Jeff Green's Evolutionary Astrology

Contents:

Acknowledgements
Preface by Noel Tyl
Foreword by Ari Moshe Wolfe
Prologue, by Deva Green
Introduction, by Jeff Green

Chapter 1: Pluto, the evolutionary journey of the soul: Sign, house & polarity point; nodal axis; in aspect to nodal axis; conjunct north node; square the nodes; in aspect to the nodes; in aspect to other planets; four natural evolutionary conditions; the evolutionary impulse; four ways Pluto affects evolution; Pluto retrograde; afterthoughts.

Chapter 2: Pluto through the houses (or signs). Example charts: Adrienne Hirt, Adolf Hitler

Chapter 3: Pluto in aspect to other planets: Waxing & waning aspects; Pluto in aspect to Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus & Neptune.

Chapter 4: Pluto: Transits, progressions & solar returns: Transits & orbs, progressions; solar returns; transit of the nodal axis; Pluto in transit through each of the twelve houses

Conclusion

Comment:

I well remember the huge impression this book made when it was first published in the mid-1980's. We were all hungry for someone who KNEW. Green sums up his premise in the opening words of his Introduction:

This book is for the practicing professional astrologer whose client asks, "Why am I here, and what are my lessons?" It is for the student of astrology & all of us who ask this question & try to answer it within the framework of astrology. (pg. xxiii)

The opening of the first chapter:

Pluto correlates to the Soul & evolution. (pg. 1)

On page 3:

Pluto's house & sign placement describe two simultaneous phenomena. On the one hand, the natal position of Pluto describes the generational vibration that a person comes in with, as well as the specific individualized patterns in identity association implied from the evolutionary past: the desires, beliefs, thoughts, perceptions, values & orientation to reality itself. On the other hand, the natal position of Pluto points to the evolutionary desire, intent or cause of this life as seen in Pluto's opposite house & sign.

Having associated Pluto with evolution, which is to say, reincarnation, Green then makes the obvious link to the nodes. The south node is said to determine past lives, while the north node points to the future. This is done by relating the house containing the south node to the house containing Pluto. He gives the example of a 9th house Pluto & a 7th house south node as indicating evolutionary progress through one-on-one relationships involving 9th house activities (travel, religion, higher education, mysticism, etc.). You then use the opposite points - in this case, the north node in the first, and Pluto's opposite house, the third - in order to resolve what you have brought over from the past. Reading Green closely, I see he is handling houses & signs in a similar way that I do, except that he has overlaid his Evolutionary Pluto thesis on top of it.

When Pluto is actually in aspect to the nodes, you get one or another special situations, which Green details.

Pluto's aspects to the other planets get rather complex:

Any planet in aspect to Pluto indicates that those planets have been, and continue to be, subject to an intensified & accelerated evolutionary metamorphosis. The type of aspect determines the intensity of the evolutionary necessity to metamorphose that planetary (behavioral) function. The stressful aspects produce tremendous evolutionary intensity leading to cyclic cataclysms & restful states. The nonstressful aspects produce a noncataclysmic evolutionary process of a relatively smooth yet continuous nature. . .

The number of aspects Pluto forms to other planets determines the degree of evolutionary pace or change in any life. . . This principle is clearly a relative phenomenon. Observe the lives of people who have many aspects to Pluto in their birth charts. Contrast this observation to those who do not. The lives of those who have more aspects will be characterized by more cyclic cataclysms than those who have fewer. (pgs. 23-4)

Each individual is in one of four possible evolutionary conditions: 1. Stupid (2 or 3 percent). 2. Part of the herd (75%). 3. Individual (20%). 4. Spiritual (2 - 3 percent). As "spiritual" is of interest, I will quote Green's exact words:

Two or three percent of human beings attempt to understand their own life & others' lives in a universal holistic context. In fact, these people desire to understand the nature of all Creation in this context and commonly link themselves to spiritual ideas or teachings as the guiding principles in life. They are attempting to discover, and therefore align themselves with, timeless values, beliefs & truths that apply at all times. In its highest condition, this state produces what are called avatars or spiritual masters & teachers: Jesus, Buddha, Lao-Tzu, Mohammed, Moses, and so forth. (pg. 26)

Note carefully: Green has not said that spiritual people all join ashrams, but he has not said that they do not. I ran around with "spiritual" people when I was younger & found them to be narrow-minded, cliquish and self-congratulatory.

Pluto retrograde, which it is roughly 5 1/2 months of the year, represents people who do not accept the status quo. Curiously, Green, who was drafted & sent to Vietnam as a young man, does not pick up the obvious: That 20th century Aquarians, all of whom, up to 1979, had a retrograde Pluto, were therefore natural-born revolutionaries, while all 20th century Leos, up to 1979, were inherently establishmentarian types.

Overall, this is a very heavy-handed presentation. Those of you looking for a detailed, well-thought-out, strongly argued thesis, will like this book.

Update, May 2012: This book is now published by Wessex Astrologer. It is identical to the earlier Llewellyn edition, except that Alan Oken's Foreword has been dropped and replaced with one by Ari Moshe Wolfe.

Wessex Astrologer, 373 pages.

Contents:

Dedication
Acknowledgements
Foreword by Jeffrey Wolf Green
Foreword by Mark Jones
Introduction: What is evolutionary astrology?

1. Pluto and Pluto's polarity point
2. Pluto & the nodal axis: the main evolutionary / karmic dynamic in the birth chart
3. The four natural evolutionary conditions of the soul
4. Analyzing the same chart in different evolutionary conditions
5. Pluto aspects from an evolutionary point of view
6. Applying the principles of Pluto aspects
7. Natural archetypes of the zodiac
8. Chart interpretation: the planetary method & the house system of chart analysis

Bibliography

Comment:

Deva Green is Jeffrey's daughter. I put off stocking this book because I thought it would be a rehash of her father's (above). Which it is, but it's better written hash than I expected.

In Deva's book, Pluto is the soul, Pluto is the soul, Pluto is the soul. This is repeated & repeated in the first pages of the book:

Because the Soul correlates with Pluto in the natal birth chart, it is critical to deeply & thoroughly understand the meaning of Pluto when practicing this type of astrology. Pluto, or the Soul, then becomes the starting point and bottom line upon which all other factors in the birth chart are interpretted and given meaning. (pg. 1)

Because Pluto correlates with the Soul . . . (pg. 6)

The Soul, or Pluto, astrologically speaking, correlates to the genetic code, RNA, DNA, chromosomes, and enzymes. (pg. 12)

In the natal birth chart, Pluto correlates to Soul. Pluto, then, will correlate with the pre-existing patterns of indentity association, desires, and bottom-line orientation of an individual coming into the life. (pg. 14)

As we evolve by embracing the evolutionary necessities of the life reflected in Pluto's polarity point [the degree opposite natal Pluto], the natal position of Pluto will automatically regenerate into higher levels of expression. The old patterns, desires, and identity associations symbolized by the natal position of Pluto will die, or be purged, within the person - only for new patterns to be born into consciousness. Generally speaking, this describes the metamorphic process of evolution as the Soul exhausts its separating desires . . . (pgs. 15-16)

To be fair about it, Jeffrey started chapter 1 of his book with those exact words: Pluto correlates to the Soul and evolution. (Pluto Vol. 1, page 1). A father - daughter thing.

Well, okay, but does it work? Was Christ's ultimate sacrifice long ago not quite enough, did we had to wait for Mr. Clyde Tombaugh to discover Pluto (1930) and then for Mr. Green to delineate it (1985) - ?

I regret that I'm not quite buying it. Pluto-as-Soul is too close to too many other simple reductions: Saturn-is-your father, the-Moon-is-your-mother, the-south-node-is-your-fate, etc. Astrology is a lot more dynamic than that.

And here I have an advantage. I know, or I think I know, my most immediate past life. It seems I was a minor hisorical figure and as such, there are a few hard historical facts known about that life that guide me. I would love to be more up front about it, I would love to take all of you into my confidence, I would love to share, but, frankly, I will never quite believe it myself. There are days I wish it would all go away. If it's true, then I've learned things about myself that actually repell & disgust me, but which are still clearly part of me. And then there's the utterly repulsive statement that I believe that I was THAT MAN, now don't you think that's the most absurd statement you've ever heard!!? That Mr. Roell, he's clearly bonkers, believing things like that.

But when I line up that birth chart to my birth chart, when I line up his death chart to my birth chart (time of death was noted precisely, to my complete amazement), what I find is this:

Everything in the current chart relates to everything in the past chart. Broadly speaking, no one planet, no combination of planets, is favored. In the next life, planets react, as a whole, to the overall outcome of the previous life. Which is pretty much what you would expect. Throw a deck of cards into the air & they will come down in a different way every time. The position of the Queen of Spades (for example) is not any more special, is not any more indicative, than any of the other 51 cards.

If there's an exception to the rule, it's the Luminaries. In the last life, I had the Moon in Gemini in the 10th. The expected result: I was a big shot (but not because of the Moon alone), and, predictably, fell out of favor, the usual result of a 10th house Moon. I took it badly, which was my fault. In this life, the Moon came to be in Leo in 3. Think about that, think about the Moon's transition from a life of Gemini in 10, to a life of Leo in 3. Tenth house prominence became Leo, which, for the Moon, is the urge to swagger on-stage, which I have. Being in the public eye became a habit (the Moon rules habits), such that whenever I go out & run errands (3rd house), I still think everyone is looking at me. (They're not.) The world, having seen my previous 10th house persona, still expects I'm going to be witty & clever & changeable & maybe an outright liar (how the heck would I know?), in other words, they still expect me to be a Gemini, since that's what I had previously presented to them. Guess what? That's my current rising sign. Hung 'round my neck like a noose. This is how things can change, life to life, how they dance.

That life ended badly, more badly than you want to know. As a result, I have a great deal of anger, and a compelling drive to know WHY. How did those manifest in my current chart? The anger externalized as oppositions. The drive TO KNOW became a strong 9th house.

Which is subtly different from what the Greens are telling us. According to the Greens, the Soul (aka Pluto) puts us in various situations so we can evolve. By contrast, the Sun & Moon in my chart seems to have been arranged in order to provide me with the tools I was in need of. Which is to say, I am not my chart (you are not your chart). The chart is what you USE. You are something else. What that might be, I don't have any idea. Not even for me.

Okay, so what, then, is Pluto? In my chart, it's an intensifier. Which is all I think Pluto really is. A concentrated bit of anger that is best left alone. In my chart, it's conjunct the Moon, opposite the Sun. In the Green cosmology, the point opposite Pluto is the Polarity Point, the place where Pluto is trying to lead you. In my chart, that exact degree is the Sun. So I should head for my Sun, except that it's in Aquarius, where it's really trying to be anybody, anywhere else. Preferably in Leo, cuddling up with the Moon. Debilitated planets have polarity points, as I have noted in many charts. So my Sun really wants to be where my Pluto is, except that I don't want to be anywhere near Pluto. Sound like fun?

Earlier today I was stuck waiting for a lengthly CHKDSK to run on my hard drive. So I went page by page through Miss Green's book. It's okay. Solidly written. Do all the stuff she says & you might find out something, like looking through a dark glass. But she has some howlers:

Half the people on earth have this placement in their natal birth chart because Pluto is retrograde six out of twelve months in each year. (pg. 34)

No, Deva. Pluto is not retrograde six months of the year. Only a planet infinitely far from the Sun can be retrograde six months of the year. Pluto is retrograde about 5 months and one week.

The first case study we are going to analyze is former president Richard Nixon. The very underhanded methods he used to achieve power through acquiring the presidential office are well-known. Nixon continued to abuse the power and authority of the presidential office, and all his lies, manipulations, and deceptions were revealed before a horrified public during the Watergate investigation. Nixon resigned immediately after the Watergate scandal. (pg. 202)

No, Deva. Richard Nixon did not sweat it out until it was all over & only then leave. He was driven from power at the very height of the scandal itself. (His choice was leave voluntarily, or get impeached & forcibly removed. He fought to the very end.) Nor did his resignation end the Watergate investigations, though it did slow them down a lot. Curiously, her father had strong feelings about Nixon (Pluto, vol. 1) & it might be that Deva's opinions of Mr. Nixon, like her book, are borrowed from her father. Deva's Nixon case study runs nearly ten pages of text, but nowhere does she cite anything specific about Nixon or his life. We simply get a recitation of "this made Nixon this way" and "this made him that way". Which sounds rather second-hand. Deva Green omits, if I am not mistaken, the critical key to Nixon's chart as a whole: His Sun-Neptune opposition. Why is this? Perhaps because, elsewhere in the book, Deva has defined Neptune as consciousness (pg. 7: Astrologically, consciousness correlates to Neptune.), and, on page 89, with the "Spiritual State" (Astrologically speaking, this evolutionary state correlates with Neptune . . . ) She, like her father, believes that 2-3 percent of all souls are in such a state. Between these two correlations, a revised interpretation of Neptune would seem to be necessary.

Evolutionary astrology, as it's developing, seems to me to be shading into a religion.

The Forword, by her father, is undated. In it, we learn he is hard at work on Pluto, volume 3. (Personally, I suspect that Mr. Green is no more, and if I say that often enough, loudly enough, perhaps he will pop in to prove me wrong.) In the bibliography of Deva's book, there are but two books listed: Pluto, vol. 1, and Autobiography of a Yogi, by Yogananda. Why study bibliographies? They tell us where the author's head is, what they've been reading, what they know, what they think is important. And, by its omissions, a bibliography tells us other things.

Llewellyn, 319 pages.

Contents:

Get what you need, by Klaus Bonert
Endorsements, by Mary J. Connoly & Sandy Hughes
Dedication by Deva Green (Jeffrey's daughter & heir)

Foreword, by Christian Borup
Preface, by Noel Tyl
Introduction

1. The nature of relationships
2. Evolutionary astrology
3. So we meet again, eh?
4. Social, cultural, parental & religious imprinting
5. Relationship types
6. Essential relationship needs
7. The nature & function of Venus
8. The phasal relationship of Mars & Pluto
9. The nature & function of Mars
10. The phasal relationship of Mars & Venus
11. The composite chart & Pluto
12. Pluto in Sagittarius

Conclusion

Comment:

This book was originally published by Llewellyn in 1996-ish & was in print for a year or two & then, as is its wont, Llewellyn discontinued it. There was a clamor for a reprint, but it took some years before Llewellyn brought out a second printing sometime around 2002. That was in print for a couple of years before Llewellyn again discontinued in 2004. It has now been brought back to life by The Wessex Astrologer, in the UK.

The premise of this book is that relationships are how we advance karmically, such relationships are intense (ie, unhappy), Pluto is intense, and so, therefore, Pluto should be examined in relationship to Venus & Mars. In other words, the most intense relationships (Venus & Mars) happen when Pluto sticks his oar in. When you think about it, it makes sense.

But Mr. Green is, I regret to say, somewhat theoretical. Here is part of his take on Venus in Libra, one of the two signs which Venus rules:

A typical cause of these people's inability to ask for what they need is traceable to their childhood. Libra is archetypally square to Cancer & Capricorn. Generally, this promotes a situation where the Venus in Libra person grew up in a family in which their needs were not honored or embraced by one or both parents. Instead, one or both parents was always telling the child what they needed, and what was expected of them based on on their own needs. When the child attempted to assert its own needs, the parents would not listen, and then reinforced their expectations. This effectively undermined the the actual identity & authority of the child. Consequently the child was made to feel insecure relative to its actual needs & desires, with a resulting fear of being negatively judged by others. (pg. 158, the book opened at random)

Examining this passage, we can see where Jeffrey's ideas come from. Libra is the sign of The Other, it is in square to Capricorn (daddy) and Cancer (mommy), and as all three are cardinal signs, the energy going back & forth is nonstop and intense. As Libra is opposite self-assertive Aries, it doesn't stand much chance of making itself heard. It is, essentially, a basket case.

And if Jeffrey was delineating Mars or the Sun in Libra, which are strong, agressive & self assertive - but not when placed in Libra, he'd be right. But Venus in Libra, which is the planet & sign under discussion, does not work that way. For contrast, here is Carter's single line take on Venus in Libra:

Much charm of manner & disposition; a sweet & gentle nature. (The Principles of Astrology, pg. 110)

But Carter is "old". Here is Anne Massey, in her 2006 book, Venus, Her Cycles, Symbols & Myths, Venus in Libra:

I'm charming, nice and at ease. I'm confident in who I am, and have an innate knack for getting cooperation. Yes, I can be very persuasive. I don't like to offend others; first, it is in bad taste, and second, you do catch more bees with honey than with vinegar... I abhor arguments & fights, but I'm extremely skilled at debate & excel at starting pro & con arguments. I love banter & like to play the mediator & to watch how it plays out, with nothing invested in the outcome. (pgs 114-5)

Green does have a lot of good things to say. I'm just trying to slow down his Sainthood a little. In Green, as with many other astrological authors, we have someone who was never actually trained in astrology. Unlike most such authors, the unique force & freshness of his ideas (like the paintings of the Douanier) have earned him a seat at the table.

I am informed that Mr. Green disappeared at some point in 2007 or 2008. No one seems to know what became of him, or at any rate, no one will admit. As he himself owned his copyrights, his other books went out of print when existing copies were exhausted (Measuring the Night, vols. 1 & 2, with Steven Forrest - a blow for Mr. Forrest). Green never struck me as the adventurous type, so I think it unlikely he went off to Mexico to fight in the revolution (the alleged fate of Ambrose Bierce). In the Dedication by his daughter, she writes, His retirement has created much sorrow for the astrological community, which makes it sound as if he has taken a vow of silence & joined an obscure Tibetan monastery. And if he had the same fate as one Cat Stevens, I presume it would not be a secret. I suspect he was haunted by his Vietnam experience, and I would not be surprised if that ugly war claimed yet another innocent victim.

Wessex Astrologer, 401 pages.

Contents:

Foreword, by Kristin Fontana
Introduction, by Deva Green

1. A review of key principles in Evolutionary Astrology
2. The leading edge of the soul's evolution: The Mars and Pluto interface
3. The role of Mercury in Evolutionary Astrology
4. The planetary nodes and Evolutionary Astrology
5. Understanding the sexual archetypes and Evolutionary Astrology
6. Saturn, Capricorn and the 10th house: Chaos and dark Eros
7. Evolutionary transits
8. Medical astrology: Anatomy, physiology & the chakra system
9. The 6th house and issues in self-improvement that allow the soul to grow
10. The planetary method of evolutionary chart analysis
11. Trauma and the outer planets
12. The evolutionary meaning of retrograde planets

Comment:

These essays, some of which are lecture transcripts, were all written by Jeff Green at one time or annother over his career. They amount to an excellent overview of his Evolutionary Astrology program. I wish they had been dated, as this would hint at Green's evolution in his own thinking.

I did finally hear what happened to Mr. Green. He is now an invalid. In December, 2011, he will be 65 years old. I hope his remaining days are many and useful.

Wessex Astrologer, 289 pages.

Contents:

Foreword, by Jeff Green
Foreword, by Roger Woolger

Introduction

1. Mars / Aries & the first house
2. Venus / Taurus & the second house
3. Mercury / Gemini & the third house
4. Moon / Cancer & the fourth house
5. Sun / Leo & the fifth house
6. Mercury / Virgo & the sixth house
7. Venus / Libra & the seventh house
8. Pluto / Scorpio & the eighth house
9. Jupiter / Sagittarius & the ninth house
10. Saturn / Capricorn & the tenth house
11. Uanus / Aquarius & the eleventh house
12. Neptune / Pisces & the twelfth house
13. The left brain approach to reading past lives in the chart
14. The right brain approach to reading past lives in the chart

Appendix
Bibliography

Comment:

This particular form of astrology was invented by Jeffrey Wolf Green. As his daughter says he has been "retired" for around two years (I write in January 2010), it was mysterious to see a Foreword by him in this book, published in December, 2009.

In the Introduction, Walsh describes Evolutionary Astrology in these terms:

Pluto, by sign & house.

The nodes of the Moon.

The polarity point of Pluto with the north node. The polarity point (PP) of Pluto is that point 180 degrees opposite. This shows where we can evolve. If Pluto is conjunct the south node, then its polarity point is equal to the north node. If Pluto's polarity point is occupied by a planet, then, the past life experience with both the PP & the planet may not have been healthy or positive. (pg. xxx). Which is to say that oppositions to Pluto can be rough.

Exceptions to the rules are when planets square the nodes. As the nodes are the Karmic Axis, planets that square them amount to a third force that has to be taken into consideration. This is because the planets in square were not properly dealt with in previous lives. Such planets are called the Skipped Steps. Placing them in square to the nodal axis is God's way of bringing them to our attention.

Planets conjunct the nodes. Planets conjuncting the south node brings the past back to life & oppose efforts to move into the future via the north node. On the other hand, a planet conjunct the south node indicates gifts from past lives that can be redeveloped. When Pluto conjuncts the north node, its polarity point does not exist, but the south node still represents past lives.

This comes in conjunction with Regression Therapy, which are a variety of ways (not all of them hypnotic) of inducing what are believed to be memories from earlier in this life, or from distinctly past lives.

Walsh deals with death & the afterlife & some of the problems discarnates experience while there. Walsh gets her details, not from first hand experience with the dead, but rather from regressions of the reincarnated living. She frames this with Tibetan Bardo theory & the result, as you might expect, is a bit abstract.

What follows are chapters on each of the twelve signs of the zodiac, each chapter around 20 pages. Each chapter starts with a general introduction to the sign. We then have a series of case studies predicated upon:

Pluto in that sign, or its equivalent house. (The old sign = house canard.)
South node is in that sign, or its house.
Ruler of the south node is in that sign, or its house.
The natural ruler of the sign is in aspect to Pluto, or aspects the nodes, or aspects the rulers of the nodes.

This gives us something to work with, but instead of delineations, we get case studies with charts with one or other of these factors.

I have the south node in Virgo. Case study (pg. 111) has south node Virgo in the 4th (that's me) square to the Moon, which isn't me. This individual, a female, felt inadequate as a mother. Which is a stretch for a guy. This case study continues with Christian guilt & original sin & how those with south node in Virgo have presumably been persecuted by the Church at some point in the last 2000 years (presuming, Walsh says, that they've had past lives during this period).

Walsh's second example of south node in Virgo (pg. 115) has it in the 9th, square to the Sun. This female felt she was never good enough. She had a past life as a male Cathar (southern France, 13th century) who was tortured & killed for heresy. This brings up a discussion of assimilation & brings us to the Pluto in Virgo generation. (The individual herself has Pluto in Leo.)

Walsh's third Virgo chart (pg. 123) she describes as "Pluto/Chiron-Saturn-Mercury opposition". By this shorthand Walsh means that Pluto is opposite the conjunction of Chiron, Saturn & Mercury (Virgo to Pisces). She does not mention that Pluto is seven seconds of arc from exactly conjunct Uranus, both retrograde. The nodes, in Taurus & Scorpio, fall in 12 & 6. All this together is said to have Virgo overtones. This individual, another female, felt herself feeling responsible & was sought out by others for help. She had a past life where she was trained as a healer, but was too insecure to take it up.

The fourth of the Virgo charts (pg. 125), again for a female, has Pluto in Virgo in the 11th, with the south node in Aries conjunct Mercury & Venus, all in the 6th. All of which are squared by Saturn in Capricorn. She felt she wasn't good enough & had a past life on a plantation as the daughter of slave owners. As a married woman she rebelled & assisted slaves in their flight to freedom. She was eventually caught & entombed in a celler, where she perished. She was earlier a (male) native American medicine man. Walsh says that Pluto in 11 relates to past lives among Amerindian tribes. He had a vision that white settlers would bring disease with them & when that turned out to be true, he watched his family die, and felt guilty.

None of this, regrettably, tells me much about my south node in Virgo. With four back-to-back female case studies, I get the impression that men aren't of interest to the author, though I could be mistaken.

Charts in this book are in Porphry houses. Porphry isn't actually a house system, as the intermediate cusps (2,3,5,6,8,9,11,12) are determined by dividing the zodiac & so do not in any way relate to the earth itself. It was Jeff Green's favorite system, and might just work if the subject is past lives, as those lives are, like Porphry cusps, by definition not "on the earth".

If you like stories. . .

Wessex Astrologer, 306 pages.

Contents:

Acknowledgments
Introduction

1. Evolutionary Principles of the Soul's evolution, by Jeffrey Wolf Green
2. From cataclysm to the awakening of latent capacities: four main ways that Pluto affects / instigates our evolutionary growth, by Deva Green
3. Evolutonary states, by Kim Marie
4. Relationships & sexuality in astrology, by Maurice Fernandez
5. Twins: similar charts, worlds apart! by Kristin Fontana
6. When planets square the nodal axis: insights from a past-life therapist, by Patricia L. Walsh
7. Time's arrow: the nature & function of the planetary nodes in evolutionary astrology, by Mark Jones
8. The evolutionary astrology perspective of the archetype of Capricorn, by Rose Marcus

Bibliography

Comment:

A collection of eight essays & an introduction. A brief overview of each:

Introduction: Welcome to the Jeffrey Wolf school of study. The evolutionary state of any given chart can be assessed, so that analysis can be more precise. Rose Marcus offers an explanation of Green's use of the Porphry system: Jeffrey Wolf Green advocates the use of the Porphyry house system, which uses the primary angles of the chart (the Ascendant/Descendant and Midheaven/Nadir angles) as the primary divisions from which the inner angles (the houses of the quadrants: 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 12) are equally divided. (pg. 4) This tells me everything I need to know about Ms Marcus, frankly.

1. Evolutionary Principles, by Jeffrey Wolf Green: Evolution defined: Pluto. Soul defined: Pluto (consciousness is Neptune). The ego defined: the Moon. Since the soul creates the ego, you could say that Pluto creates the Moon. Jeffrey's description of the immediate post-death state (pg. 16) is technically correct, but flat in expression & limited in scope. As advance training, it's feeble. Which is a pity. This is the one place where specific training could make a lot of difference. Continuing: The four evolutionary conditions. This is greatly expanded from what Green published in his two books on Pluto. There are subdivisions! Humble charisma seems to be the ultimate goal. At the very end, we learn that Jeffrey Wolf Green retired in 2001. Secluded retirement. For those of us who have been wondering what became of him, we now have some clues.

2. From cataclysm to the awakening of latent capacities, by Deva Green: Evolution can be slow or cataclysmic. Example: Kriyananda, a disciple of Yogananda. His cataclysmic event was being "excommunicated" from the Self-Realization Fellowship. Which I suppose is akin to being fired. There is some embarrassing rubbish about Barak Obama: From this natal signature we can see that Obama's devotion to God, or the Source, and his desire to purify and perfect himself, manifests through his service to others in a social context. . . (pg. 66) Trenchant analysis this isn't, but it's the best the current head of the school can do.

3. Evolutionary states, by Kim Marie: A repeat of Jeffrey Green's opening essay, with the four evolutionary states, etc., etc. To give an example how vague Evolutionary Astrology as a whole is, what is meant by "de-volution", i.e., a loss of status, commonly happens to hard core IV drug users. This simple fact seems to have escaped all notice. The author is the director of the Evolutionary Astrology Network, which offers on-line classes. She has been a student of Evolutionary Astrology since 1985 (A student of evolutionary astrology for twenty-five years. . . pg. 99), which was the year that Green published Pluto vol. 1 and nine years before Jeffrey established his school.

4. Relationships and sexuality in astrology, by Maurice Fernandez: A condensed re-write of his book on Neptune. (Recall that on the cover of his Neptune book was an abstract image of the female genitalia.) This chapter amounts to twelve essays on sex, each keyed, more or less, to a sign of the zodiac. There are few if any references to Pluto or the nodes or evolution.

5. Twins: similar charts, worlds apart, by Kristin Fontana: In studying charts of twins, we start with Pluto, because Pluto represents the soul, and the soul is timeless. Twin charts are distinguished by noting that Pluto in one chart will be in one house, and that Pluto in the twin's chart will be in a different house. Or they will both be in the same house but there will be different signs on the cusp, from one twin to the other. There is an example of fraternal girls, one with late Leo on the cusp of 3, the other with early Virgo on 3, both with a tight Pluto/Uranus conjunction in 3 but very near the IC. There is a second example of identical boys, one with Pluto just below the descendant in 6, the other with it just above the descendant in 7. Note that this method of analysis will exclude the majority of twins. The author is a certified graduate of Jeffrey Wolf Green's School of Evolutionary Astrology.

6. When planets square the nodal axis, insights from a past-life therapist, by Patricia L. Walsh: An interesting essay. Walsh attempts to frame past life regression with the simplistic & rigid evolutionary astrology analysis, which causes her to overlook most of the chart. On the other hand, she is coming close to my own deduction, that karma does not exist, that we merely reincarnate with a collective case of amnesia & stumble about, still trapped with the same people and the same problems. Solve them now or solve them later, your choice, but know that no one will solve your problems for you. There is no savior, no Big Daddy, no avenging angels. Walsh would get further, I think, by dropping all imposed frameworks, listening to her clients' stories, and then seeing how the chart as a whole speaks to them. She will make many surprising discoveries when she does. At the end of the chapter, Walsh delineates the nodal axis, by sign/house. Use Dave's rules to read them, with one caveat: Flip them: Her delineations are for the south node, not the north.

7. Time's arrow: the nature & function of the planetary nodes in evolutionary astrology, by Mark Jones: We are hoping for someting interesting. We get this: We can see the south node of Venus is at 15 Virgo in a wide conjunction to Jupiter [8 degrees separating], and that the natal Venus placement at 16 Gemini, conjunct Uranus, is therefore in square to its own node. (pg. 204) In this chapter, the chart of Jeffrey Wolf Green himself: December 2, 1946, 4:52 am, Hollywood, CA. The essential thrust of the chapter is that tight aspects to a planetary node (conjunction, opposition, square) reinforces the nature of the planet itself. Does this apply to the Moon's nodes? The author is in charge of the UK branch of the Jeffrey Wolf Green school.

8. The evolutionary astrology perspective of the archetype of Capricorn, by Rose Marcus: Pluto entered Capricorn, to stay, in late 2008. It will be there until early 2024 or so. So, we are now in the Capricorn Archetype. Which is, resistance, dread, apprehension, foreboding, skepticism, fear, paranoia, blame. (pg. 228) When Capricorn is feeling extreme, things get really bad. Marcus attempts to write mundane astrology. Supposedly we are to suffer greatly & then get a big reward when Pluto gets to Aquarius, but I think that suffering breeds more suffering and that the present course of world events are not promising.

The Bibliography (a strange thing in a book of essays by different authors) is a grab-bag, presumably with titles suggested by each of the contributors.

Evolutionary Astrology (EA) is shaping up to be the next big thing in astrology, a rival to Jung & his Depth Analysis. Founder Green's chart is notable for squares from a 9th house Saturn/Pluto retrograde conjunction, to a first house Jupiter/Venus/Mercury in Scorpio, and trines from the 9th house duo to Sun/south node/Mars in Sagittarius in 2. Nine square One makes for a dogmatic priest, Nine trine Two make it financially rewarding. Pluto/Jupiter, Pluto/Saturn conjunctions in 9 in Leo are priestly on the face of it. Moon in Pisces in 5, disposed by Jupiter on the ascendant, makes the priest's work fun & exciting in gut-level ways. Read Jeffrey's chart yourself. His ideas will be with us for a long time.

Llewellyn, 277 pages.