July 13, 2022 at 1:37 pm Central—Wednesday’s Full Moon in 21° Capricorn 21′ highlights themes around power and responsibility as well as security and protection.
Origin story
Origin stories always help to contextualize current day events. The sign of Capricorn is connected to the goat-nymph Amalthea who fostered infant Zeus (Jupiter) in a cave. Afraid that Cronos (Saturn) his father would swallow him like his older siblings, Zeus’s mother hid him in a cave on the island of Crete where he was cared for by Amalthea. For her service, Amalthea was placed in the heavens as the constellation Capricorn.
The Capricorn-Cancer constellations originate from ideas of protection and service. You may remember the crab that aided The Lernaean Hydra in the unwarranted provocation by the Greek hero Heracles who blasted fiery arrows into her cave to draw her out for a deadly confrontation. In gratitude for answering her plea to help the Hydra in the unfair attack, Hera (Juno) swung the crab up into the heavens where it shines as the constellation Cancer.
In the Full Moon chart, Juno forms an exact trine to the Sun in Cancer and sextiles the Moon. We can ask ourselves, what sanctuary (cave) is being threatened? What inviolable right is at risk? Who are our allies that can protect, nurture and help us now?
Planets in play
Full Moons often bring a culminating event where we understand all the players and underlying motives in a situation we’re experiencing. Pluto’s wide conjunction to this Moon underscores power plays, deception and manipulative efforts to gain control of a situation. If we find ourselves pitted against our own flame-throwing Heracles, we might heed the advice of the Four of Pentacles, the tarot card associated with the last decan of Capricorn. Fours in the tarot seek to preserve, maintain and secure. In the Pentacles, we are stabilizing our finances and solidifying our values while we sit tight in protective mode.
What’s more, the last decan of Capricorn connects to themes of authority, power and “administrative intelligence” (Austin Coppock). In his book 36 Faces, Coppock gives us the image of a throne. But just as there is great power in that seat, there is even greater responsibility. As we know, “Heavy is the head that wears the crown”. This decan speaks to the right use of power as well as the mismanagement of it. There are karmic consequences to both.
The ruler of this Full Moon is Saturn. In Aquarius, Saturn does not have a line of sight to Capricorn. We can translate this as we don’t yet have all the information yet to make an informed decision. As the tarot card suggests, it would be wise to go into protective mode, like a snail into its shell or the Hydra sitting tight in her cave.
Help will arrive; perhaps it is already here. We can see this with the stabilizing trine between Saturn and Venus. Venus can represent friends, a supportive person, available funds or an inner peace that gracefully descends on us. Whatever Venus signifies is also unrelated to the situation at hand for in Gemini, she also does not see the Moon in Capricorn.
I mentioned before that Pluto’s presence close to the Full Moon can denote power plays, deception, control and manipulation. It’s true. It’s also true that the force of Pluto works to transform. The rebirth process is not an easy one. The contractions that show up as sticky and seemingly unbearable situations work to push us down the birth canal of our own renewed selves. A self that has a deeper understanding of their own power. Sometimes, we don’t connect the dots of what led to what until we’re well past the endurance test.
Finally, I know that many astrologers will be writing political commentary that tie in to the problems currently evolving as hydra heads one after the other in the United States. In this essay, I wanted to write more directly to the archetypes and themes present at this lunation. You can overlay these ideas on top of current events of a country or to the landscape of your own life.