Jupiter and Saturn: Stick or Twist?

After the sturm und drang of last month's Cardinal Cross, it's good to report Jupiter and Saturn are comfortably trined. Between them, these two giants symbolize growth versus contraction, liberal v. conservative, spirit v. matter... Jupiter believes a pie expands during the baking, Saturn knows if it sounds too good to be true, it will be. Financial astrologers draw heavily on these planets to predict market trends, and their mutual synodic cycle is an easy reckoner to see the shape of the world economy.

Every 20 years Jupiter and Saturn come together in a Grand Conjunction which describes a new beginning, financially and philosophically. In the Tropical Zodiac, the Conjunctions occur in the same element for approximately two hundred years at a time, with the penultimate conjunction foreshadowing the change to the next element. For example, since 1802, Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions have been in Earth, before they move to Air in December 2020. However, the second last conjunction was in Libra in 1981. The 2020 Grand Conjunction in Aquarius will see our full emigration to The Cloud.

This present Jupiter-Saturn cycle is the last to happen in the Earth element for the next approximately 600 years. Earth is security-oriented and all business: in this era we have seen the Industrial Revolution, the rise of the Banks and the model of nine-to-five work. However, this is not how life always was: setting so much store by material matters would have been considered positively Diabolical in previous ages, where faith in God's Providence was the thing. Incidentally, it is theorized that the Star of Bethlehem was the Triple Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in Pisces in AD.7.

So, we are three quarters of the way through the cycle which began in May 2000, in Taurus. The planets go through their synodic cycle, very much like the phases of the Moon: first the waxing phase: the separating sextile, square and trine. Then the opposition which is like the Full Moon - this peaked in 2010 in Aries-Libra, when the financial crash was at its scariest and everyone was predicting financial Armageddon. Perhaps the last Earth conjunction had to be a full-blown crisis, marking a clearing-out process before the next cycle in Air. Our present waning Trine in water is the first step of the recovery, where choices made at the opposition phase start bearing fruit. 

In Vedic astrology too, we see Jupiter and Saturn in their respective exaltations: Jupiter entering Cancer in July, while Saturn is at the end of Libra, until November. This shows the two principles at their strongest, with the promise of faith and generosity, and wisdom and renunciation. Somewhere, somehow, someone is thinking of the future in a smart way and good decisions are being made. The generation being born with this signature will also prove influential in politics and world affairs, perhaps after they have their Saturn Returns.

By any reckoning, this is an auspicious time to make good moves in your own life. Particularly if Jupiter and Saturn's placements trigger good things in your natal chart (placements in Tropical Pisces might benefit especially) but generally you can plan ahead under this influence and balance competing factors in your life. Mars now going direct after an epic retrograde spell is further good news if life has been all planning and no living.