Cosmic & human interactions during the Apollo 17 flight to the Moon (an astrological study)

Fourty-one years ago today the last manned vehicle to another celestial body was launched (on December 7th, 1972), Apollo 17! That was the very last mission of the epic NASA "Apollo" series (that actually brought men to the Moon) and the longest one in duration. The Apollo 17 astronauts remained for more than 12 days out of the earth's protective cocoon and within the realm of the unforgiving deep space. It broke many records and among them the longest extravehicular activities - moonwalks time.So this mission is offering us a wide field - much wider than any previous Apollo mission - to study the dynamics of the cosmic and human interactions that took place in those 12 days spent in outer space and on the surface of the Moon.

The composition of the Apollo 17 crew is - under an astrological point of view - somehow iconic! You see all three astronauts belong to the same astrological "Element", to the so called "Water" element. And not only this but each one of them was representing a single sign of the watery triad! Starting with the civilian member of the crew, geologist Harrison Schmitt who is a Cancer and Ronald Evans who was a Scorpio and commander Eugene Cernan who is a Pisces, the three Apollo 17 astronauts were perfectly representing the "watery triad" (Cancer - Scorpio - Pisces).

Let's see Harrison Schmitt's chart.

And now his "triplex" chart cast for the day of the Apollo 17 launch:

And last but not least Ronald Evans':

And here is his triplex at the time of the Apollo 17 mission.

Last but not least, commander Eugene Cernan is a double Pisces (both his Sun and his Moon are in the sign of Pisces). One wouldn't think of a double Pisces (a sign portrayed as mutable, weak, confused) would be the commander of such an epic mission. Astrology is not that simple and single-layered. The sign of Pisces i.e. is a universal one, thus more proper for a space mission. And it's not "weak" in the sense an average person perceives weakness, because Pisces possess a kind of "cosmic strength". Plus, his Second House stellium bestows him with a lot of stability, practicality and earthness (his Capricorn Ascendant too). This is Cernan's chart:

(his so called "triplex" chart). On the Apollo 17 mission period Cernan had Both his progressed Sun and Mars (the two most energetic and "activating" planets in the char) in conjunction to his natal Uranus (the planet that this the ikon of space and space exploration)!

By the transits of those days we can say that Cernan experienced the launch date as if he were in a short of limbo (transiting Moon was in his 12th House as you may see below). The "unusuial experience", "space" section of his horoscope (his Elventh House) was over- activated at the time by the presence of transiting Sun and by the ruler of his own sign Neptune! All his personal planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars) were concentrated in his Tenth House - showing how importan this mission was, how responsible and concentrated, how professional he had to be on those days.

Moon-centric Astrology (a "birth" on the Moon!)

The astrological chart you see above might seem pretty ordinary to you. But it's not ordinary at all! On the contrary, it somehow is an "alien" chart! Actually, it is a "mundane" chart representing a momentous event that took place in 1969 on the Moon: the very first step of a human being on another celestial body! Thus, what you see above is a "snapshot" of the lunar sky, showing the configuration of the planets the very moment Neil stepped for the very first time on the powdery lunar surface! We are having here the first "Moon-centric" horoscope, an horoscope calculated not for some terrestrial co-ordinates but for some lunar ones instead (those of the so called "Tranquility Base" - or "Statio Tranquillitatis" in Latin)!

If you are capable of elementary reading an astrological chart, the first thing that you will notice on this specific chart is that there is no Moon depicted on it! You see this is a "Moon-centric" (and not a geocentric) horoscope, thus the Moon is symbolically located at the center of the chart and the "energies" of the entire horoscope are dynamically focused on it! But there is an "Earth" instead (you can see its glyph at the top right, in the Eighth House of the chart - as a cross inscribed in a cycle)!

Immediately, a question comes to mind: how do we interpret the Earth in a "Moon-centric" (lunar) horoscope? This is a question that actually did not substantially bothered the astrologers of the previous generations. As these astrologers were standing upon the surface of the Earth they were not perceiving Earth as a celestial body floating in space. Thus, no astrologer ever was forced to figure the astrological properties of the Earth! But we are in the 21st century, things have radically changed and the events have already surpassed us! Twelve human beings have already visited the Moon (four decades ago in fact), they walked and lived on the Moon (some of them for four whole days). In a couple of decades babies will be born on the Moon. And we earthlings have not yet developed a Moon-centric astrology! Thus, we are confronted now with the chart of the first human step on the Moon but we cannot interpret it properly because we actually ignore the astrological meaning of the Earth in a Moon-centric horoscope! All of the sudden our old tools grew inadequate...

It takes a giant leap to move from the Geocentric astrology to the Mooncentric one (and a far smaller leap to move then to a Mars-centric, Plutocentric etc. astrology. Our eventual grandchildren will be accustomed to this kind of astrologies)! Still, we will need another giant leap when we will move to the "Exo-astrology" - the astrology for the planets of the strange Solar Systems we are currently discovering. How will we deal with the alien planets of these systems and their eventual alien zodiacs? But ultimately the zodiacs of these remote to us solar systems are they alien or are they identical to our zodiac? Most probably, when we will go there we will confirm our current assumption that the zodiac is an omnipresent universal principle, exactly the same in every single corner of the Universe...

For the time being, our imperative need is to determine the astrological properties of the Earth! Is the Earth a sort of "Moon" to the Mooncentric astrology, a planet associated to the "cradle", to the roots of the "Mooners", to their past, their "inner world", their soul's particular features? This "riddle" is one of the first we have to solve in order to formulate a proper mooncentric astrology...

To turn back to our horoscope, this "first human step on the Moon" event has a Leo Ascendant (according to my calculations). A brilliant, regal Ascendant which is further strengthened by the ultra-propitious trine aspect that the Earth and the planetoid (planet to astrology) Eris are forming with it! Ultimately, this Leo Ascendant is not irrelevant to the fact that the first moon-landing turned to be a glamorous TV show that attracted the largest number of viewers till then - 600,000,000 across the Globe!

There is an oddity though regarding the Ascendants of the future "Mooners". This oddity stems out of the fact that the Moon is not rotating around its axis as fast as the Earth. It takes almost 28 days for it to perform a full rotation. This fact has some strange implications. I.e. a "day" on the Moon lasts almost fourteen of our days (for 14 whole days the Sun is located constantly either below or above the horizon)! And what is astrologically more important, all the children born within a frame of two days and a half bear the very same Ascendant, ALL of them (that's an interesting "synchronicity" with the fact that - seen from Earth - the Moon spends two days and a half in each zodiacal sign)!

The "synchronous" rotation of the Moon (it rotates about its axis in about the same time it takes to orbit the Earth) produces another paradoxical effect: in any given Lunar location the Earth seems to be eternally fixed at approximately the same point of the lunar sky, as if it were "stuck" there! This implies that the Earth is changing alright zodiacal signs every two days and a half but not Houses - in the lunar horoscopes! Therefore, all children born in a particular lunar location would have their Earth in the very same House of their horoscope or - on few occasions - in an adjacent one! And as a result of this "fixity" the Earth almost never "transits" in a Mooncentric horoscope (it does transit actually but just within a few degrees frame)! All these "oddities" must have their own intrinsic astrological meaning which we ought to decipher!

Why is there - for example - such a "spatial fixity" of the Earth in the Mooncentric horoscopes? Why is the Earth permanently emphasizing a particular House in all the horoscopes of the people born in a particular lunar zone? Why i.e. all the people born in a certain lunar zone should have an Eight House Earth in their horoscopes - regardless of the time period they were born? Is that lunar zone particularly dangerous and life threatening, invoking thus the presence there of strong, risky and sexy inhabitants - meaning with an Eighth House Earth in their horoscopes? And how the majority of these "Eighth House people" will be treating the minority of the "Seventh or Ninth House people"? These are interesting - probably vital - questions and we must find adequate answers to them.

The position of the Earth in a Mooncentric horoscope can be easily found: it is the opposite of the position that the Moon has in the corresponding Geocentric horoscope. Thus, the first thing we have to do is to cast a Geocentric horoscope for the same "Universal Time" (U.T.) our lunar event took place. Then we should note and write down the position of the Moon in it. In the corresponding Mooncentric horoscope the Earth will be located at the diametrically opposite sign, at about the same degree (i.e. if the terrestrial Moon is in the 11th degree of Libra then the corresponding lunar Earth will be in the 11th degree Aries)! I said "at about the same degree" because on Earth's surface the Moon's position may vary up to a whole degree, depending on the particular terrestrial location we are observing it from. You see the Moon is very close to us - in comparison to the other planets - so its zodiacal position changes slightly if we observe it from two distant terrestrial locations. On the other hand, the zodiacal positions of the Sun, Mercury, Venus and Mars seen from the Moon are almost the same as seen from the Earth. They vary only by a few tens of minutes. The other planets are so far away that they do not present significant differences.

For the rest, I think we should interpret a Mooncentric horoscope the same way we interpret a Geocentric one. We cannot fail to notice i.e. in this "first human step on another celestial body" chart the tight Jupiter - Uranus conjunction (both planets are in the same degree)! We couldn't get a more ideal planetary configuration for this unique event, a configuration expressing so neatly the expansion of the human species in space! And this conjunction becomes even more important if we observe that it coincides with one of the "fingers" of an impressive planetary formation called "Yod" - composed in this case by Sedna (on the base of Yod), by the Jupiter - Uranus duette at the one "finger" of the Yod and by Mars at its other. All these planets are located at about the first degree of the signs that they are in and they mutually activate each other, participating in the formation of two powerful quincunx aspects (Sedna is forming a quincunx - 150 degrees - aspect to both Jupiter-Uranus and to Mars!

Another important factor in this chart is the tight conjunction of the Earth to the planet Eris (planetoid Eris is actually considered a "planet" in astrology). Although we can make some assumptions, in reality we ignore both the astrological properties of Earth and Eris, thus we cannot say much about this pivotal conjunction. All we can say is that this is a VERY significant conjunction - especially if we take in consideration the fact that Pluto is forming a square aspect to it! Pluto and Eris are two "universal" and somehow "fatal" planets, harboring very strong and "transforming" energies in them. And indeed enormous energies have been consumed for the first man to reach the moon - not to mention that this has been a very transformative event, an event of unprecedented proportions in the evolution of the human species!

Thomas D. Gazis
Copyright:Thomas D. Gazis

NOTES:
1) Since 1997 I have been talking and lecturing over the need of a Universe-centric Astrology.
2) I first published the above article on my blog "science-astrology", on July 8th, 2012
3) Since there is no Mooncentric astrology program - as far as I know -  I had to calculate the positions of the Mooncentric planets on my own. As I explained before they do not differ much from their - same Universal Time - Geocentric positions. I am using the Equal House system.