The Full Moon on April 5/6th is at 16 degrees of Libra, the sign of love, relationships, balance, and fairness. It is opposite Chiron, the wounded healer and Jupiter, the planet of optimism and deeply held beliefs such as religion.
Hang in there with me, I’m going to get a little technical, but it will help to understand a very important point about this full moon.
In astrology planets within 5 degrees of the Sun get burned by its rays and it’s called ‘combust’. If you look up into the sky when planets are that close to the Sun, they disappear behind it’s shine. Essentially, the Sun steals the show and weakens the planet, burning it with its brightness. So if a person has Mars close to the Sun in their chart, then that person may have some difficulty with taking action or following through. If Venus is close, the person born with this may be shy or insecure.
From 15 degrees of Libra to the end of Scorpio is said to be via combust, Latin for the burned path or the fiery way. This was due to a number of malefic fixed stars that were contained in this area. The Milky Way is a collection of 100 – 400 billion stars and in Babylonian times, the Milky was in Libra. Planets close to the Sun, which is a star, may suffer, but planets close to 100 -400 billion, may explain why the ancients did not like this section of the sky. The Milky Way with all its bright shining stars was the fiery path! Over the next couple of thousand years, the milky way progressed at a rate of 1 degree every 72 years through Libra, then Scorpio, (during Babylonian times Libra and Scorpio were one sign called the Claw) and is now in Sagittarius. This slow progression is due to the precession of the equinox. It burned a path through relationships, marriage and love ruled by Libra and then moved through Scorpio to burn through sex and intimacy.
Essentially it created a massive wound in the area of love, relationships, sex and intimacy. The collateral damage was a very tough time for women, a loss of the goddess archetype, and a split between sex and love. The Bible was written, emerging out of Babylonian times (have you discovered useful charts yet?) and pits Adam and Eve against each other, blaming Eve for their descent. Since then, not only did women endure a very deep wound, one that we have consciously and recently been working on healing in the rise of the feminine, but relationships experienced massive wounds as a result.
Margaret Starbird, whose book was the inspiration for the Divinci Code speaks about this wound in her books. We went from Gods and Goddess, inclusive of temples and cults that followed them, to a celibate God and a virginal Mother, losing intimacy, partnership and sex, or at least demoting it to the level of “evil” or “sin”.
As it is with many wounds, I’m not sure we realize that the time of wounding is over. The burned path has moved on. It’s now at the end of Sagittarius. It left that area and now thousands of years later it’s time to realize the fire is gone. That time of wounding is done. New growth has sprung up. We have done a lot of work to heal the feminine and now it’s time to heal our relationship wounds. Within personal relationships and within the collective relationship archetype!
The full moon will help us with this healing. It’s at 16 degrees of Libra, bringing up the burned path wound. Chiron also reminds us of the wound but gives us an opportunity to realize all of the healing we have done. We have worked on ourselves and now we can let another in – fully and authentically. Jupiter in Aries is there to help us feel the hope that exists and asks us to tap into our own religious truth. What has been missing from our relationship paradigm? What do we believe? How does it need to change? How can we acknowledge the healing and welcome new belief systems?
The Sabian symbol is “a retired sea captain”. In retirement, the sea captain can reflect on the storms they have sailed through and all they have overcome. They can sit back in peace and calm and reflect on their victories. In the same way, we can reflect on the storms we have endured in relationships and all that we have learned. Every one of the loves in our lives has brought us something to help us heal and grow. We can thank them and know that the struggle is done. We can forgive not just our past loves, but also the broken relationship archetype.
Happy Full Moon in Libra.