Before
interpreting the birth-chart of a man who has perhaps done more than any other
living person to establish a consistent and inclusive approach to the problem of
individual integration, I need to state again that the truly valid use of
astrology, psychologically speaking, is the clarification
(the making more conscious and objectively real) of the law of the individual's
being thus of the structural foundation of the individual.
Any
sound astrological interpretation should become a guide to self-realization, a
help in the "process of individuation." It should seek to transform
psychological confusion into a lucid understanding of inherent potentialities,
and of the most "logical" manner (in terms of the "law" of
the individual's being) to develop these potentialities into fully expressed
actualities.
With these aims in mind, the astrologer should first of all
seek to determine from the birth-chart the typical nature of the relationship
between conscious and unconscious factors, for this relationship sets the stage
for the process of personality-integration and self-realization. Obviously, this
relationship constantly changes in its actual and precise manifestations; but it
is nevertheless established on some kind of structural foundation, which
constitutes the "archetype" of the future self.
In every individual, the conscious ego tends to develop in
a particular and different way; it emerges from the matrix of the unconscious
impetuously or with diffidence, under great pressure or in a smooth, easy
manner. The attitude of the ego toward the unconscious depends upon how this
process unfolds. This attitude is essentially defined by the time the individual
reaches the age of 28 which I have elsewhere(1) called the age of a
theoretical "second birth." This attitude may still change; but, if it
seems to do so radically, it will be in an act of revulsion; that is, it will
tend to become repolarized into its opposite, out of sheer dissatisfaction with
itself. No single astrological factor can indicate the typical character of the
ego's attitude toward the unconscious
no more than any single factor in the birth-chart is sufficient to determine
whether a person can be classified as extrovert or introvert
one of the most difficult points to determine from the birth-chart. Yet, by considering the overall pattern
of the chart and the way in which planetary factors are individually related, a
great deal can be ascertained concerning these basic elements of character.
The over-all pattern of a
birth-chart has been shown by Marc Edmond Jones
to fall into a few fundamental
structural types.(2) Whether or not one considers his definitions and
characterizations fully satisfactory, the principle underlying such a
classification is entirely sound, especially whereever the chart's pattern comes
close to one of the ideal types. In his book, Marc Jones presents Jung's chart
as an illustration of what he calls splay type of pattern
a pattern presenting, in its ideal form, "strong sharp aggregations of the
planets at irregular points" and suggesting highly individual or purposeful
emphases in the life, where the temperament juts out into experience according
to its own very special tastes." By considering
the over-all pattern of the
birth-chart, the astrologer is able to ascertain the relative concentration or
dispersion of a person's interests and lines of activity
thus, his particular
way of making his
experience serve the essential purpose of his being. Experience is to be used by the ego if there is to be
integration of the personality and self-realization. The ego's main function is
to personalize the harvest produced by the many experiences of an individual
life by referring it to a relatively permanent structure of consciousness and
giving it an individual meaning.
Where the planets are evenly scattered throughout the
chart, the ego's tendency is to use various and sundry types of experiences or
acquired knowledge to universalize the person's interests. The individual then
may become involved in many areas of life, finding relationships between a great
many facets of being. If the ego has a strong enough sense of stuctural
integrity and enough breadth of vision to integrate this diversified material,
the individual's contribution to humankind can be invaluable in its
universality or its power to expand the horizons and participation of all human
beings in the multifarious activities of a wide world. The particular planets
emphasized in the chart by their angular positions indicate the characteristic
form the manifestation of the planetary pattern will take. For instance, in the
case of Theodore Roosevelt (given by Marc Jones as one illustration of this
scattered a splash
type of planetary pattern), Mars rising
indicates an aggressive approach to the problem of integration. Pluto at the
nadir, the Moon at the cusp of the seventh house, and Sun in Scorpio at the
zenith, further stress the imperialistic and willful character of this actional
type of American.
Several outstanding facts emerge as we study this significant pattern. First, we
see a balancing of two groups of factors in the zones of the zodiac including
the equinoctial points, each group containing planets of opposite polarity to
the planets of the other (Saturn, Neptune, Moon in one group are of opposite
polarity respectively to Jupiter, Uranus, Sun
and Pluto, in a sense, can also
be said to be of opposite polarity to the "inner" planets, Mercury and
Venus). Then, we find that these planetary groups are balanced in such a way
that they seem to hang from the elevated Mars, somewhat like two loads hanging
by ropes from a high peg. The added fact that Mars is in sextile to both the
upper edges of the planetary groups (Saturn and Jupiter, which are therefore in
trine to each other) adds a constructive and integrative undertone to the
meaning of the over-all pattern. The Moon is likewise in sextile to Venus and
Mercury, Uranus in sextile to Jupiter; and these several sextiles integrate and
balance the strong squares of Saturn to Moon-Pluto, of Jupiter to Venus (and,
distantly, to Mercury and the Sun), of Sun to Neptune, and of Moon to Uranus.
Finally, the pivotal Mars strengthens the dynamic equilibrium of the power-laden
configuration by being in sesqui-quadrate aspect to both Neptune and the Sun.
If all
these aspects were considered one by one, as in the old astrological techniques,
the result would be an extraordinary confusion of meanings. If, however, the
entire planetary pattern is seen as an engine operating for the integrated
release of power, the picture is both highly significant and inspiring.
One rarely finds instances of such harmonic interweaving of stressful and
power-releasing planetary factors. Jung's chart can thus be seen, almost at a
glance, as a remarkable formula for personality-integration. If we now more
closely examine the connected elements of this formula, we will also find a most
interesting "balance of power" where the relationship between ego and collective
unconscious is concerned. This relationship can also be interpreted as one
between "form" and "energy," between "rational" and "irrational," between
"meaning" and "life" as can be seen from Jung's commentary on
The Secret of the
Golden Flower,
a most significant linking of ancient Chinese mysticism and
modern psychology. The realm of "life" is essentially that of the
dualism of energies represented by the Sun and the Moon, while the principle of
"form" is under the rulership of Saturn.
In
Jung's birth-chart (according to the birth-data furnished by Jung himself to
Mrs. Fleisher), we find that the last degrees of Capricorn are rising. Saturn,
the ruler of the chart, is in the first house, retrograde in Aquarius (which it
co-rules with Uranus, opposing from Leo in the seventh house). This establishes
the Saturnian element of form in strong predominance, even though the fact that
Saturn is retrograde suggests that this predominance has to fight against
internal enemies. In most cases, Saturn retrograde refers to an ego which has to
turn its attention inward rather than outward in order to gain control of the
energies of life; this, because the life-energies are not normally held in
subservience to either the generic patterns of the human organism or the
collective traditions and moulds of society.
Indeed,
Jung's chart shows at once how difficult it would be for ordinary bio-social
structures of themselves to hold in check his unusually aroused life-energies!
Consider that Uranus is conjunct the Sun, that the Moon is surrounded by Neptune
and Pluto, and that the two groups are in square to each other; and you will see
how radically the "planets of the unconscious" challenge the very
substance of Jung's physical and spiritual vitality. Bio-psychic energy is
restless and explosive in Jung's being
and the fact that the Sun is powerful
in Leo and the Moon exalted in Taurus adds to the intensity of a configuration
which could easily lead to emotional explosions or a peculiar overwhelming of
the conscious by the unconscious. On the other hand, the strength of this Sun
and Moon indicates that, in his work of integration, Jung is able to depend upon
a strong vitality, spiritual as well as biological.
Nevertheless,
the need for Saturn is very great if the power of the remote trans-Saturnian
planets is to be held in check. The metal of the engine of personality must be
able to contain and purposefully release an enormous amount of unconscious,
bio-psychic power, or "libido." If Saturn does the containing (with
its attention "turned backward" toward the unconscious), Mars is in
charge of the releasing; and this releasing is shown to operate in an
extraordinarily balanced manner because Mars is the pivot of the entire
planetary pattern. It is equidistant from Saturn and Jupiter (contraction and
expansion), from Sun and Neptune (Selfhood, and its universalistic Vesture;
Christ, and His "Robe of Glory") and from Pluto and Venus. It is in
the house of social purposefulness and reform, in the sign of abstract knowledge
and spiritual teaching.
Mars is the symbol of all directed releases of power, and, in a chart which
reveals such a stress on controlled power, everything that relates to Mars is
important. If that Mars-outlet should become clogged or distorted, a psychic
explosion might indeed be inevitable even in spite of Saturn's strength of resistance. The
squares of Saturn can produce constructive power yet if the
dynamic balance were "unhinged" by something happening to the Mars-outlet, these
squares would easily turn destructive
especially the ones in which Pluto and the Moon operate. Mars, however, shows
outstanding strength not because of
its zodiacal position, but because it is stationary and occupies a focal
position in the whole chart. It is strong because two masses of opposite
polarities are balanced upon it, and almost neutralized; and, being stationary,
it has a character of near immovability. The Sabian symbol for its zodiacal
position (Sagittarius 22) adds to the meaning of these Martian characteristics,
for it reads thus: "A perfect bit of the old world is found in the new:
A Chinese laundry has its shutters up and is now itself
This is the symbol
of the reality of the interior world to which man usually shuts his eyes, the
retreat of the soul where none but itself may enter. Positively, it is a degree
of easy poise; negatively, the world at large in a fullness of enjoyment. The
keyword is Calmness." (Marc Jones,
Symbolical
Astrology.)(3)
The
literal accuracy of the symbol is quite amazing, for any deep student of Jung
knows how he has found a metaphysical and alchemical basis for the
interpretation of psychological processes in Chinese philosophy (the yang-yin
cycle of compensatory changes, the principle of integration through a mediating
function the Emperor who "assimilates" the unconscious need of his
people and projects the structural pattern of the Sky-self upon the State-ego).
Besides, is not psychological practice a cleansing process and catharsis, which
requires great poise, inner "calmness," and periodic withdrawal into
one's own inner nature?
Mars, in
Jung's chart, rules the ninth house (philosophy, wisdom, teaching) and is found
in the ninth sign of the Zodiac; and teaching and psychological practice were
for Jung a necessary release. As a psychologist, he had to stand, as it were,
poised between extroversion and introversion
as the
"stationary" Mars is poised between retrograde and direct motion, just
going direct. In other words, this Mars is the point of release for a chart in
which everything is in a state of balanced dynamism
and thus Mars is itself
significantly balanced between two directions of motion. Its sextiles to Jupiter
and Saturn establish a practical and smoothly constructive social foundation for
the Martian release. Jung's revolutionary impulses operate within the framework
of a mature attitude to society as well as to the conscious ego. The quality of
vision and understanding signified by the trine aspect of Jupiter to Saturn is
focused outwardly and imbued with idealism through Mars.
Mars' approximate 135° aspect to the Sun and Neptune reveals the deeper sources
of Jung's public and educational activities. In any cycle of relationship, the
sesquiquadrate aspect refers to the overcoming of actional crisis. It precedes
the opposition aspect, which symbolizes (in its positive aspect) full
illumination, and it follows the trine which gives it a background of vision
thus a means to overcome the crisis. In Jung's chart the seventh house Leo Sun
is a proud symbol of masculine power and self-development; Neptune, on the other
hand, about to turn retrograde in Taurus, is a symbol of inner substance and
wealth, of collective-racial evolution. The two planets are "masculine" and
"feminine," spiritually speaking and in square. The former is the center of the totality
of being, the Self; the latter, the universal substance which this Self can
shape into a "spiritual vehicle" for its manifestation. The shaper and
the yet-to-be-shaped are in aspect of crisis
an exact square. Can the tension
be resolved? It can only be resolved if it is exteriorized. Mars is the
exteriorizer. By teaching others, by reforming psychological techniques, Jung resolved
his own crisis of spiritual formation; and built himself a "body of
immortality" social, and
presumably personal, immortality
the Diamond
Body of Chinese esotericism, the Christ-Child within of the Christian mystics.
The extraordinary significance of this process of spiritual
integration in Jung's life is revealed by the unusual fact that his natal Sun is
11½ degrees behind Uranus his natal Moon, 12½ degrees ahead of Neptune.
Uranus can be said to be in the "solar path" of relationship between
the unconscious and the conscious; Neptune, the "lunar path." Again,
we see these two approaches in crucial (or "cruciform") aspect to each
other, with Neptune exactly squaring the Sun, and Uranus exactly squaring the
Moon a kind of flattened-out X-shaped configuration. Significant polarities
are once more seen in a condition of interweaving.
In the last chapter, I stressed the meaning of the Moon in
astropsychological analysis as a mediatrix between the unconscious and the ego
and, in the case of a male individual, as the symbol of the "anima."
Jung's anima is shown in an unusual light in his birth-chart, for, as I already
said, his Moon is surrounded by Neptune and Pluto and squared by Uranus. In
other words, it is entirely dominated by the planets of the collective unconscious. But the Moon is also squared by Saturn, and
very strong in a biological sense because of its position in its sign of
exaltation, the prolific earth-sign, Taurus. Moreover, it is in opposition to
the Part of Fortune in Scorpio in the ninth house. In other words, the Moon
receives the full pressure of a Cross in the fixed signs (power signs) of the
zodiac, besides being universalized and expanded by Neptune and Pluto on either
side. This Moon rules over Jung's seventh house (partnership, marriage). It is
also in "mutual reception" to Venus in Cancer
a strengthening
indication for both the Moon and Venus. This is a very intricate interweaving;
and, as the Moon also represents the psychic energy focused through the
woman-image in a man's life (another aspect of the anima, the
mother-wife-daughter image), one may look for some very unusual part being
performed by women in Jung's life.
Available
biographical notes reveal nothing outwardly spectacular. In 1908 at the age of
28, Jung married a girl belonging to "a conservative Swiss family," with whom he
had four daughters and one son. Marriage occurred as his progressed Sun was
moving from Leo to Virgo the mystical Sphynx point of the zodiac. By
transit, Uranus may have been crossing progressed Mars at the time of the
marriage, and Saturn opposed his natal sun; Pluto was opposing Uranus. The
marriage presumably added stability to Jung's life. He had obtained his M.D.
degree in 1902, was becoming acquainted with Freud's ideas (although he met him
only in 1906), and had probably completed his studies in Paris with Pierre
Janet. This was undoubtedly the formative period of his mature personality
but we do not know more than that. It seems, however, that his marriage
must have been a polarizing factor at the concrete earth-level of
biological-social fruitfulness. Venus has much to do with marriage, especially
in Jung's chart; and the accent there is on concrete productivity. The essence
of the Moon-function seems, on the contrary, to have operated at a more psychic
level. The symbol for the Moon's degree may also be revealing
also the fact that the
Moon is found in the third house.
The Moon
symbol pictures An old man attempting, with a degree of success unsuspected
by him, to reveal the Mysteries to a motley group, and it is said to
symbolize "the conscious possession of greater knowledge and potentialities
than it is possible to bring to immediate practical use." The "motley
group" symbol is indeed interesting, for Jung's moon function may have been
polarized in a universalistic sense (Neptune-Pluto influence) by the
"motley group" of women who, as patients, demanded that he help
establish in them a link with their own inner nature through some spiritual
logos-fecundation. His Mars
the release point of his chart
is in biquintile aspect (144°) to his Moon (his Saturn also in quintile to his
Neptune, and Pluto to his Sun), and the "quintile series" of aspects deals with
creative activity (the five-pointed Star symbolizing man's victory over
instinctual nature). Nevertheless, we can see Jung's Moon being forced into a
focus of Saturnian activity through its participation in the square of Saturn to
Pluto. However "mystical" his congenital adjustments to life and to the
experiences of his environment and one wonders what kind of person his mother was, or
whether or not he had some unusual woman-relative
Jung's destiny (Saturn)
compelled him to square these anima-adjustments to the realities of the outer
world of society, to frame his undoubtedly most intense intuitional experiences
within the logical moulds of a strong ego-consciousness. Without the latter
(Saturn), and without the outlet provided by his activities as teacher and
reformer, Jung's psychic energies would have become dissipated into an
inexpressible "stratosphere" of transcendent vision.
The preceding discussion covers only some of the most essential points to be
discovered through a thorough study of a remarkable birth-chart. What makes this
chart so valuable for the psychologist is that it is an outstanding symbol of
all Jung put into his life work. This, indeed, is always more or less the case
when a great personality reaches the "creative" stage
that is, when
an organic totality of living experience is brought to the condition of
"seed," and thus gains the power to immortalize itself, reproducing
its vision in the minds of the coming generations. We also saw the significance
of Freud's birth-chart, with its drill-like shape and surgical emphasis, its
cutting down to the roots of personality. And if we wish to realize what C. G.
Jung brought to the psychoanalysis which Freud originated, we have only to study
the birth-charts of these two men side by side. The story they tell is quite
striking. To record it fully would take far too much space; but we can see at
once that Freud's Sun stands on the same degree as Jung's Moon, and that a most
significant relationship exists between the emphasized Taurus-groupings of
planets in both charts. We can see that the birth horizons of the two charts are
identical, but reversed; the Ascendant of one being the Descendant of the
other. And in both cases Mars (stationary in Jung's chart and nearly stationary
in Freud's) occupies a position of structural stress or pivotal importance; but
how different the implications of these two Mars! Freud's points to the deepest
depths, ruthlessly uncovering the hidden remains of social frustrations; Jung's
teaches the way to the heights, to a conscious grappling with the problem of
education and social reform or regeneration. Freud, the soul-surgeon
Jung, the
spiritual Guide, the modern Westernized Guru holding a most receptive
attitude to universals within the Saturnian focus of a clear consciousness and a
determined ego.
We can also compare these two charts with that of Adler, which displays a
brilliant panoply of self-confident and sanguine optimism, but which is
curiously anchored to the ground-level of consciousness by the conflicting pulls
of Uranus and Saturn and
without any bottom! Here, too, we see Mars in a strong position in conjunction
with the Sun; but it is a direct, over-forceful Mars (placed on Jung's natal
Saturn) and Venus is retrograde. We have the same planetary
emphasis on the sign Taurus Jupiter and Pluto to on Jung's Moon, Adler's Moon on
Jung's Neptune. One wonders indeed if there is not a basic meaning in this
triple recurrence of Taurus 16° in the charts of the three most outstanding
representatives of the new psychology. Considering the Sabian symbol (above
described) for that degree, could it mean that these three men, in different
ways and to different degrees, tried to bring to the "motley group" of
their followers a knowledge which far exceeded the possibility of its being told
to the Western world at this time?
This
chapter concludes our study of modern depth-psychology per se. The next
chapters will study a new generation of psychologists who, in several different
ways, have sought to bring to the new psychology some of the religious or
"spiritual" elements which Freudian materialism had violently tried to
discard.
cf. the
author's
The Astrology of Personality
(1936);
New Mansions For New Men
(1938)
both in current editions and more recently,
Occult Preparations for a New Age
(Quest Books, 1975).
Ed.
cf.
Marc Jones' Guide to Horoscope Interpretation.
Also, the author's
PersonCentered
Astrology
(C. S. A. Press, 1968) includes an essay entitled "First
Steps in the Study of Birth Charts," in which he renames and reinterprets
the characteristic planetary patterns.
The
Sabian symbols presented in this book are taken either from Marc Jones'
Symbolical
Astrology
or from the condensed version of the symbols published in the
author's The Astrology of Personality.
cf. also,
An Astrological
Mandala: The cycle of transformation and its 360 symbolic phases
(Random House, 1973) by Dane Rudhyar, an expanded reinterpretation of this most
remarkable series of symbols. Ed.
