houses, and what the Mercury Retrograde phenomenon is about.
By knowing more about 2016’s Mercury retrograde periods in Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn, as well as the 2017 retrogrades in Capricorn and Sagittarius, Taurus and Aries, and Virgo and Leo, and 2018’s retrogrades in Aries, Leo, Sag and Scorpio, you may see patterns in what has been going on in your life, the different things you’ve been taking a new look at and why, and how this "looking back" has influenced your choices as you moved through past events. And, by taking a look at the qualities of this March 2019 RX in Pisces and July’s RX in Leo and Cancer, you’ll get important information about what to expect in the months to come!
Here's the Amazon link to the page where you can purchase a paperback edition of A New Look at Mercury Retrograde. If you want an ebook, you can order one at the link, or go to Barnes & Noble and it's available through Nook.
Previous articles in this series:
This one is a one stop shop of the previous six articles on this Mercury Retrograde period. Each has a brief description of what’s in that specific article.
Copyright © 2019 Robert Wilkinson
Truly remarkably inspired. Spot on.
Posted by: Mel | March 15, 2019 at 04:28 PM