Asteroid-World Spring 1998
Zip Dobyns
The Bible Code
A variety of books and articles have been published in recent years on the mysterious “code” supposedly discovered in the first five books of the Bible. I acquired two of the books, The Bible Code by Michael Drosnan, and Cracking the Bible Code by Jeffrey Satinover M.D. Both tell an enthralling story, though Satinover does not approve of the book by Drosnan, who is described but never mentioned by name in Satinover’s book. Drosnan is a journalist, offering a less technical treatment, and his book was on the best-seller list for considerable time. Satinover’s objection to his work is Drosnan’s attempt to use the Bible code to predict the future. Satinover explains why he considers predictions difficult to do, impossible to evaluate statistically, and in danger of discrediting the work on the code being done by serious scientists and mathematicians.
The first five books of the Old Testament are called the Torah, and are believed to have been dictated to Moses by God. They have been preserved by the Jews, painstakingly hand-copied letter by letter to avoid mistakes, for over 3,000 years. Periodically, scholars have hinted of hidden messages in the books, some claiming as many as 70 “gates” to knowledge, but the most commonly described technique for encoding messages involved skipping a specific number of letters to produce meaningful information. For example, every 50th letter in a section of text could spell out the name of a person, a place, an event, an object, a date, etc. Numerous examples are given in both books which provide related words describing an event, involved individuals, dates, locations, etc. Experts in mathematics, statistics, and cryptography have been working with computers since about 1982 to discover the hidden information and to calculate the statistical odds against it being due to chance. The odds vary, depending on the criteria being used, but they are very high.
Naturally, there are many materialistic skeptics trying to disprove the claims. If the claims are substantiated, that precise details of modern events were described in a book written over 3,000 years ago, it will upset the materialistic belief system. One of the leaders of the skeptics, Professor Diaconis, is an expert in statistics, a professional magician, and a member of CSICOP. Our readers will recognize the latter organization as the group which used fraud and lies to try to discredit the astrological research of the Gauquelins, as was pointed out by a former CSICOP member (Dennis Rawlings) in his article Starbaby. Rawlings resigned from the organization, dismayed by their dishonesty. Diaconis teaches courses on statistics which attempt to refute the idea of synchronicity or meaningful coincidences. He offers four principles which he claims account for (discount) the presence of any real meaning in coincidences. Satinover quotes Diaconis: “Once we set aside coincidences having apparent causes, four principles account for large numbers of remaining coincidences: hidden cause; psychology, including memory and perception; multiplicity of end points, including the counting of “close” or nearly alike events as if they were identical; and the law of truly large numbers, which says that when enormous numbers of events and people and their interactions accumulate over time, almost any outrageous event is bound to occur. These sources account for much of the force of synchronicity.”
Notice, he is honest enough to say “most,” which is like the Condon Report on UFOs. After ignoring the most inexplicable cases and proposing unlikely causes for many other cases, Condon’s debunkers were able to say that only a small number of cases were unexplained so the whole UFO flap could be ignored. Diaconis dismisses the coincidences he can’t explain as due to “hidden cause!” Talk about a cop-out! In effect, he is saying “whatever doesn’t fit the materialistic belief system has a hidden cause which is certainly materialistic—we just haven’t found it yet.”
I can’t do justice to the two books on the Bible Code, but encourage readers to get and read them. One of the most fascinating chapters by Satinover discusses the war against Iraq in 1991. All of the work is done in Hebrew, using the Torah as a string of letters with all spaces and punctuation removed. Hebrew letters have number equivalents, which lets them represent dates in the Jewish calendar, which are then translated into the western calendar. In the interrelated messages about the Gulf war, when translated into English, the coded words included Saddam, Hussein, in Baghdad, at Tel Aviv, my enemy, scuds, missiles, Russian, (the source of Saddam’s missiles), Iraq, America, in Saudi Arabia, Schwarzkopf, CNN, Peter, and Arnett (the reporter in Baghdad). There are even references referring to a previous war between Babylon (modern Iraq) and the Jews with an approximation of the name of Nebuchadnezzar, who destroyed the temple in Jerusalem and took many Jews into captivity.
Satinover says he cannot quote his sources, but he was told that as the Gulf war loomed and the Israelis were sure they would be targeted by Saddam’s missiles, the code scholars conferred with the Mossad, the Israeli secret service, to try to pinpoint possible dates for a missile attack. The general consensus of the serious investigators is that the code cannot be used to predict the future, since too many possible dates and words can be created. They feel that only a past event which has already occurred with known associated individuals and dates can be searched for in the Bible and its statistical odds can be calculated. The Mossad believed that Saddam did not yet have operational nuclear bombs or biological weapons such as anthrax, though he was known to be working on both, but he did have chemical weapons which he had already used on his own people, the Kurds, and his missiles could reach any part of Israel. Gas masks had been issued to the citizens of Israel, but they could not wear them constantly, so the authorities urgently wanted a way to provide a timely warning. Even if the launch of a missile was detected when it happened, its flight time would be too short to allow any effective warning. According to the “unauthorized” report, the Mossad picked three dates which they considered the most likely for a missile attack. All three were found in the Bible code associated with the other words describing the Gulf war, and the one closest to the rest of the associated messages was actually the date of the first missile strike.
Unlike Satinover, Drosnan gives a number of future dates of possible events, so we will know in time whether the more cautious investigators are right in their insistence that the focus should be on testing the validity of the code with past events. Drosnan says that he developed his own computer program to work with the Bible, and that high-level U.S. military men have also developed their program and have been impressed with their results. One of the forecasts described by Drosnan was the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin. Rabin’s full name was given, and the year when he was to be killed. He was warned about the discovery of the coded message a year before it happened, but discounted it. Among Drosnan’s future dates are the potential of nuclear war in Jerusalem in 2000 and/or in 2006. The same years are listed as critical for Japan, but connected to economic problems or natural disasters (earthquakes) rather than war. L.A. is connected to a major earthquake in 2010. According to Drosnan, two recent earthquakes in Japan and one in China are associated with the years in which they occurred.
As our readers know, I have been concerned about and have written repeatedly about the increasing danger that shows in the chart of Israel. I do not anticipate an atomic war, but I have written of the danger of a nuclear incident, perhaps by a suicidal terrorist. In light of the destruction which would affect everyone in the area, both Jews and Palestinians, only a fanatic could set off a nuclear bomb, but religion can obliterate common sense and normal morality. The P MC of the Israel chart (using the time of the end of the British mandate) will reach the asteroid Hiroshima in February 2000. Also in February 2000, P Nagasaki starts a square to N Moon, and P Sun starts a trioctile to the MC to add to a quincunx to the Ascendant which will start in the fall of 1999 and an octile to N Mars starting in early 1999. Still other aspects starting in the spring or early summer of 2000 are P Vesta conjunct Israel, and P Moon conjunct the midpoint of Saturn/north lunar node, the midpoint of Sun/Moon, and P Ceres, while it squares the natal Part of Death in Aries and the Saturn/south lunar node midpoint and P Part of Death in Libra and is quincunx the MC. As mentioned in the previous issue of The Mutable Dilemma, P Israel remains on the midpoint of P Mars/P Saturn for over 70 more years. In 2000, P Israel will also conjunct N Aeternitas (immortality), square P Ra-Shalom (named for the Camp David peace treaty), trioctile N Ra-Shalom, quincunx N Siva, and oppose Biela, the comet which theoretically hit the earth in the last century to cause huge fires in Chicago and accross miles of Michigan and Wisconsin, resulting in thousands of deaths in Peshtigo.
What I have seen or heard so far from the professional debunkers does not appear to acknowledge the really careful work that is being done. The same computerized and statistical techniques were used on a variation of the first five books of the Bible whch was preserved by the Samaritans, a sect that separated long ago from the Jews. The Samaritan Torah says the same things as the Jewish Torah, but uses many variant spellings which produced chance statistical results. When Satinover’s book was written, in addition to the Samaritan version of Genesis, the code investigators had tried their techniques with a Hebrew language translation of a selection from the start of War and Peace equal in length to Genesis, on the Book of Isaiah, on the Book of Genesis randomized by scrambling all of its letters over the entire text, on the Book of Genesis randomized by scrambling all of its words within verses, but leaving the structure of the verses intact, and the letters of each word intact, and on the Book of Genesis randomized by scrambling all of its verses, leaving the word sequence within each verse intact. Only the ancient, original text produced the statistically significant results.
Satinover discusses the huge philosophical question which overshadows all astrologers—the question of whether humans have “free will,” and if so, how much. He feels that the Bible code points to a mixture of some freedom and some predetermination and some chance. I am inclined to rule out the chance, but strongly believe in a mix of choice and predetermined consequences stemming from the past. I think that the psychological principles are predetermined and are visible in the sky, where the state of the cosmic mind is symbolized by planets, etc. Each principle can be manifested in many different detailed life events. Habits may also permit some of these to be predicted, but to the extent that we can change our habitual beliefs, emotions, attitudes, and actions, we have the freedom to change our lives. Even when we are playing a role in events which involve many other people, so we can not change the events, we can change our attitudes, which, obviously, changes our personal experience of the events. The ability to see meaning in the world and life, as Victor Frankl pointed out, can totally transform our experience. This is what the materialists seek to deny, but they are the losers, ending like Carl Sagan who died in a hospital of cancer and pneumonia, 3 expressions of Neptune. He could not accept his connection to the cosmic consciousness, and he died with his P Sagan (the asteroid named after him) opposite his N Mars conjunct Neptune and quincunx his P Mars.
Satinover points out that the discovery of the Bible code is turning many former atheists and materialists into orthodox Jews, but I consider that a mixed blessing. Sagan needed to go beyond materialism, but must we jump to the conclusion that the knowledge of the future revealed by the code (IF it continues to be verified) means it was given to Moses by the supreme Creator of everything, and therefore that all of the Bible is the true Word of God, to be obeyed in every detail? It is the orthodox Jewish extremists who refuse to compromise with the Palestinians, who want to tear down the mosque in Jerusalem which is one of the most sacred sites in the world to devout Moslems, who claim that 90 % of the Jews in the U.S., the primary financial supporters of Israel, are not “true” Jews because they are not orthodox. (90% belong to the Reformed and Conservative Branches of Judaism.) If the orthodox Jews are, as Satinover writes, having huge families and educating them to believe that they are the favored people of God and they alone are the keepers of his Word, the chances of peace in Israel are vanishingly small.
It seems quite possible that a highly developed consciousness channeled the Torah to Moses, that he (the content rules out the channeler being a “she”) knew some ways to see patterns which we are just beginning to discover as we expand our understanding of astrology as a key to consciousness. The exploratory work being done now with asteroids may well be part of what permitted a higher level consciousness to make the precise predictions which are theoretically being discovered in the Torah. However, the channeler’s morals seem more akin to the time of Moses, possibly around the time when the Age of Taurus was being replaced by the Arian Age, than to the current Age of Pisces when humans are supposed to be learning empathy, compassion, and oneness.
Spring 1998 Conferences
It was a lively spring, with the Council Grove Conference (CGC) in April and the United Astrological Congress (UAC) and the Society for Scientific Explorations (SSE) back-to-back in May. One of the most interesting (though partly over my head) talks at CGC was by the physicist, Bill Tiller. He is trying to develop theories (mathematical models) to connect the physical world and consciousness. Successful models let scientists predict, but mathematical models with more than 3 dimensions may be impossible to visualize and only comprehensible to mathematicians. I took notes while Tiller was talking and will try to list some of the highlights, but my knowledge of math and physics is not up to the task, so I’m not sure how much will make sense to readers or whether it is really what Tiller was trying to convey.
Tiller describes his model as composed of layers including a magnetic, emotional, and mental layer among others which he describes as like a diving bell, a “bio-body suit” surrounding us when we enter the physical world. He suggests that techniques such as meditation can help us still the mind in order to become conscious of a wider part of the spectrum of existence. He said his model had 11 dimensions, that the 10th dimension was a “frame,” the 9th dimension emotion which was like a “toner” in a copier, the 8th dimension an area of reciprocals, the 7th dimension cognitive, etc. On one dimension, we are all connected, though most of the time we are not aware of that.
One of Tiller’s basic concepts involves reciprocal relationships between physical (normal science) subject areas and related subjects which cannot be explained by physical energy-matter. He plots these reciprocals mathematically as holding 90 degree angles. He matches astrology as the reciprocal of psychology, feng shui as the reciprocal of sociology, homeopathy as the reciprocal of chemistry, etc. He connects with double arrows (going both ways) matter-energy-consciousness-love. He describes a vacuum as holding infinite energy, and suggests another model composed of three branches: 1 building structure; 2 surrendering ego; 3 spirit growing to connect to the whole universe.
Tiller is busy moving from California to Arizona, and I am perpetually over-extended, but we may make contact later to try to explore his attempt to find a place for astrology as a legitimate subject for scientific investigation. For the moment, I find the psychological model of astrology more helpful in very practical ways than mathematical models.
UAC was great fun, with at least 1500 eager astrology students sharing ideas. I keep thinking that some day I will go more deeply into financial astrology, so I mostly attended the talks in that area. There were lots: Jeanne Long, Grace Morris, Bill Meridian, Alphie Lavoie, and Ray Merriman. I did manage a few other speakers. Rob Hand, who is always stimulating, talked about an ancient Persian system of cycles for forecasting. Diana Rosenberg did her usual fascinating talk about the fixed stars, with new examples from our current world. Nick Campion had uncovered some previously undiscovered facts about Benjamin Franklin, including his plagiary, copying (with minimal changes) texts in almanacs from England and France from the preceding century, which Franklin used in his American Almanac. I had not previously had a chance to hear Bernie Ashman, and his talk on looking for past lives in the horoscope was interesting. Caroline Casey is one of the most dynamic speakers in astrology today, with a terrific sense of humor and a gift for catchy phrases. One I remember was “As long as God is a guy, men will be gods.” Luis Lesur from Mexico City gave an excellent talk on the current situation in his country, and presented a new technique for geographic regions between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn, which includes Mexico City. Rick Tarnas gave a terrific talk about the vital role which astrology should be playing in the modern world. I just wished he had been chosen as the opening night speaker. Thomas Moore had that honor and was the only bomb of the conference from my point of view. His talk would have been appropriate for a conference of psychics, but I considered it shocking to be told to not think or reason or look for meaning, but just to do divination. A quote: “Venus does not have any meaning. Venus just is.”
Despite Moore, it was a great conference, and I hope we can do it again in three years if the sainted souls who did all the preparatory work are game to do it again. I was thrilled to win the Regulus Award for Research and Innovation. This year, it came with the usual black marble pyramid, but also with a generous grant of money thanks to Marion March, who has set up a Foundation for that purpose. At the banquet, we saw a video of Marion hoping we would have a great conference and regretting that her health did not permit her to attend. We certainly hope her health will improve and thank her for her Foundation to aid astrology. Other major contributions to the future of astrology include Kepler College in the state of Washington—a liberal arts college which will include astrology as an integral part of its curriculum. If all astrologers who are able will make a contribution to the cause, it can become a reality in the near future. A related effort is being made in England to purchase the Lilly Cottage as an astrological world center for classes and conferences. Though this original home of the famous William Lilly is called a cottage, it is actually a sizable building with acres of ground and other buildings, so it will be a beautiful as well as historical center for astrology. So, should you come to the next UAC? Yes, with bells on.
SSE is a California-based organization which is devoted to using scientific methods to study anomalies. In other words, they try to stay open to looking at any type of human experiences, even when materialistic premises cannot account for them. “Anomalous” refers to events which can’t be explained by currently accepted theories. The organization puts out a journal and has annual conferences, usually in different places each year. 1998 was number 17 and it was held at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Next year’s conference will be in Albuquerque, NM, probably in June. I have been subscribing to the SSE journal for years, but this was my first conference. In light of the fun I had, it may become an annual event like CGC.
I can’t begin to cover all the topics, but they included UFOs, cold fusion, reincarnation, several types of psychic research, healing with magnets, new theories about the heart, energy, distant healing, astrology (by Francoise Gauquelin), solar activity and earthquakes, near-death experiences, challenges to Einstein’s theory of relativity and to current ideas about global warning, etc., etc. The variety covered in three days was absolutely astonishing. The one thing in common was that all of the topics are disdained and rejected by materialistic science. It is incredible to think of what the establishment is ignoring, or, in the case of CSICOP, fighting to the death.
For an information junkie with a mutable dilemma, it was paradise. I took notes like crazy, was grateful for abstracts that were provided for many of the talks, and heard more new information and talked to more interesting people than I have in years. Some of the great contacts were in between the official sessions. For example, one man not on the program had gorgeous pictures of incredibly complex crop circles, and synchronicity was working because a local though relatively simple crop circle appeared nearby in Virginia while the conference was meeting. Another man not on the official program gave a three hour presentation on a free evening describing some new psychics who are producing physical phenomena in England. In a tiny town called Scole, this man watched disembodied hands appear and disappear. On one occasion, a detached hand massaged his thigh. Photos appeared on film which remained inside cameras until it was developed. The whole film would have a running scene with pictures, ancient scripts and symbols, signatures, Latin and Greek quotations, etc. Another man I met at the reception held the first evening gave me a paper on his theories about a force in the solar system other than gravity which he thinks explains some of the anomalies in the motions of Jupiter’s three moons which are closest to the planet. His theories also explain the reason the outer layer of the Sun is hotter than the interior, which is supposed to be a nuclear furnace providing the warmth that makes life possible on earth. His theories are based on resonance and harmonics, and he thinks they might help to explain astrology, but as with other physical theories, it doesn’t explain the psychological meaning we see in astrology. We have to include consciousness as a primary reality.
One of the most exciting contacts during the SSE conference was with a psychology professor at the University of Arizona, where I got my MA and Ph.D. I am just astonished at what is happening in what is basically a pretty conservative state. The U of A seems to be a real leader, with Andrew Weil M.D. at the medical school offering a full curriculum in alternative and complementary forms of healing, with a journal and regular conferences devoted to consciousness studies, and with Gary Schwartz in the psychology department doing psychic research with mediums. I told Gary that for years I had wanted to do a research project combining astrology and parapsychology, using the horoscopes of the psychics to pick out possible times when they might be more psychically open, to increase the odds for significant results. Gary says we’ll do it. Now, we both just have to design the project and make the time for it. One of his specialties is designing projects to test theories which are hard to test! Yay team.
I will just mention a few of the interesting talks at the conference. Cold fusion is not dead. I have a list with dozens of recent references. The Japanese are deeply involved in the research and close to commercial products. One speaker had studied the births of conjoined twins who shared identical heredity (they were always identical) and environment (they were never separated) yet they often had very different personalities. Someone in the audience asked if that did not disprove astrology. After the talk, I offered to explain why it didn’t but he did not want to hear it. Even in a group of mostly open-minded students, you will find limits. I sounded out the editor of the SSE journal to see whether he would be interested in an article on using asteroids in astrology and he said that was too far out for him. The answer to the question on differences in people born at the same time and place is that astrology shows psychological principles with many possible details. In the case of one pair of much-studied conjoined twins, one was optimistic and verbally fluent while the other was serious and good at detail. I do not have their chart, but am confident the potential for both expressions would be present. The depressive twin drank while the other did not. The drinker finally died of liver failure and his conjoined twin was not able to survive. I wish we could get that chart!
One fascinating talk followed up on the recent book by Dr. Ian Stevenson which describes physical birthmarks or deformities in people who had been injured in that place on the body of the preceding life. Two men had gone to Mianmar (Burma) and Thailand looking for cases in which bodies were deliberately marked before burial, with the belief that when the individual reincarnated, he or she would have a birthmark in the same marked spot. Mostly, the marks on the dead body were made with soot from the bottom of a cooking pot. The researchers located about 15 cases of this practice in which a newly born person had been identified in this way as a former relative or friend.
As I mentioned in the News Notes of the Gemini 1998 The Mutable Dilemma in the section on global warming and ice ages, one of the talks at the SSE conference attacked the current theories of global warming. The speaker, Patrick Michaels, is the state climatologist for Virginia and a professor at the University of Virginia. He presented graphs showing there was no general warming, and said that what warming was occurring was only in the colder areas of earth, so it was increasing the area which could grow crops and lengthening the growing season, while the increased carbon dioxide produced by humans was encouraging the growth of plants everywhere. In short, the feared doomsday scenario was actually a “greening” of the planet. Michaels did not touch on the ice age scenario, so we can only echo the mantram of all good scientists: more research is needed.
After a long detour through the wonderland of mutable curiosity, we had better return to astrology. One of our readers who was born in Germany was able to get the data for the recent train wreck, which was the worst in the history of the country. It occurred just outside the town of Eschede on June 3, 1998 at 10:58 to 10:59 A.M. The train is an extremely high speed one. A broken wheel derailed several cars, killing at least 98 people and injuring many more.
The outstanding feature in the chart is the mutable cross, with Mercury conjunct Mars opposite Pluto and all of them square the lunar nodes. The cardinal houses show the potential for events rather than purely mental activity. The mutable signs show possible conflict between practicality and ultimate desires. Other features show Juno (similar to Pluto) and the Moon opposite Jupiter and Pallas. Helio, a sun god for fame, squared the Virgo-Pisces opposition from Sagittarius, and it was quincunx the asteroid for the country—Germania. Libitina, a death goddess, is in 20 Aries octile-trioctile the lunar nodes so connected to the mutable cross. Hela, another death goddess, is on the Moon. Uranus is also connected, with a trioctile to the Moon and an octile to Pallas. Lacrimosa, sorrow and tears, is on the Sun. Vesta, for effective work and health, is square three asteroids in 15 Virgo: Ate (evil), Photographica (pictures of the wrecked train were in papers world-wide) and Dresden (for innocent victims). Vesta was also quincunx Nemesis in 15 Scorpio. Urania (another Uranus) was just about to rise in 25 Leo, and it was quincunx Jupiter. There are appropriate aspects, but the chart is not really impressive, so I suspect the event will not lead to any real changes in the system.
Data for another current event came from another Internet contributor who dug out the information for sending the Galaxy IV into space. This was the communications satellite which failed on May 19, 1998 shortly after 3 P.M., and left a lot of cellular phones and pagers stranded for hours or days. The satellite was launched on June 25, 1993 at 0:18 UT from Kourou, French Guiana, 5 N 9, 52 W 39. Galaxy IV had been in a stationary orbit over Kansas, but I am not sure of the time zone for the failure, which was discussed in the Los Angeles Times on May 21, 1998. Using CDT for the failure would put the transiting Moon on its own south node for a challenge to public security, and the nodes were square Pluto and Vesta in signs and houses of knowledge and communication. If the time and approximate place are accurate, a Pallas-Jupiter conjunction would have been opposite the Ascendant and square the MC. T Pluto was also quincunx Ceres and Mercury to repeat the emphasis on mutable factors, including communication and work efficiency. Four factors in Taurus, added to Juno and the north node and three angles in Virgo, highlight the need to deal with the material world. Uranus for modern technology squared Chiron in Scorpio and (more widely) Mercury in Taurus, to repeat the concern with financial matters.
The chart for the original launch of Galaxy IV has 10 Aquarius on the Ascendant and a 12 Aquarius East Point, the exact position of transiting Uranus when the satellite began spinning out of control. Engineers in the PanAmSat Corp. in Connecticut were not able to repair the satellite, putting about 90% of U.S. pagers out of commission. In addition to an estimated nearly 50 million paging subscribers, organizations such as National Public Radio, corporations with private networks including Ford, Microsoft, Xerox, Eli Lilly, N Y Life Insurance, check verification systems at thousands of small businesses, etc. were all shut down until they could locate an alternate satellite to handle their business.
The Secondary Progressions of the launch chart are dramatically appropriate. P Moon was crossing the MC, which carries the same meaning of Saturn, a chance to see how we are doing in handling the “rules of the game” in this physical world. In Saturn periods, we get a report card on how we are doing. The consequences for effectiveness can include an increase in power and success in the world. The consequences for a lack of effectiveness can lead to failure. In addition to P Moon on N MC, P MC had just reached P Pluto about a month earlier, repeating the theme of time for a report card, and P Venus continued to hold an opposition to both Pluto and P MC, hinting at the financial crisis with the signs of Taurus and Scorpio and their rulers. Adding more emphasis, P East Point was square P Moon and N MC from Aquarius, and P Juno, an alternate Pluto, squared them from Leo. And for still more emphasis on the fixed dilemma, P Sun in its own house was octile/trioctile P Venus, P MC, and P Pluto. P Chiron was also involved, with P MC square it. It would be hard to imagine a more appropriate combination to picture a major issue involving personal and joint finances and power.
Chiron seems to symbolize another Jupiter in astrology, and it can represent either the Sagittarius or the Pisces potentials of Jupiter. In addition to its square to the P MC, P Chiron was also holding a long octile to Jupiter and a long double quincunx (yod) to the Antivertex in Pisces and a tight Uranus-Neptune conjunction in the Pisces house. The mutable emphasis fits the focus on communication with the potential for separations. P Saturn in Pisces had maintained an opposition to Mars in Virgo from the initial launch, and the lunar nodes in Gemini-Sagittarius reinforced the mutable emphasis. The major focus on Pisces, 12th house and Neptune also fits the mysterious nature of the failure, and even metaphorically the dizziness one would expect to experience with continued, uncontrollable spinning.
I have not seen any material on the cause of the satellite spinning out of control, so am not sure which asteroids to search for. If it was hit and damaged by space debris of any kind, we might find Biela, Tunguska, Gubbio, Alvarez, Clube, or Marsden emphasized. If it was a mechanical failure, Uranus, Urania, Mars, and Mercury might be featured. As far as its productive life is concerned, the satellite died, so the death goddesses could be aspected, or any associated with destruction or war.
N Urania was on the IC at the launch, and P Urania in 19 Taurus was square N Tunguska in 19 Aquarius at the failure. The asteroid Interkosmos, which was named for the Eastern European space agency, was in 12 Leo, on the West Point in the natal chart, and had progressed to 14 Leo, conjunct N Juno and Marsden. Another asteroid associated with astronomical observations is called Spacewatch. It was conjunct Alvarez in 5 Virgo, with both trioctile the Neptune-Uranus conjunction. P Biela in 7 Sagittarius squared the Moon. P Gubbio in 21 Pisces was conjunct the Antivertex and quincunx Chiron to form a yod with Neptune-Uranus. N Clube was octile P Chiron from 6 Cancer, and P Clube was conjunct P Sun, N French and N Dresden. Galaxy IV was launched from French Guiana. Dresden is one of the keys to innocent victims of violence. Gallia, named for France, was in 23 Virgo, conjunct Washingtonia, and the P Antivertex opposed it. The asteroid Baikonur, named for the Russian space center which competes with the European consortium that uses Kourou and with Cape Canaveral in Florida, was on the 9th cusp octile Mars and trioctile Saturn. As mentioned, P Saturn maintained its opposition to Mars and also held the trioctile to Baikonur. P Hel squared Ceres and was trioctile Biela. P Hela was conjunct Mars opposite Saturn. Both N and P Libitina opposed the Moon and squared P Biela. The north node of Mars in 7 Gemini completed a grand cross in mutable signs and cardinal houses.
Many more appropriate asteroids could be mentioned. The P Ascendant had just reached N Icarus, who overreached and crashed, while P Icarus had retrograded to oppose Marsden and Juno and P Interkosmos, to square N and P Karma in 14 Scorpio, and to quincunx P ASCII, the communications character set. P Dionysus, another variety of extremist, was opposing the N Ascendant and quincunx the first house Pallas and Vesta. The NORC, named for an early computer, was progressing in 29 Pisces, holding octiles or trioctiles to the T-square in 14 degrees of the fixed signs and square P Apollo (the name of one of our space programs), in 29 Gemini. The Apollo 11 made the first Moon landing, a triumph for the U.S., but an earlier Apollo caught fire on its launch pad and killed three astronauts. All seven of the astronauts who were killed in our other space catastrophe, the Challenger explosion, have had asteroids named for them, but by this time, the eyes of our readers may be glazing over.
In the fascination of the multiplying asteroids, we should not forget that astrology has many other techniques, and that basic themes will be said in many ways. As previously mentioned, the south node of Mars completed a grand cross. The north node of Mars in 8 Libra was square the P Sun and P Clube, the astronomer in England who is promoting the idea that early humans feared the sky because of past strikes on earth by fragments of asteroids or comets. The south node of Pluto was on Neptune-Uranus and Pluto’s north node opposed Neptune. P Mercury was on its own south node for the challenge to communication. The Ascendant/MC midpoint in 29 Sagittarius squared P The NORC and opposed P Apollo, while the perihelion and aphelion of the Moon were also connected in 28 Virgo-Pisces. The French call the Moon’s Aphelion, where it is farthest from earth, the “Black Moon.” The Saturn/node midpoints in 21 Capricorn and 20 Aries were connected to the Uranus-Neptune conjunction. So, enough already. There are always both conflict and harmony aspects in the sky. Dramatic events are helpful for testing our theories, but self-understanding is the primary goal of astrology.