The Role of the Least Aspected Planet in Astrocartography.
Planetary Symbolism in Astrocartography and Transcendental Astrology,
by Rob Couteau.
Jupiter = 011
Sun = 121
Moon = 140
Uranus = 200
Saturn = 201
Pluto = 210
Mars = 211
Venus = 222
Neptune = 311
Mercury = 321
With malice toward
none; with charity for all.
–Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln,
the sixteenth president of the United States (1861-1865), was born near Hodgenville,
Kentucky, almost precisely under the setting position of his Secondary Sun.
His father, Thomas Lincoln, was a poor migratory farmer and carpenter, and,
as a result of the transient nature of his work, the Lincoln family moved
several times within this Secondary Sun region before settling in nearby Indiana,
in 1816.
Lincoln received a smattering
of formal learning in Kentucky and in the neighboring state of Illinois, but
most of his education came as a result of independent efforts to teach himself,
largely by reading a small collection of books. The emphasis placed on the
“expansion of consciousness” through “knowledge gained from books” and on
the “need to pursue higher learning” in the overall Lincoln legend are keynotes
of Primary Jupiter, the planet symbolizing “publishing, higher education,
ethics, and philosophy.”
When Lincoln was nineteen,
he traveled on a flatboat down the Mississippi to New Orleans. There, he received
his first intimate view of slavery: one that made a lasting impression on
him. In his astrocartography, Secondary Sun is almost directly over New Orleans
and curves over the Gulf in a setting position. Combined with Primary Jupiter,
we have the keynote: “self-improvement / and expanding one’s horizons through
travel and education” (Sun / Jupiter): a fitting description of his early
life. With Jupiter rising over the Atlantic coast, Jupiter and Sun form a
Transcendental Midpoint-Field over the eastern and southern states: the principal
focus of his entire life.
Lincoln made one more trip
to New Orleans, and in 1837 he settled in New Salem, Illinois, where he worked
as village postmaster and deputy county surveyor. Fortunately, with the light
workload of these jobs, he had enough spare time with which to continue his
study of law. In Lincoln’s devotion to legal matters (particularly noteworthy
in the rough-and-tumble company of this pioneering town), we again see the
especial influence of Jupiter, which rules “legal matters, the pursuit of
a law career,” and the reputation he gained for the “breadth of his wisdom”
and the “ethical strength of his character.”
Lincoln was so widely respected
among the local townspeople that he was appointed captain of a group of volunteers
preparing for the Black Hawk War of 1832. In 1834 he was elected to the state
legislature, where he served until 1841. Finally, in 1836 he began a law practice,
in which he displayed a great natural ability. He became the leader of the
Whigs while working in the legislature, and he later served a term in Congress
(1846), but his “law practice” (Primary Jupiter) continued to take his attention
away from politics.
When Stephen A. Douglas’s
Kansas-Nebraska bill of 1820 rekindled the national debate over slavery, Lincoln
was inadvertently drawn into what was to become the central political issue
of the day. After Douglas outlined his proslavery views in a speech given
at the Illinois State Fair, in October 1820, Lincoln’s reply speech triggered
his rise to national “prominence” (Secondary Sun). After the Whigs were reorganized
into the Republican Party in 1854, he was nominated in 1856 to run against
Douglas in the Illinois senatorial election. Although defeated, the nomination
placed him in the “public spotlight” (Sun).
In his subsequent debates
with Douglas, Lincoln forcefully and “eloquently posed the higher ethical
and philosophical questions” (Primary Jupiter) associated with the issue of
slavery. In this and in the subsequent speeches he gave as president, we see
the classic Jupiter / Sun symbols of “wisdom / revealed.” The “philosophical
wisdom” of Jupiter was now placed in the “light of public scrutiny” through
the “noble personage” of Lincoln and, especially, through his “dignified leadership”
(Sun). His “much celebrated” (Sun) nomination speech, given in Illinois near
his Secondary Sun line, exemplifies a “dramatic presentation / of a higher
ethical philosophy” (Sun / Jupiter). “A house divided against itself,” Lincoln
sagely proclaimed, “cannot stand.”
In February 1860, Lincoln
traveled to New York to deliver a speech at the Cooper Union building (with
Primary Jupiter rising over the Atlantic, New York is positioned in the center
of a Jupiter / Sun Transcendental Midpoint-Field). His speech provided a final
boost to his “increasing popularity” (Sun) and helped him to win the nomination.
In May 1860, he secured the nomination for president in Chicago, a location
near his Secondary Sun line.
After his presidential election,
South Carolina seceded, followed by the secessions of Mississippi, Florida,
Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. As we can see on Lincoln’s astrocartography,
most of these states fall directly within his Transcendental Midpoint-Field.
Indeed, his presidency would remain focused precisely upon this overall geographic
region.
During his inauguration, Lincoln
declared the Union to be perpetual. He also called for upholding the laws
of the land. Besides a “philosophic declaration” of perpetual union and an
“ethical” appeal to “legal measures,” as the planet symbolizing the archetype
of “expansion” Jupiter appears as a central symbol in Lincoln’s role of preserving
the “expanding” Union. (Jupiter also stands in opposition to the Saturnian
“contraction” that was proposed by
the Confederate States.)
By serving as president in
Washington, D.C., he placed himself precisely in the center of the Jupiter
/ Sun Transcendental Midpoint-Field. Within this highly charged location,
he delivered one of the most eloquent speeches of modern times. In the Gettysburg
Address, Lincoln incarnated a classic Sun / Jupiter equation: one exemplifying
the “illumination / of higher principles.” His Jupiterian interpretation
of the Declaration of Independence to include the rights of African Americans–that
“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent
a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that
all men are created equal”–was, in fact, a denial of the precepts of the actual
Constitution, which considered African Americans as property: a denial in
favor of his own vision for a “more expansive and inclusive ethic” (Primary
Jupiter). His famous call for a “new birth of freedom–and that government
of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this
earth” represented a constitutional reinterpretation. These words: “of the
people, by the people, for the people,” often assumed to exist somewhere within
the Declaration or Constitution, came into existence only with Lincoln’s
summons for a more “humanly inclusive society”: one / founded on higher “ethical
awareness” (Jupiter). Therefore, Lincoln personified the Sun / Jupiter keynote
of “dramatic self-expression1 / of a higher philosophic order” and the “publicizing
/ of a higher philosophic awareness.”
In medical astrology, Jupiter
transits are associated with healing and with cellular renewal (see Millard,
Casenotes of a Medical Astrologer). In a similar fashion, Lincoln’s second
presidential term was to have focused on his call for “national healing” and
“Reconstruction” (echoed in his famous words: “With malice toward none; with
charity for all”). His charitable and forgiving approach is reflected in the
Jupiterian theme of “benevolence and charity toward those less fortunate.”2
Unfortunately, Lincoln was unable to oversee his plans for a Reconstruction.
After several precognitive dreams that foretold his assassination, he was
shot by John Wilkes Booth in Ford’s Theater, on the evening of April 14, 1865.
1. Sakoian and
Acker, Transits Simplified, “Keywords
... Sun,” p. 27.
2. Ibid., “Transiting Sun Conjunct Natal Jupiter,” p. 31.
