Full Moon in Aquarius 2025: Chthonic power versus Celestial power
A Controlled Opposition, or a process?....
The Moon’s silvery chalice will become full on the 9th of August at 3:55 EST with the Moon and Sun in the 18th degrees of Aquarius and Leo respectively. This lunation has a number of very active and challenging aspects, demanding that each one be examined individually to parse out some of the most critical mythological meanings.
The Full Moon herself will be co-present with Pluto in Aquarius. Moon under Saturn rule in Aquarius is challenging to begin with: Saturn is the ruler of the least fertile times of the year, and Aquarius holds this essential energy of contraction The Full Moon represents the highest illumination of the meanings of this Sign, contrasted to the Sun’s seasonal illumination of its domicile of Leo. Saturn’s nature is to rein in and diminish the expansion of Creation, and to return its base elements to the Great Goddess.
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As an Air Sign, Aquarius represents the aeration of the root of the Tree of Life, a time when we look at the established foundation of our structures and critically decide what is working for us and what is not. The Sun casts light on the world and illuminates an established order from the Celestial Realm, while Aquarius critiques this and seeks an egalitarian and utopian New Order projected from below (or rather, from within us).
All of our Creation is composed of the Light of the Sun in different stages of solidity: the chthonic realm of solid forms takes on its own consciousness in opposition to the Celestial Realm.
Pluto is the Royal embodiment of this Chthonic consciousness. This exists in contrast to the Raw Creative Power of the Sun, which is the Source of all Power.
Established Power, the power of the chthonic realm, exists in opposition to the nurturing, individuating and naturally hierarchical Celestial Realm, but this balance is best conceived of as a controlled process rather than a pitched battle to be decisively won by one side or another. The struggle is sacred theater, a ritualized dance that takes no prisoners and leaves no one standing.
The Full Moon, the fertile and fecund Goddess is also the Goddess of death and destruction. Here she is informed by the Plutonian power struggle. Aquarian Egalitarianism easily becomes conflated with victim consciousness in the form of striking out in jealous rage at the beautiful, the talented, the successful and the wealthy. It is also true that, in time, the wealthy and powerful often become purely Plutocratic- ossified, insular and inbred, and nepotism tends to protect them from their own rigidity, fragility and laziness. Their energies are too often devoted to protecting their wealth and power at all costs, rather than into self-education, self-improvement and principled leadership by example. Again, these dynamics are archetypal and they create a fire in the minds of men: we must step outside of this drama to see what is really happening.
This lunation occurs in the second decan of Aquarius. This territory is ruled by Mercury according to the Chaldean order of planets, and also by Mercury according to the elemental Triplicity. The story here is of commerce between realms: having left the Established Order represented by Capricorn, the Newly Established Aquarian territory needs goods and services- there is profit to be made from bridging this gap and branding the New, distinct from the Old. But more than that, the denizens of the New Lands need and want information about the Other, things outside of their territory that help them to define who they are. The Mercurial and mercenary merchant becomes the mythmaker, peddling ideas that help create new identity.
This can be good, and it can veer into the realm of the self-destructive, or even the comical.
Mercury will be in retrograde at the time of the lunation, applying to an opposition with Pluto. This gives us a clear rear-view image of the rabid Aquarian egalitarianism which has struggled to gain hegemony over the popular mind over the last decade or so, and came to a head since Pluto entered Aquarius. Add to this, Venus loosely applying to a conjunction with Jupiter in the second decan of Cancer and we get a more honest, realistic and traditional discussion of beauty and gender roles in the protected space that this decan represents. Additionally, Venus is separating from a square with Saturn and Neptune in Aries: Saturn in Aries desperately tries to quash conflict, and in doing so makes it far worse, while Neptune quietly corrodes and degrades discussion into fantasies and delusions. Add Mars in the first degrees of Libra, completely unable to be diplomatic and uncertain how to defend “social justice”, opposing Saturn and Neptune, and we something more like a barroom brawl.
Thus we get a perfect description of the raging meme war that has erupted over established ideas of beauty and the role of race in the collective consciousness: woke neo-Marxist “egalitarianism” has gone totally sideways into a comical and tragic hatred for traditional ideas of beauty and femininity.
While Mars and Saturn are in opposition- generally a very bad thing in traditional astrological thinking- they are in mutual reception: Saturn is the exaltation ruler of Libra, where Mars is, and Mars rules Aries, where Saturn is. The malefics must agree to disagree here, as they need each other to take care of the other’s territories. Unfortunately, an agreement between malefics is often dangerous. and might blow out sideways. Extreme heat mixed with extreme cold usually manifests as violence, often as natural disasters.
Mars, Pluto and Uranus also form an extremely tight Grand Air Trine at the time of this lunation. These are all potentially dangerous planets: Mars patrols the limen of the unconscious realm, searching for emergent threats to our individuation. In Libra he tries to do the Venusian work in the name of harmony and justice, an archetypally incompatible work space for the God of War. Pluto protects the Established Order, as previously elucidated; Uranus represents a primordial Sky God who has been usurped and entered an exalted and spiritualized state, castrated but still unstable and erratic.
The Sun will be in the 2nd decan of his domain of Leo, close to the center of the Summer season. The decanic ruler is Jupiter by both traditional methods of reckoning, while as previously mentioned, the Moon is in the opposing decan of Aquarius, ruled by Mercury in both traditional ways of reckoning. This highlights the polarized ways of knowing that Jupiter and Mercury represent, the reductive Mercurial versus the expansive Jupiterian. This portion of Leo shows us the Victor, the One who has passed the test and is being celebrated for their abilities demonstrated under real world pressure. The technical skill and capacity that bring victory does not always bring with it true virtue, ethics or wisdom. It is for the individual to decide for themselves what these things are.
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