The Astrology of Eris

The astrology of Eris has been acting as a powerful, silent, invisible player in the story of man. There is a new planet out there beyond Pluto. Its diameter is 1444 miles, making about the same size as Pluto (1447 miles), and by examining the motion of Eris’ moon Dysnomia, the planet is determined to be about 27 percent heavier than Pluto, which means it is denser than Pluto.. It has a highly eccentric elliptical orbit and ranges from 37 AU (Astronomical Units) to 97 AU (way, way out there), and it is inclined to the ecliptic more than 44°, making it a planet of some close and intense influence, and sometimes exerting a distant and subtle effect.

Planetary orbits of the Sun are major determinants of historical cycles. This planet, Eris, takes 558.04 Earth years to orbit the Sun, whereas Pluto takes 248 years to make the same orbit. Eris moves more than twice as slowly as Pluto around the Sun. Outer planets that move slowly, staying often in a degree for a long period of time, exert a corresponding powerful influence on world events (and also on people, especially when that aspect happens to their Sun, Moon or Ascendant).

Now, since its discovery on January 5, 2005 (from images taken on October 21, 2003), it is entering mass consciousness, coming into the collective mind of man.

A  Description  of Eris 

So how does Eris in astrology work? Eris is the feminine equivalent of Mars; it is the goddess of war. As the sister of Mars, it represents the feminine side of aggression, of war, of assertiveness, of anger, and of moving out into the world. Look at the female warrior, Bellona (the Latin name for Eris), as represented by Rodin, the French sculptor. This sculpture is a prophetic rendition of the female warrior. The woman of war is an archetype that has only recently been allowed to come into the earth plane on a mass level.

Thus, the human race is experiencing a new awareness entering its consciousness. In fact, the discovery of this planet will coincide with a growth and development of a deeper side of the feminine, which is a quality necessary, if humanity is to reach higher potentials.

If the Eris archetype is developed fully, humanity may never have to experience war again. The feminine of Eris will balance the aggression of Mars. A well developed Eris archetype could banish all war. The ancient prophesy of swords turned into plowshares could be realized.

Eris the planet has always been in the solar system; it is one of the invisible outer planets, whose influence has been so powerful, like that of Pluto and Neptune and Uranus, but for ages unknown. When a planet is discovered by humanity, people discover new powers in themselves; thus, new responsibilities appear as gifts. Often they seem unbearable.

When Pluto was discovered, physicists were already theorizing that if one could split an atom, then enough energy could be released to destroy an entire city. A few years later, this happened, exactly. Two Japanese cities were destroyed (Pluto always has had a dual quality about it), and yet a war , which promised to kill possibly several million more soldiers, was suddenly ended. Great power was discovered. Its potential was self destructive, and to many that seemed unbearable. Thus the Plutonian conundrum.

The discovery of Eris brings a completely new power to humanity; it is tricky and dangerous, requiring careful handling. Eris is a regenerative planet; Eris is exalted in the sign Cancer; Erian women, no matter how warlike and violent they are, will always have a soft spot and a certain affinity with childbirth, pregnancy and nurturing young and defenseless children. Yet Erian women are the authentic warrior types—something not seen very often in the real world.

Eris is a double edged sword. The new powers released probably have to do with genetic advances that will increase the human lifespan.  The planetary influence of Eris—like all the outer planets that govern the deep sciences—rules genetic science. Increased life spans, first in multiples of tens, then hundreds, then in thousands of years, are coming soon to the human race. This will be as destabilizing to civilization as nuclear power has been in the past.

Ultimately the development of the female side of the warrior instinct will balance out this reintroduction of long life spans to the human race (yes, they have existed before). If this balance were not reached, long self-destructive wars will be fought.

The descriptions of Eris/Bellona from Antiquity describe a goddess who exhibits all the selfish characteristics and rages attributed to all of the Olympian gods. The problem here is that the ego-centric angers describe only the bare surface of the matter; it is the shallowest meaning of the planet. These descriptions completely miss its inner archetypal energy. The inner drive of the Erian requires long periods of struggle, and often the energies of the Erian work best alone. People with a heavily configured Eris in their chart, like a Sun opposition Eris, will often have to go through a Dark Night of the Soul experience at least once in their lives.

The Erian functions uniquely in close relationships with others. The Erian functions very well in a combat unit, like a platoon or a company, as long as the cohesion is created in the fire of war, under combat, where members of the unit are “family”, employing again the Cancerian influence (especially the second decanate of Cancer). You will, nevertheless, in allegory and in reality, see at times the Erian, in her armor and weapons, picking her way through the desolate landscape of war, possibly searching for renewal, for regeneration.

George Washington had an Eris Mars conjunction in Scorpio; it exactly bi-septiled his natal Sun in Pisces. During the American Revolution, he functioned in close relationship to his staff, and they all loved him. Eris gave him protection against flying projectiles. He was never wounded in battle.

Historians like Alexis de Tocqueville, writing about America have often noted–but without offering good reasons why–that American women are essentially the freest in any civilization of the record of man. (See Alexis de Tocqueville on  Democracy in America, circa 1835). Even when women did not have the vote, and they got that roughly a century ago (August 18, 1920, 19th Amendment, voting rights for women), they have always had rights of property. They have always been outspoken and free, and certainly they have had more freedoms than women other civilizations.

Astrologers can come up with lots of reasons for this, like a possible Moon in Aquarius in the USA chart (7/4/1776), and those arguments may have some truth. I think that the historic freedom of American women can be attributed to something entirely different. One of the most important aspects in the USA Declaration chart is Eris opposition the Sun Jupiter Venus, within six degrees (actually 5°11΄ away from the Declaration Sun, exactly opposed its Jupiter, and 2° away from its Venus). Erian women have always been a major part of the fabric of American life, its politics, its culture, its spiritual life. While this influence has been hidden until the discovery of Eris, believe me, it has been highly effective. In fact, an Erian woman was a de facto president in the Wilson administration (see Pluto opposition Sun).

The Astrology of Eris: How Eris Complements the Pluto Function

In the structures of man, when the old, the corrupt, and that which blocks the life force, has been destroyed, something new will be built in its place. Plutonian influence clears out, kills, destroys whatever is obstructive to the life force—then, a new temple, a new religion, a new politics, a new civilization, and a new world can be born. Pluto is the archetype that is literally the creator and destroyer of worlds.

A New Religion Replaces An Old One

After the wildly destructive civil wars in the Fourth Century AD, the Emperor Constantine, finally triumphant in all the wars of the Empire, entered the ancient and corrupt city of Rome, which was still the administrative head of  the empire. Constantine refused to offer the traditional sacrifice at the temple of Jupiter Maximus, a custom going back almost a thousand years; instead, a Christian religious service of thanksgiving was offered in churches in different parts of the city. Further, the emperor understood how corrupt ancient Rome had become, and in order to renew and preserve this vast civilization, he moved all its administrative functions—its military, its bureaucracies, its taxing agencies, its Senate and everything else—to Byzantium, a city located on the Bosporus in present day Turkey. Consecrated 11 May 330 AD, after six years of hasty construction, it was called Constantinople, the city of Constantine. No pagan churches were allowed to be built in this city. This city was built with the finest engineering of antiquity, including thick high walls making it impregnable for more than a thousand years. It became a repository of all the wisdom, culture, science, and arts of ancient Rome, Greece, Israel, Persia, and Egypt out of which Europe and the Renaissance would be reborn.

The influence of Eris, functioning in a Grand Trine, was at work here, building in this case a new empire in the midst of the decay of the old.

The destruction of the ancient and corrupt Aztec and Mayan civilizations, ones that performed human sacrifice and other abominations, was effected by a few Spanish warriors possessing advanced technology and highly educated free minds, plus that luck of Plutonian energy that always appears when it is destroying what is ancient, evil and obstructive of the life force .

Yet the building of the New World, including all its centuries-long starts and stops, well, that was all governed by the Erian archetype. Erian energies always are concerned with giving birth; that is why they work so well in the sign of Cancer.

Any nation’s chart which has a strongly configured Eris, as in the USA Declaration chart, where Eris opposes the triple conjunction of Sun/Jupiter/Venus, and inconjuncts exactly its natal Uranus, will possess certain qualities: It will be intensely concerned with nurturing and caring; when challenged, it will gladly go to war; and it will be deeply occupied with building new structures. Any influence that attempts to oppose or stop this drive to build the new temple on the site of the old will be challenged head-on until it is destroyed.

So Eris, as one of the unseen outer planets, has been exerting its influence for millions of years. It now surfaces into the conscious panoply of history. Each surfacing of hitherto hidden influence subtly changes how history itself plays out. The human race evolves, people change; a civilization and culture that have suppressed the feminine will either have to evolve or it will pass out of the human record. Eris entered the 20th century in late Pisces, the unfathomable, the hidden, the great ocean of unknowing; it moved into Aries, the sign of new beginnings, pioneering change to a deeper lived humanness.

In the early 21st Century Eris moved to 23°, 24° Aries, located in the Sagittarius decanate: Changes are demanded in the realm of belief, of faith, or the religious. Even as this is being written, there is ferment and unrest in Islamic nations, where the balance of the feminine with the masculine remains to be achieved. If this balance is not achieved the Islamic civilizations will collapse and be forgotten in the dust heap of history.

Historical astrology has noted for over a century that when various planets get to the 8° II 55΄, where natal Uranus sits in the Declaration chart, that the USA goes to war. I agree with the 8°- 9° theory. I just don’t think its focal point is Uranus.

I believe the focal point of USA wars sits with Eris instead, or to Uranus inconjunct Eris where Eris at 8° is in a partile inconjunction to Uranus at 8° Gemini, and that when Eris was activated, those wars ensued. For example, the American Civil war began on April 12, 1861, and yes, Uranus by transit was a few minutes away from that 8°55΄ Gemini natal position. However, transiting Pluto, a war planet, located at 8° Taurus 34΄was exactly trine the natal Eris of the Declaration chart, activating the inconjunct between Eris and Uranus. Inconjuncts are an aspect of separation, or stated on a higher level, they represent an aspect of rearrangement of energies so that things work better. In this case, the rearrangement involved the abolition of slavery and the collapse of the Planter aristocracy, a direction that some Americans were taking, one that threatened human freedom.

Like death aspects, war aspects do not always connote a war. Death aspects can simply mean a transformation into a new consciousness, and I have seen that happen many times, and no one died under those aspects at all either in the ones that happened my own life or in that of others.  The Saturn exactly conjunct America’s Pluto (Declaration chart) that occurred at the beginning of the actual bombardment of Iraq in the First Gulf War that began 17 January 1991 (at 27° Capricorn 33΄) could have manifested as another event, such as a restructuring of the nation’s lending institutions, or as in the formation of a new healing modality affecting millions, or as a new method of controlling nuclear explosions. Surrounding ambient events led to this war.

The world in 2018 is unstable. Irresolute purpose and a drifting foreign policy often can result in war. I am not practicing divination here, which I really do not like. This discussion simply focused on acute possibilities.