The Cosmic Story: Venus in Capricorn
Venus Retrograde in Capricorn Begins a New Venus Star Point
The Queen of Heaven Births A New Earth
Gifting our Talents to the World
The Power of Venus
Alice Bailey, the esoteric astrologer, wrote that the planet and power of Venus will become dominant in the Aquarian Age.
While this newsletter discusses the astrology of the planet Venus, I want to also talk about the archetypal Venus, who is more fully embodied as the Greek Aphrodite. This Aphrodite/Venus generates the power of love, of human sexuality, of beauty and most especially for women, the power of our embodied feminine wisdom. It is this energetic Venus who can teach us how to integrate our individuality with group responsibility.
“In the Aquarian Age the power of ...Venus becomes dominant….Venus was the planet which we are told was responsible for the appearance of individualized consciousness in humanity...In the Aquarian Age, Venus will again have an analogous influence...of an expanded consciousness of group responsibility. (Alice Bailey: Esoteric Astrology)
I love the Night Sky. There’s always something new going on up there.
I’ve looked to the stars since I was a child, laying on my back, searching for the Big Dipper and ‘arcing’ to the bright star Arcturus from its tail. I also looked for Venus as the wishing star that sometimes appeared as the first star to glow in the evening sky. Star light, Star Bright. First star I see tonight. But it wasn’t until I began to study astrology that I paid attention to how She moved through the night sky.
The first time I really bonded with Venus in the night sky was early Christmas morning (one of the perks of getting up at night with a new baby!) in 1970, when I saw her shining light spread out over the Bay outside my in-laws home. I couldn’t believe it at first. I was looking at the Star of Bethlehem! The cone-shaped light radiating in the dark sky. Her light so bright, shining on the Bay like moonlight!
I didn’t know that Venus’ light is sometimes as strong as moonlight. And because I just couldn’t stop looking at this magical sight, I watched with even more awe as a deep red balsamic crescent Moon rose up just before sunrise and sent a red ray of light out over the waters to join Venus’ silvery ray. What a blessing and gift. And on Christmas morning! How cool is that!
Next time I really paid specific attention to Venus’ journey in the sky was in June of 2004, when she crossed the face of the Sun. It was the first time in over 100 years that her orbit took her there. I was up by dawn, down at the town beach, and watched her passage with a couple who lent me their binoculars. I got to see the tiny black dot that was Venus, crossing over the face of the Sun as it rose. I felt myself embodying that experience. I felt I was seeing an image of The Woman Clothed with the Sun, a birthing of the solar Feminine returning as women’s wisdom.
That 100 + year cycle is interesting because the crossing repeats itself, the second time after Venus’ 8 year cycle completes. As in 2004, Venus crossed over the face of the Sun again in June, 2012. She won’t do it again for another 100 years. This second time I was in the desert with my tribe and we watched it on the side of a building with a homemade viewer.
Venus began her latest 8 year cycle in June, 2020 as a (Gemini) Morning Star, then transformed into an (Aries) Evening Star in May 2021 and will once again become a (Capricorn) Morning Star in January 2022. This upcoming Venus retrograde starts on December 19, 2021 at 27* Capricorn and ends on January 29, 2022 at 12* Capricorn. Venus conjuncts the Sun on January 8, 2022, beginning the new Venus Capricorn star point at 19* Capricorn.
The Sabian symbol for Venus retrograde at 27* Capricorn is: Pilgrims climbing the steep steps leading to a mountain shrine. Venus wants us to aspire to a higher vision, one that includes the Future.
The Sabian symbol for Venus conjunct the Sun at 19* Capricorn is: A five year old child carrying a bag filled with groceries. This symbol asks us to assume social responsibilities that might seem too overwhelming for us. But they aren’t!
Venus Conjunct the Sun at 19* Capricorn
The Sabian symbol for Venus turning direct at 12* Capricorn is: An illustrated lecture on natural science reveals little known aspects of life. Here Venus activates our ability to explore unfamiliar realms and explore the laws of Nature.
This whole series of Sabian symbols suggest that it’s time for our soul’s initiation into a deeper connection between Love and Desire, and a more grown-up, responsible attitude to life. It’s time to stop acting like we’re all teenagers without any responsibility for the conditions of life in our world.
The most important aspects Venus makes on this re-birth journey is to Pluto, the Sun, and Mars in Capricorn and to Eris in Aries. As Venus moves through Capricorn, She squares Eris, strengthening our will to follow our hearts and to be fierce defenders of our heart’s needs.
When Venus conjuncts Pluto, She invites us to re-define and re-design systems and structures that shape and condition our collective lives, honoring Earth’s wisdom and Nature’s organic systems. Since Uranus is in Venus’ sign of Taurus now, it’s important that we learn from Mother Earth’s creative genius as we restructure our global society to make it more sustainable, creative and free.
When Venus joins forces with Pluto, our values evolve, our heart space deepens and we see clearly who we are. It is also a time to take back our own authority (Capricorn is all about authority!) and power as women. So this next year is a time for us to exercise our personal authority instead of giving into the collective authority of patriarchy.
Venus conjuncts Pluto in Capricorn on December 11th, and then for a second time when She’s retrograde on December 25th, and a third and final time when direct again on March 3, 2022, this time joined by Mars. Venus and then Mars conjunct Pluto at 28* Capricorn – the degree of the U.S. Pluto in the 4th of July birth chart. (So Americans will be feeling this grand conjunction big-time!) With Pluto connected to the Venus/Mars conjunction at 1* Aquarius on March 5-6, it feels like there’s a possibility for a deep psychic re-balancing of masculine and feminine energies within each of us and within the American psyche. Whatever happens, this is sure to be a deeply transformative Venus Cycle!
I love the Sabian symbol for the first two Venus/Pluto conjunctions at 26* Capricorn: A nature spirit dancing in the iridescent mist of a waterfall. Nature is alive with spirit and creativity. We all need to go dance!
With the solar transits of 2004 and 2012 , Venus announced her presence to the 21st Century. If Alice Bailey is correct, then I hope Her presence grows in the coming years, both in the heavens and here on Earth. It would mean that Venus/Aphrodite can help us heal the divisions in our world, since Aphrodite’s power is to bring together ‘disparate’ things into a new wholeness. When we consciously acknowledge Her light and embody her wisdom, we help birth the Aquarian Age.
The Venus Cycle
In the past decade, astrologers have turned their attention to and written books about the Venus’ cycle (I’ll post at end of newsletter). Simply put, we can say there are 4 stages to her journey, involving both the Morning Star and Evening Star phase. Venus’ orbit also creates a 5-pointed star – a pentagram – in the sky, which repeats itself every 8 years. Below is a drawing of the energy lines the Venus cycle creates over a period of time. A cosmic rose!
How the 4-fold Venus cycle works:
Because Venus is closer to the Sun than we are, She doesn’t get very far away from it, from Earth’s point of view. Our orbits cause Venus to shift from Morning to Evening Star. To do this, She disappears two times as she joins up with the Sun.
When Venus retrogrades every 19 months, she passes between Earth and the Sun, transitioning from being an Evening Star to her new appearance as a Morning Star.
Nine months later, when her Morning Star phase is over, she is furthest from Earth and disappears behind the Sun for 50 days to later rise as an Evening Star.
During these next few weeks, Evening Star Venus will disappear from the western night sky into the Sun’s light on January 3, 2022. After 11 days, Venus will reappear out of the Sun’s glare as the Morning Star on January 14th.
For another in-depth look at this cycle, I recommend Melanie Reinhart’s newsletter. https://melaniereinhart.com/melanie/VenusRXCapricorn2.htm
While Melanie references the Sumerian myth of Inanna, I am going to look at another myth to expand on this Venus cycle.
Venus Retrograde and the Capricorn Reset
As astrologers, we look to Venus to symbolize relationships, love, money, value and self-worth. When Venus retrogrades, we take time to re-evaluate those things we value and our own worth. Venus elevates the feminine values of love, peace, cooperation, beauty, compassion, the Arts and community.
But of course, Venus, as planet and as Goddess, is so much more than those words can convey. Venus/Aphrodite is an archetypal energy that creates its own world-view. Each archetype or planet “...comprises a totality, a whole world with its preferences, each filling it with desires to fill, shape and illumine the world of human existence with its own spirit.” (Walter Otto)
The ancients gave their gods and goddesses forms that human could relate to, perhaps because the real message was, and is, ‘The goddesses and gods are within you.’ In working with Venus, we have to allow her to ‘live within us’ and teach us to know how to engage in relationships, how to show our love to others and to ourselves, how to find our self-worth through our talents, and to discern what’s really of value to us and how valuable we are to the world.
Embodying an archetypal energy fills us with a more meaningful life, one that has a different vision and goal from our collective vision of life. When we speak about the planet Venus in astrology, we’re talking about just such an archetypal energy, one that elevates us to a new, clearer vision of ourselves and each other. Walking in the world of Venus’ wise love and connection enables us to see the divine in each other and within ourselves. What a great lesson we’ve been given to learn.
The myth I associate with Venus when She disappears from our skies is the Myth of Psyche and Eros. In this ancient myth, Psyche (Soul) marries Eros (divine desire), who was originally a primal god in early Greece (before patriarchy reduced him to a mischievous boy). But the marriage is unconscious until Psyche goes to Aphrodite and is initiated into higher consciousness by four tests of insight, trust, faith and courage that includes a journey to the Underworld to reclaim its beauty. When Psyche and Eros are reunited, they give birth to a daughter, Bliss.
At this moment in our history, perhaps we need to be initiated into the true meaning of Love. Can we unite our soul with our divine desire? Can we let Love open our eyes to each other so we can see in its light, without hate or rancor. Love is supposed to be a bridge between people, just as Venus and her associated metal, copper, are connectors. They connect disparate things, uniting them to work together.
Venus/Aphrodite brings together and reconciles what is ordinarily kept apart, not through fusion into one thing, but by valuing both sides. She bears the tension of opposites until a third, transcendent route appears. This is how She initiates a transformative consciousness in humanity.
Let's look at how this Love energy would manifest when Venus occupies Saturn-ruled Capricorn, a zodiac sign we usually associate with patriarchy (the rule of the fathers) and our society’s structures. Because of her retrograde, Venus is in the sign of Capricorn from November 5, 2021 until March 6, 2022 – 4 months. Venus usually moves through a sign in about 3 weeks! So Venus really wants us to bring this world-view of Love into society and into our governing institutions.
Older astrology texts suggest that Venus in Capricorn is loyal, serious and practical, a little shy but needing to love and care for their people. With this retrograde, it’s time to change the way we think about Venus there.
Another way to look at Venus/Aphrodite in Capricorn is to see how we can bring the Venus world-view of connection and love to our collective lives. Some astrologers are talking about Capricorn being ‘the council of Grandmothers’, a perspective of making responsible choices for the good of the whole.
Before the American Revolution, Benjamin Franklin and other founding fathers went to learn about the Iroquois Confederacy, a group of six Native American tribes who had banded together to live in peace and equality, created by their union’s power. These tribes were rules by a Council of Grandmothers – those women past child-bearing age (our Crones!) who became Clan Mothers. While there was a power balance between women and men, the wisdom of the Mothers was acknowledge and these councils would select the chief (and they could get rid of him if he wasn’t doing a good job!), and rule on whether or not to go to war.
Perhaps this powerful Venus retrograde and Capricorn Star Point will usher in a time when grandmothers will step forward and bring their gifts and wisdom to their communities once again. We have to ask ourselves, What values are important for the future? What can we do now to support the future? That’s what Grandparents do – they can help shape the future because of their experience and wisdom. I personally wish that we could gather all our most wise Elders and ask them to take over governing us until we achieve a ‘more perfect union.’
Working with Venus’ archetypal energy
How can we work with this Venus retrograde energy? First, slow down and pay attention to what this energy feels like. Who do you want to connect to? What do you want to be doing? How are you nurturing yourself? What talents do you have that you want to share with a larger community? Where is Capricorn in your birth chart? Where is your natal Venus? They can give you clues about what you need to sit with.
The energy of Venus/Aphrodite isn’t just about personal relationships between partners, family and friends though. Venus’ energy is involved with what makes civilization worthwhile. The engagement of citizens in government, in education, in the arts, in the sciences, in commerce, in the healing arts and in all forms of exchange. Venus is connected to any form of interaction that brings beings and ideas together.
In Capricorn, Venus connects us to our society, to our community and in fact, to anything we’re passionate about that we want to share with others. Venus/
Aphrodite is the goddess connected with the 9 Muses, those mythic figures that inspire human art, knowledge, science, music, dance, storytelling, poetry, healing and beauty. Venus in Capricorn asks us to look at our talents and our values and share them with society as a whole.
Venus was the goddess of the multi-talented courtesans down through the ages, those women who were strong enough to be the equal to, and often the seductresses of, powerful men. Women who embodied the creativity and sexuality of Venus, whose world-view and intelligence encompassed beauty, sexual freedom, art, creativity, embodied wisdom, and a broad understanding of the ways of the world. Courtesans set the tone for culture, art, beauty and fashion. *
Venus and women have been used by men for their own pleasures and as the dark shadow of their own desires. So often, Venus has had to hide behind a mask of compliance and obedience, but she always looks for her freedom to reclaim her own nature. She renews her virginity after she makes love, surrendering to her partner sexually but returning to herself and her own needs each time after.
Venus’ archetypal energy embodies our ability to create life and nurture it, as well as our role as the water of life (all the hero stories point to the fact that the men wanted to claim their feminine nature). As Joseph Campbell said, women don’t need to go on the hero’s journey because we already have what the male journey seeks – a connection to our souls, to our unique feminine purpose as queen of heaven and earth.
Venus connects us to our power spots, the landscapes that refresh our souls. She guides us to take care of ourselves – to love ourselves enough to go out into nature to regenerate our spirits when our 3D reality gets us down. Her sacred space was a Garden of delight, and is still anywhere in nature that brings us spontaneous joy and freedom.
When Venus goes retrograde, She is closest to Earth and so we can integrate her energies more easily. Venus’ journey through the heavens as 2022 begins can enrich us with love and a connection to Heaven, Earth and Pluto's Underworld. Will we make ourselves available to embody her Truth and her Wisdom?
We’ve been waiting to change the world but first we had to change ourselves. NOW is the time, though, when we have to go out into our communities with our art, our talents, our passion and purpose. We are here to create the future and so we have to take the long view of things. We might even have to sacrifice some of our comforts to create a better world. To do this, we have to live our new story. What will you do?
Bright Blessings at this Dark time of year.
Cathy
Check out Charles Eisenstein’s little allegory about how we are here to midwife the conscious evolution of Earth:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XinVOpdcbVc
Books:
* Wisdom’s Daughters: How Women Can Change the World Cathy Pagano (describes the return of the Divine Feminine as Wisdom, as well as diving into the stories of Aphrodite as the embodiment of Feminine Wisdom).
Adam Gainsburg, TheLight of Venus (describes a more complex Venus cycle than the 4 points I mentioned).
Arielle Guttman, Venus Star Rising (describes the Venus Star Points – those times when Venus transitions to either a Morning Star or an Evening Star)
Liz Greene, Relating: An astrological guide to living with others on a small planet. (My first deep dive into Jungian astrological wisdom. Highly recommended for a psychological explanation of aspects of astrology.)
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