Japan – A Brief Event Analysis

I find it difficult  to immediately write about large-scale disasters, particularly with the extent of injury both to life and land.

A week has passed now and just as seismologists are analyzing the situation so too many mundane astrologers. I will only post a few observations today, a more thorough analysis with charts, etc. will have to wait.

At first I thought it might be sufficient to look at charts for the region, but considering the extent of the damage and the major atomic crisis it seems more likely that this event will also be reflected in the mundane chart of Japan. This is indeed so. Nicholas Campion in his book, “The Book of World Horoscopes”, lists two possible events for the newly constituted sovereignty of Japan after WWII. The first event is the presentation of a new constitution by the Diet to the Emperor on May 3, 1947 12:00 LMT, Tokyo. The second event, and this is the one I have chosen here is for the official restoration of Japanese independence on April 28, 1952 at 13:30 GMT in Tokyo. Only three charts will be referred to here:

1. Japanese sovereignty
2. Solar Return for 2010-2011
3. Solar eclipse Jan. 2011

I would like to list only a few relevant event “activators”:

• In the sovereignity chart the MC/IC Axis is 20 Libra/20 Aries
• The IC is at the midpoint between Mercury and Jupiter
  (earthquake and inundation)
• This midpoint was activated by the Jan. eclipse.
  The chart for Tokyo has an MC/IC axis that is exactly the
  reverse of the sovereignity chart ( 20Aries/20Libra)
• The solar return of the sovereignity chart 2010/2011
  has 13 Capricorn on the ASC
• The Jan. eclipse was at 13 Capricorn

The acitivation of both the ASC/DESC and the MC/IC axis along with the middle point activation of Mercury/Jupiter by a solar eclipse alone point to a major event.

Earthquake Prediction: What are the limits?

I wrote this a month ago, but decided not to publish while the event was so recent. The questions asked below could equally be applied to the recent earthquake in Chile. This too I would prefer to look at closer at a later date.

The recent earthquake in Haiti has had me examining the charts and has raised many questions.

• Could the earthquake have been predicted? And under what circumstances?
• By whom and with which charts?
• If an astrologer had seen the potential danger could he have been able to help?
• Would he have been believed? And if so could he have prevented panic?

Before looking at the charts I would like to tackle these questions and try to answer them.

• Theoretically yes. But in practice it would be highly unlikely. The main problem is that no one person can digest all of the mundane charts for every location for all hours of the day. That would require omnipotence. A local astrologer might indeed look at all of the relevant mundane charts and see a potential and he might even be able to narrow down the more crucial time period but I don’t think it likely that he would be able to narrow down the time frame to the exact minute.
• A local astrologer is the best candidate or any astrologer who for whatever reason chooses a locality to study. Which charts are relevant? Well there are a whole slough of them. There are ingress charts, moon phase charts, solar and lunar eclipse charts. All calculated for the latitude and longitude of the locality. The question of a solar eclipse casting its shadow beforehand is one I would like to discuss further.
• That is the crux of the problem. Probably seismologists are faced with the same question. The best help is to emphasize the prevention of unwanted damage. In an earthquake region this means that buildings should be planned for just the eventuality of an earthquake, but in very poor regions of the world to what extent can this be done? So added to the ethical questions is a political one. What role does foreign aid have? Should it build up an economy or an infrastructure?
• Again this question is also likely faced by the seismologist. Can exact times really be predicted or must one be content with recording events and then trying to understand them in the hope of eventually, in an unseen future, to have an exact predictive method. And when one has an exact method, and is believed, how does one prevent panic? That is entirely dependant on how critical information is received and treated and by whom- in this case a governmental institution is likely. Who is party to the prediction and who is able to act on it? In this case again a political decision as a whole region is affected.

Here is the chart for Port-au-Prince at the time of the earthquake:

Earthquake:Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 12.01.2010, 9:53:10pm EST

Most notable is Uranus on the descendant and Moon close to the IC. The Moon, Pluto and Mercury are also in the 4th house. The antiscion of Mercury Lord 1 is conjunct the IC. If we look at the midpoints we find Jupiter/Neptune at the midpoint of Moon/Uranus. Mars also on the midpoint of Mercury/Uranus. The Moon is in opposition to the IC of the Solar Eclipse of July 2009.

If we look at some of the mundane charts, Capricorn Ingress, previous solar and lunar eclipse, can we see earthquake potential? Could a local astrologer who follows the charts have seen the possibility? Let us look at a few factors:

Solar Eclipse July 22, 2009 ASC/DESC ( 25 Pisces/Virgo). Uranus conjunct Asc 26 Pisces; MC/IC (26 Sagittarius/Gemini)

Capricorn Ingress 21 Dec, 2009 ASC/DESC (18 Aries/Libra). MC/IC (13 Capricorn/Cancer) Mercury wide conjunction to MC (19 Capricorn)

Lunar Eclipse 31 Dec ,2009 ASC/DESC (25 Taurus/Scorpio). MC/IC (13 Aquarius/Leo) Mars near IC (18 Leo).

If we take into account the planetary positions during the inception of Haiti as an independent state (Jan. 1, 1804 Gonaives Haiti) then there might be call for more acute attention, particularly considering the recent Saturn return at 3*27 Libra. There is also a Pluto/Mars conjunction at 3* Leo if you want to bring Pluto into the picture. The predominance of Uranus, Mercury and Mars in the above three mundane charts should have a local astrologer looking for more detail. That means looking at more than one solar eclipse and looking at the moon phase charts for the period as well as ingresses of Mars and Mercury. I however don’t think that anyone could have predicted the destruction of this earthquake on the three charts alone. The earthquake chart of course provides the detailed information.

Krakatoa 1883: A World Event Examined (2)

We can trace the Krakatoa event in all the succeeding mundane charts. The lunar eclipse of 25 Nov. 1882 was in square to the Grand Conjunction chart MC/IC Axis, but at the Aries Ingress more critical indications are given:

Aries Ingress, 20th March 1883, 10:49 PM GMT, 105e25, 6s06

You will note that the MC/IC axis of the Small Conjunction is reversed. This reversal of the MC/IC axis is also found again in the Full Moon immediately preceding the event. The Mars/Mercury conjunction of this chart is also in conjunction to the IC of the Grand Conjunction chart. Both charts are activated. In the Ingress chart Jupiter is also applying to conjunction with the IC. The Lord of the 4th house, Mercury is in conjunction with Mars in the 12th house.

The solar eclipse of May 6, 1883 (chart not shown) has Mercury at 5 Gemini, the Small Conjunction position of Mars/Saturn and in square to the Grand Conjunction IC. In this chart we once again have the MC/IC at the midpoint between Mercury and Uranus. The Cancer Ingress (chart not shown) repeats the MC/IC axis of the eclipse, but here Saturn and Venus conjunct the Small Conjunction postion of Mars/Saturn (again). Saturn has returned to this position after a long sojourn in Taurus where he was retrograde. He reinforces the motif of the Small Conjunction, the big bang that we spoke of.

Full Moon, 18th August, 1883 12:53 pm GMT,105e25, 6s06

Here there is the reversal of the MC/IC axis as noted but what is really critical is that Mars is now just inside of the IC. If you also note that the antiscion of Mars at the Full Moon is at 3 Cancer 36, then you can understand the triggering effect of the Moon at the time of the event, where the Moon has separated from conjunction with Mars at 2 Cancer and applies immediately to conjunction with the Mars antiscion of the Full Moon.

Event, 27 Aug. 1883, 10:02 pm LMT, 105e25. 6s06

Of significance is that in this chart the MC/IC axis is the midpoint of two sets of planets. First between Saturn and Mercury. Mercury is conjunct the Ascendant of the Small Conjunction and is therefore exactly square the Small Conjunction MC/IC axis. Again a focus. Then there is the Mars/Moon conjunction, that we discussed above, in juxtaposition to the Sun, Lord 4 of the event chart.

I think this series of charts demonstrates quite well how an event may be pre-figured in a series of charts. If it is a major event the angles themselves have much to tell. In comments to the first article of this series other aspect configurations have been noted. Please feel free, dear reader, to make any further observations on other planetary configurations. Interesting is that the outer planets are not necessarily needed to understand the event. I have included them in the charts and so relevant observations with respect to the outer planets are also welcome.

Krakatoa 1883: A World Event Examined (1)

While the greater part of the astrological community is in eager expectation of havoc in the communication and transport sectors 🙂 we will apply ourselves to looking back into the past. Appropriate for Mercury Rx, don’t you think? Th.

The instruments we use to define critical periods by mundane astrology can be refined by looking at past events. We can expect that an event of such major import as the volcanic explosion of Krakatoa in 1883 to be reflected in the charts. I am a bit wary of speaking of Signatures, as these can easily be misinterpreted as a fixed set of very particular configurations. The temptation is to make lists of aspects and then compile them, looking for the most common denominator. This however ignores the individual quality of the event, which is probably more important. There are of course general rules that must be followed, but these only provide the framework on which to build a judgement. But first let us look at the event before we describe the framework we will use to examine it.

The eruption of the Krakatoa volcano on the 26th and 27th of August 1883 is among the most catastrophic eruptions in history. It’s detonation was one of the loudest sounds in recorded history, heard thousands of kilometres away. The explosion itself was equivalent to 200 megatons of TNT, almost 13000 times stronger than the atomic bomb that devastated Hiroshima. The volcanic eruption was of course accompanied by earthquake and tsunami of immense proportion. Edvard Munch’s painting “The Scream” was inspired by this event. He says:

…suddenly the sky turned blood red … I stood there shaking with fear and felt an endless scream passing through nature. (see this Wikipedia article for more details)

If you have any familiarity with mundane astrology you will know that the story of the event (or in this case, series of events leading up to a dramatic climax) is not confined to the event chart(s) alone. In fact it is easier to understand the event when you look at the cascade of a whole series of charts that lead up to the event, and trace the chain of testimonies from one chart to the next. Mundane astrology is a very time consuming affair as there are so very many charts (we will be looking at the Grand Conjunction, Small Conjunction, pre-event lunar and solar eclipses, Aries and Cancer Ingress, previous lunation and the major event chart) and so very many factors that have to be considered. Where does one start? This is the IC. In this series of articles I will be focussing exclusively on the IC. You will see that it is enough to begin with. I encourage you, dear reader, to print out the charts and examine them yourself. You are very welcome to share any insights as a comment to this series of articles. You can find all the charts I used here in the Charts section of Altair Astrology for later easy reference.

Grand Conjunction, 18 Apr. 1881 1:35:59 pm GMT 105e25, 6s06

This is our beginning chart. What we can note is that Mars is within 7 degrees of the IC and he is in opposition to Uranus. As the opposition was world-wide, the important thing is the presence of Mars in the 4th house. The opposition is strengthened further by both planets also being contra-parallel to one another (Mars 8s27, Uranus 8n34).

Small Conjunction, 20 July, 1883 9:56:00 LMT 105e25, 6s06

Here the first thing we need to search for is the tie-in with the Grand Conjunction. It isn’t surprising that the Small Conjunction (Mars/Saturn) is in square to the IC of the Grand Conjunction chart. We also have Grand Conjunction Mercury conjunct the Ascendant. What I would also like to point your attention to is that the MC/IC axis is more or less exactly the midpoint between the Mars/Saturn conjunction on one side and the Mercury/Jupiter conjunction on the other side. We have the explosive violence of Mars/Saturn combined with the megadecibel [big (Jupiter) bang (Mercury)] noise and the enormous debris carried swiftly in the atmosphere around the earth (Mercury/Jupiter) focused on this axis. The stage is set.

The 2009 Mars/Saturn Opposition and Koror

We have recently been looking at earthquake charts with respect to the Mars/Saturn conjunction, known traditionally as the Small Conjunction. The Great Conjunction is that between Jupiter and Saturn. I would like to continue the series on predicting critical periods and critical areas. Next year, on the 5th of April 2009, the opposition between Mars and Saturn takes place. This is an important astrological event particularly when we view seismic and meteorological phenomenon.

The question is to find where the foci of this particular configuration are. I will choose one region as there are a concentration of testimonies beginning with the January solar eclipse, continuing with the Aries Ingress of the Sun, the nearest lunation, the New Moon on March 26th, leading finally to the opposition itself on April 5th.

One region that in my estimation has a high probability of being a focus of tremendous natural forces is the island of Koror, east of the Philippines. Koror and the major city of the same name belong to the little heard of and mostly ignored Republic of Palau.

Dear reader, we will be analysing the above charts, with respect to the potential they show. Generally describing a thunderstorm and being in the midst of it are almost incomparable. The charts we look at, and our attempts to understand them can only be dry approximations of upcoming events, and we must always beware of habitually seeing only the worst scenario in them. We are allowed to worry though. And we are allowed to look at what happened and be relieved when the worst did not occur! Unfortunately if we hear anything of such remote regions, it is usually bad news, and without much differentiated description. Ideally someone who lives in this region should observe and record what really happens, to put flesh on the bones of the charts and to also give the right degree of perspective. Now to the charts:

Solar Eclipse, Jan. 26, 2009 Koror, Pacific 134e29 / 7n20, 7:54 GMT

The solar eclipse on January 26th is at 6 Aquarius 29. The IC for Koror during the eclipse is at 20 Libra 24. Mars at 22 Capricorn is close to the Descendant and is in square to the IC. He will form a conjunction with retrograde Mercury a few days later. Saturn forms a separating trine to Mars which ‘gentles’ things a little.

Aries Ingress, March 20, 2009 Koror, Pacific 134e29 / 7n20, 11:43 GMT

The IC at 6 Aquarius 01 of the Aries Ingress chart for Koror, picks up the solar eclipse position of Sun and Moon (also 6 Aquarius). The North Node is tucked inside the IC cusp (8 Aquarius), by April 5th, it will have moved to 6 Aquarius, in a sense reactivating the potential of the eclipse.

New Moon, March 26, 2009 Koror, Pacific 134e29 / 7n20, 16:05 GMT

The New Moon of March 26th seems to contain no threat. In fact the New Moon is in exact sextile to the solar eclipse position. No ‘heavy’ aspects seem to oppress the IC.

Let us go on to the Mars/Saturn opposition chart. Here the potentials of the last three charts seem to gather. First the chart itself. The IC is at 9 Virgo 22, with Saturn in the 4th house about 7 degrees away. The antiscion of Mercury exactly conjuncts the IC. Mercury itself is at 20 Aries 37, the domicile of Mars and is also parallel to both Saturn and Venus. The Mars/Saturn opposition, along with the Mercury antiscion conjunction on the IC, is enough to show turbulent weather with strong and destructive winds. The earth/water combination of the opposition could also increase the possibility of earthquake/tsunami activity. Now what really worries me are how the chart picks up on the previous New Moon, with the New Moon Mars conjunct the MC at 9 Pisces, in opposition to the Mercury antiscion on the IC. The New Moon IC conjuncts Mercury of the Opposition chart (20 Aries) as does the antiscion of New Moon Mars. And not only that. The MC of the solar eclipse is also here. And there is the IC (Aries Ingress) – Sun/Moon (solar eclipse) conjunction to the North Node. There is a lot of activity between Mercury, Mars, Saturn along with several IC interactions of eclipse, ingress and lunation. This means that we must keep an eye out for Koror and hope that some of the positive testimonies mentioned above will help to keep the elements more temperate.