The Role of Mercury in Evolutionary Astrology

Jeffrey: The first way we are going to be talking about Mercury and its role in evolutionary astrology, and in our consciousness. It may sound somewhat abstract.

We are going to be talking about the nature of consciousness, but then we will apply it specifically to birth charts, i.e. putting Mercury in various signs, houses, and aspects to make it as concrete as possible.

The very first thing to understand about the necessary role of Mercury is that it correlates in the human consciousness to the need to give order and linear structure to the nature of phenomenal reality.

Now what this means is that what we call reality or creation of itself is phenomenal. In other words, this blackboard that is next to me does not call itself a blackboard. I do, you do. What this means is that the nature of existence is inherently phenomenal, simply the creation of appearances.

Now for the human consciousness to feel secure, emotionally secure, it has to give names to all the phenomenal forms and images in order to create a linear structure of reality. One name, blackboard, connects to another name, floor, wall, room, building, parking lot, the city of Tukwila which we are now in, the Northwest, and, of course the planet, then the solar system, etc.

My point is that of itself these things don’t call themselves these names. We do.

So Mercury provides this role of intellectually ordering the phenomenal nature of existence. Now we can ask the question: “How does it know what to call anything?”

One of the reasons is to he able to communicate with each other through a consensus agreement of what is called what. If most people agree to call this phenomenal object a paper, instead of a sink, then there is a basis to communicate with each other. The bottom line is that we have, as part of consciousness, senses. Consciousness actually creates the phenomena of what you call senses: tactile, hearing, and so on.

These are extensions of consciousness. In other words, if we approach a corpse, that is to say a physical body that is dead, it is no longer sensing. I can not walk up to a corpse and somehow put bread in its mouth and expect it to chew and/or taste the bread. There has to be consciousness to make that body sense, to be in motion. So what 1 am suggesting is that what we call senses are an extension of consciousness into the physical body. Now this is necessary because it is through the vehicles of senses that thought and perceptions are ignited in consciousness.

Now thought is a Mercury function. There are two types of thought. There is linear and rational thought, or what we could call deductive thought which is specifically linked with the left brain and Mercury. And there is intuitive thought, non-rational, non-linear, which is of course the right brain which correlates with Jupiter. My point is that based on sensory stimulus the very nature of this stimulus will actually induce or ignite thought.

The bottom line is that that which is ignited, thought through senses, induces ideas: this is a blackboard next to me. Through senses I perceive form and function which allows for the idea to occur in consciousness. This very same mechanism, this dynamic, is that which ultimately orders all phenomenal reality.

The point is that as we move through life, in any given life, we continue to have experience, meaning we continue to collect information and data from our external and internal environment. This ongoing collection of information and data continuously ignites more thought and perceptions which ultimately leads to the creation of whole thought, and how whole thoughts are ultimately connected to other thoughts to create an intellectual whole, an organized mental whole that generates our mental understanding of our experience called life.

These thoughts are of course linear and deductive by nature. The very essence of Mercury via the left brain correlates to deductive logic, not inductive logic.

Deductive logic simply means one phenomenon linked to the very next phenomenon and so on to build a whole. An example would be analogous to taking a jigsaw puzzle out of a box and throwing it randomly on the floor. Of itself it is not now organized and yet has inherent organization within it. Sitting there it is a mess.

As we begin to make connections (Mercury), i.e., this piece fits this piece, we enter into a deductive logic process in which we finally get the whole picture. All the parts finally are connected. This is a simple example of how Mercury works, and through the process of deductive logic we generate intellectual systems that help us organize as whole thoughts our experience of phenomenal reality.

This is very important for those interested in human history for example. The very nature of thought/perceptions which are based on inner and external stimulus is the very basis of what we call language. The question is, since the human species happens to have been on the planet a whole long time all over the earth, why is there not just one language? We are all human beings, same species. Why not just one language? Why has there been this incredible diversity (Mercury) of language systems on the planet? Why? Anybody ever asked this question? Too boring to ponder?

Very simply it reflects the evolutionary condition of the Soul, and is ultimately linked to the geographical locality of a people and the evolution taking place there. In other words, if you found yourself in aboriginal Australia, an aboriginal Soul, that is now living in the Outback of Australia, your experience of phenomenal reality in that type of organized ecosystem would he fundamentally different than if you found yourself in the late Renaissance of Western Europe.

The very nature of your perceptions and resultant thoughts would be different, and as a result your language would be different.

Audience: “Where does invention come in, like say the light bulb? Before it existed there was no thought, no experience.”

Jeffrey: Well, ultimately you are asking a Uranian question, and the basic issues here, and this is probably a matter of debate for some: can anything really be invented, or can it simply be attuned to and, thus, create the appearance of an invention.

My point is that in my opinion all that is called Creation in totality, and in potential, was manifested at the same moment, and yet through the process of evolution, which is a non-debatable issue when linked with time and space, the evolutionary requirements of the species on any given planet determines that which it is attuned to in order to advance the development of the species at that time. So this to me is a Uranian principle, or what is called in the astrology books the “higher mind”.

So the nature of language then is very important to understand. How many of you have studied different languages? For those that have studied different languages, is it not true that by absorbing yourself into the language framework that you are studying that it alters your perceptions of reality? This is my point.Mercury provides this function, and it is totally based on the evolutionary requirements at hand.

So language becomes a vehicle, obviously through which we communicate (Gemini, Mercury, Virgo) that which is the basis of our perceptions, the basis of our intellectual thought process. The very nature of communication itself is an ongoing learning experience. When you communicate with someone else more often than not you are going to hear something that you had not thought about.

That is why people talk in essence. And so here you are collecting yet more information. So it is an interesting process because as we generate experience of external phenomena stimulus it ignites internal stimulus manifesting as perceptions and thoughts; and vice-versa which becomes perpetual. This is the essence of the learning process. Stimulus, again, is the very basis of thought and perceptions in consciousness. And consciousness evolves according to the requirements of time, space and geographic locality. Mercury thoughts are linked to perceptions and how we perceive, which in turn becomes the basis, as this progresses, of our intellectual framework. Rational, deductive, linear thought: sequential thought.

This is very different than Jupiter and the right brain. Again, the right brain is non-linear, non-deductive, “non-rational”.

Jupiter’s function is to provide an abstract or conceptual basis for that which we perceive and think about. If I find myself in aboriginal Australia and I am dealing with the nature of my phenomenal experience there, and I am generating language and perceptions and thought processes, at some point I am going to have to wonder, “What does this mean? What are the larger connections?”.

Right when I ask such a question this ignites the right brain. The point is that the right brain supplies conceptions or abstract principles to the linear and deductive thoughts of Mercury. This becomes the basis of what we call beliefs. The point is that Jupiter is the archetype in consciousness that makes us aware as a species, and as individuals, that we are connected to much more than just the immediacy of our physical environment; our eyes can perceive that there is a sky, stars, and planets around us.

This gives rise to the larger questions of consciousness. How am I connected to this part of the universe, which becomes the basis of belief or religion or philosophy or metaphysics.

All of us do this. If you examine the nature of civilizations East and West through time, you will find in every single one of them mythologies or religions that correlate to the individual’s and the species’ connection to the cosmos throughout time. This is a Jupiter function.

Now here comes the big issue. Who is right and who is wrong? Whose perceptions/beliefs are right? Whose are wrong? Are they all right, or are they all wrong? Are the exceptions/beliefs/ideas of Roman Catholicism somehow more relevant and right than the perceptions/thoughts and beliefs of a Tibetan Buddhist? Is my version right? Who is wrong? Who decides these things?

The obvious issues – and here it comes – is that whatever your evolutionary condition is, i.e. what your Soul needs in each life to facilitate its ongoing growth, will determine the nature of your perceptions, which in turn determines the nature of your beliefs. If you have evolved and find yourself in a consensus state it simply means that your perceptions and ideas (opinions) are determined by your Soul’s need to be in a consensus state, and as a result you will simply become a vicarious extension of the consensus beliefs of your particular culture. Do you understand this point?

If, on the other hand, you are trying to be free from the consensus, to individuate and think for yourself, then your perceptions/thoughts and beliefs will simply equate to individuated thinking. Your thinking process will primarily be based on rejection and rebellion of consensus held beliefs as you seek to determine an intellectual/philosophical way of understanding the nature of your individuality as linked with the cosmos.

If you find yourself in a spiritual state, which is very different than religion in the sense that religion is for the consensus, then you will ultimately realize that all perceptions, all beliefs, all paths lead to the same point of Creation. It is the ultimate Piscean symbol of unity in diversity.

This is a graphic point because if you will examine the nature of Mercury and Gemini you will find that it is connected in the natural zodiac to a mutable cross: 3rd/Gemini, 6th/Virgo, 9th/Sagittarius, and the 12th/Pisces. This mutable cross creates a natural state of dynamic tension within consciousness.

Why is this and what does it represent, symbolize, in the area of consciousness?

We have a natural conflict here between deductive and inductive logic. A natural conflict between singular and sectarian points of the view, and universal points of view which are not sectarian based. The tension of inductive and deductive logic is a quite dramatic issue, particularly in this type of culture.

Most of you, at least in this room, have grown up in an educational system that places a premium on left brain, linear deductive processes. When you go to school you are basically asked to memorize what you are being taught, not the conceptual basis of what you are being taught. Most of you have been exposed to these systems in your early educational environments, and even in your parental environments, and have not found, as an example, meditation as part of the educational curriculum.

Audience: “Why do you think that is? Do you think that the U.S. and Canada are – I don’t mean to generalize – in a lower evolutionary state than, say, the East?”

Jeffrey: It is not a matter of judging at all. It is simply a matter of observing the phenomenon itself. Because when you break down the nature of existence by way of the human species, it ultimately comes down to each individual. I mean, why is it that the Soul decides to be born in the U.S. versus Zaire or Tibet or New Caledonia? That reflects the individual Soul’s requirements karmically and evolutionarily speaking. So to answer your question specifically, it was based on the developments of Renaissance Europe and the transference between natural science, which is based upon observation and correlation, to deductive and empirical science, i.e., the effort to prove empirically that which is perceived as phenomenal.

So, whereas those of the East do the very same proving through the inner microscope so to speak, those of the West try to prove it through the external microscope. My point is that neither one is better or worse, it just is and, in fact, can be quite complementary to each other if one’s philosophy is universal in nature versus sectarian and dogmatic. So you have this dynamic tension between deductive and inductive logic. The point here is that inductive logic, the very essence of the thing, is to grasp the whole first in such a way that the parts reveal themselves in their own natural order.

Whereas the deductive approach, again, attempts to build the whole out of the parts. In this type of culture this becomes a major conflict. Why?

Because no matter what culture you find yourself in, East or West, you still have a right and left brain. You still have an intuition and deductive intellect. You still ponder and ask the big questions. You still have spontaneous realizations which are not products of deductive analysis. Yet, because you have been conditioned by this culture to empirically prove everything that you think that you know, this creates a conflict between the right and left brain.

As a result many people in these types of cultures tend to doubt (Virgo, 6th House) what in fact they are intuiting (Jupiter, 9th House), and through the Pisces and the 12th House symbol confusion results. My point is that Pisces and the 12th House archetype linked with this type of issue will cyclically or perpetually dissolve any thought/perception/idea/opinion that is limiting the necessary growth of the Soul. How many here have not experienced intellectual confusion?

This is the experience of Pisces coming through Gemini, Virgo, and Sagittarius. Even if you find yourself right brain based and have these magnificent philosophical structures to explain yourself to yourself and others, if those belief systems or philosophic structures themselves are only a version of the whole truth then, at some point, those very happy beliefs will not be so happy any more. They won’t work.

The whole point of Pisces linked with this dynamic is ultimately to embrace the whole truth, not a version of it, not a limited understanding of it: all of it, Unity in diversity, all paths leading to the same point.

Now believe me, the left brain can not prove any of this. Of itself it is limited. So at some point in order for such a truth to be grasped there has to be a transference in consciousness from the left to right brains as your primary guide in your consciousness. That is to say, allowing Jupiter to lead Mercury, not Mercury leading Jupiter.

Now when we link this with astrology you can put Mercury in various houses and signs and aspects. What is this going to tell us? If you have Mercury in Scorpio, or in Virgo, or in Pisces – amazing position for the thing – or Mercury in whatever sign, is this at all suggestive of what kinds of perceptions and thought processes you are going to have? Is it at all suggestive of how your intellect – left brain – is of itself naturally oriented to the phenomenal existence?

Is it suggestive of how you are going to intellectually put together and then communicate the nature of your phenomenal experience and existence? Is the Mercury in Scorpio going to be different than the Mercury function in Taurus? Are the very nature of its thoughts, how it arrives at those thoughts, how it puts together one thought with another thought, and how it communicates such thoughts, going to be different?

And then the question becomes: why is it that your Soul would choose to have Mercury in whatever sign, in whatever house and with whatever aspects? Clearly the ultimate answer is to facilitate the very next step in your evolutionary development. If we look at it this way, is one Mercury in whatever sign better or worse than Mercury in another sign? Why judge it at all? Why not see it as necessary?

If we illustrate some of this stuff, if you find yourself with Mercury, say in Scorpio in the 1st house, what kinds of thoughts and perceptions do you feel such an individual may have? How are they going to be intellectually putting together their reality? How would you anticipate such an individual would communicate? Who has an idea here?

Let me ask a rhetorical question first: do you think the person is going to be intellectually interested in superficial conversation? Do you think such a person would indiscriminately read any book? Why not? If you answer no – you are all shaking your heads – why not? Is it just possible that this signature is looking for very specialized information that reflects the general and overall sense of purpose in life? And is it also possible that by narrowing upon specialized information relative to the implied purpose, whatever that may be, that this narrowing could produce intellectual limitations that would be reflected through resistance to other sources or forms of information? If so, how would this impact on the individual’s way of communicating, and how he or she listened to or received communicated information from other people?

Audience: I know an individual with Mercury in Scorpio in the 1st house and it would appear that his mental nature, the nature of his Mercury, penetrates down to the Soul level, always recapitulating knowledge and going deeper and deeper, stirring it up and transforming and evolving it.

Jeffrey: Okay- Is it also possible for a Mercury in Scorpio individual to experience within itself, as a consequence external to itself, periodic limitations in its thought process; that they have reached some sort of limit?

Audience: By the nature of Scorpio going deeper and deeper, there would always be boundaries that had to be gone through and penetrated at deeper and deeper levels. One would assume that it would be a frustrating and liberating position. Frustration when they reached that boundary, and then liberating in terms of a great inductive breakthrough, i.e. Jupiter seeing the bigger picture, going to a deeper level.

Jeffrey: Okay. It we put this very same Mercury in Scorpio in the 1st house it is like a de facto Mercury in Aries. Are we going to be looking for a person who is wanting to do independent thinking, to at least challenge (Aries archetype) the pre-existing opinions of many other people? Is it basically going to want to be a free thinker? If these are related archetypes, is it not going to have the ability (Mercury in Scorpio) to penetrate to the intellectual limitations or weak link in somebody else’s argument? By being able to penetrate to somebody else’s weak link, is it not in a de facto sense attempting to prove the worthiness in its own thought process?

At minimum we would say such a person is an intense thinker looking for bottom line information that correlates to its life experience, and its requirements. Those very over-all life requirements are the determining or causal factor in the information that it selects to bring in. This is why it would have no tolerance for superficial, indiscriminate information. The Mercury in Scorpio within consciousness would instinctively operate in this way. If we contrast this Mercury with Mercury in Libra, and put the Mercury in Libra in the 11th House, now what kinds of thought processes, perceptions, communications, information gathering would we anticipate?

Audience: International mediator.

Jeffrey: Let’s remember this very deep issue about Libra. You have to remember its natural polarity is Aries. In order for a Libra archetype to understand its individuality, i.e. the Libra/Aries polarity, it must initiate a diversity of relationships with a diversity of types, with a diversity of opinions, a diversity of value systems, and a diversity of belief patterns in order to evaluate its own individuality through comparison and contrast.

If you have this as a Mercury function within the 11th house, have we not potentially magnified the potential volume of relationships and information necessary? In this initiation is it not possible for a Mercury in Libra person at some point to lose sight of its own individuality, what itself thinks, what its own mental process is, its own ideas and opinions? Is this not possible? If this occurs could we not anticipate the Mercury in Libra person running about trying to validate itself through the opinions of other people?

“What do you think about this?” would be a typical Mercury in Libra statement. Could we not say in general terms that the Mercury in Libra person is intellectually oriented, is going to have a primary focus, to understand the nature of human dynamics and human relationships, and, more broadly, the inter-relationship of everything within Creation? And this being the very basis of its need to communicate and initiate with so many. Does this make logical sense to you?

What if you have Mercury in Pisces? Let us put it in the 3rd house, the natural Gemini house. If you have Mercury in its natural archetype, i.e., the 3rd house which is linear, sequential, deductive thinking and yet the very essence of Pisces is the antithesis of this archetype, is there not a natural internal conflict within this person’s mental process? Is it not logically seen in this way? Is not the Mercury in Pisces of itself going to naturally think in metaphorical terms or parables or analogy: poetic?

Our fellow friend Jesus had six planets in Pisces in the 3rd house. How did we experience his communication? Still trying to figure it out, eh? Pisces!

Audience: “How do we know he had six planets in Pisces in the 3rd house?

Jeffrey: It was a chart rectified by a theologian named Moby Dick. Funny name. His real name was Donald Jacobs. He is the father of Jayj Jacobs. He bases it on the Bible and rectifying. I mean, he was a theologian so he studied Biblical history obviously. Of course there are many charts created for Jesus by astrologers, but you know if you study Biblical themes yourself and read what he researched it would in all probability make intuitive sense to you

.

As an example: all those Pisces planets in the 3rd house are opposed by Pluto and Mars retrograde in Virgo within the 9th house. Is that possibly a symbol for crucifixion based on beliefs? It has Mercury in Aquarius: the unexpected message. It has the South Node in Scorpio conjunct Neptune – the son of God. Sagittarius rising – all the traveling that he did in his early life, let alone within Judea itself.

And why is it that so many of his analogies are linked with fish and fishing; the “miracle” of walking on water; the emphasis on healing, and the one God which is the essence of all gods and goddesses which were so prevalent in those pantheistic times.

My point is that here is a man who clearly spoke in parable, metaphor, and analogy. It is one of the very reasons that Christians have been confused ever since. It becomes the breeding ground of sectarian points of view. This is the problem with Mercury in Pisces, that the Mercury part of this individual can sense, perceive, much larger wholes, much larger frames of reference than the Mercury function itself can logically order. As a result it must speak in metaphor, parable, allusion; to allude to something much larger, higher and grander.

This of course is problematic for many people who find themselves in modern societies. How many current modern societies in the West honor such an intellectual function? What happens to such a person when they are exposed to public education in 1989 in America? So typically this particular symbol learns (Mercury) to adopt (mutable archetype) the language systems of the culture that it is exposed to. Therein lies the origin of the conflict. Do you understand?

We can also link Mercury to various planetary aspects as conditioning this function. As an example, what if we had somebody with Mercury inconjunct Uranus? What kind of thinking process, perceptual process, intellectual organization process, and communication process would we anticipate in such an individual?

Let us remember that the essence of the Uranian archetype is to liberate from any pre-existing condition which is limiting growth, and as a result sets up the need to rebel. Let us agree, if we can accept any form of metaphysics, that Uranus at this level can correlate with the Universal Mind, the archetype that has been in place since the beginning, the blueprint which we only have to attune ourselves to somewhat like the radio dial. The signal exists. You just have to tune into it.

Audience: That linear thought becomes non-linear on occasion.

Jeffrey: Let me ask a rhetorical question now. Is it not possible in that person’s consciousness that their radio dial, i.e. their inner Mercury process, is attuned to a signal (Uranus) that they find great difficulty (inconjunct) in finding the specific words (Mercury) to communicate through?

Audience: Would you then say that the individual is unable to explain the notions and concepts that he or she has of the greater?

Jeffrey: Yes, he or she would find very deep difficulty in finding the specific language or word sequence.

Audience: That Mercury by its nature moves an individual toward liberation and so in that moving toward liberation you have a rhythm and a build-up, and then every once in a while it will trip, you know, spontaneous Uranus, and it will get like a spark, liberation. Then, it is like a radio tuning out as soon as it gets strongest.

Jeffrey: That is right because one of the very deepest experiences of an inconjunct is inadequacy; less than perfect. So if you have got this mental process that is attuned to something higher than itself, and it is now trying to find a word to explain it, it is simultaneously aware of its inadequacy. This creates frustration in the communication. It can paralyze the individuals’ mental process.

This is analogous to the centipede that has a thousand legs. The thing is fine as long as it keeps walking, but as soon as it tries to figure out how, say, leg 46 works, it is over: paralyzed. So the whole challenge of the Uranus/Mercury inconjunct is to speak as it comes, not to (inconjunct) analyze as it is coming. If that happens you have leg 46 in operation.

Even if you look at it at a brain level, you know, Uranus happens to correlate with dendrites in the brain. Dendrites are responsible for the evolution of the brain. It also correlates with synapses and all the wiring of the brain as does Mercury.

Well, if you have Uranus linked with Mercury it is like 10,000 watts coming through a 5 watt bulb. It tends to blow itself out. It can create a tremendous excitation in the brain.

When you see that particular signature all that you have to read yourself is that that is a Soul that is planning to rapidly evolve its brain in this life, to create all kinds of new dendrites, all kinds of new realizations. Any time you have an “aha”, or a new realization, or a new thought you have never had that spontaneously occurs, that is a dendrite being made in your brain. You are experiencing within yourself Uranus. And, of course. Mercury kicks in and tries to find the linear word sequence, logical sequence, to explain what it just spontaneously got. That is when frustration can occur.

These are typically people who have obviously unique and original thoughts. Yet those very thoughts can be so far ahead of their time (Uranus) that it creates crisis (inconjunct) with many others who attempt to hear it, or listen to it.

Keeping in mind that Mercury correlates with the anatomy of hearing. It can overload the nerves that allows us to hear. People tend to – Mercury – tune out or externally rebel against this person’s communications. Why?

They are challenging the existing status quo of mental consensus; thus the emotional security dynamic in consensus type people. Guess who had Uranus in the 3rd house Retrograde in Virgo? That’s right: Einstein. Most of us remember the little slogan he made for us: when genius interfaces with mediocre minds you should expect violent opposition. The essence of this interface is resistance because of the challenge to the existing status quo mind-set.

Audience: Immanuel Velikovsky had Mercury conjunct Uranus, and he came out with his book way ahead of his time, and was ostracized by the scientific community as a result.

Jeffrey: That is very true. In fact if we carry that particular example forward he postulated, based on his theories in the 1950s, that if his theories were right they would find a certain type of climate on Venus. This was before they sent any spaceship up to Venus. At that time the prevailing scientific community had a completely and altogether opposite view of what that atmosphere would be. Of course he was roundly criticized, blackballed from university speaking and so on for 20 odd years. And then when they sent the space probe up to Venus guess who was right? So now he is revered. His ideas were ahead of their time.

The last thing to grasp is that we are going to have transits of Mercury. Also we are going to have a sign on the 3rd house cusp, and it is going to be ruled by a planet which also then directly correlates to this mental function of organizing the phenomenal nature of reality.

There will be a sign on the 6th House, and a planetary ruler which will correlate with the analytical function of rational intellect. There will be a sign on the 9th House, and its planetary ruler, and, of course, a sign on the 12th House with its planetary ruler which all contribute to this left brain/right brain function of consciousness in a total sense: from ideas and perceptions to a philosophical belief system dynamic that allows any individual to understand the nature of his or her existence. And yes, we must consider the specific nature of the houses and signs that Jupiter, Mercury and Neptune manifest through.

This may sound like a lot to understand, but this total dynamic is the basis of understanding how all of these signatures, these planets are always transiting through the birth chart all the time. If you just key in on those particular transits, and particularly Mercury since that is what we have focused on today, you will find exactly where you are seeking new information at any point in time, and how this new information either supports or conflicts, obliquely or directly, your pre-existing intellectual apparatus, your pre-existing opinions, your pre-existing beliefs at all times.

If you have a transiting Mercury moving through the 3rd house for example, what would be a simple analysis here? Is it not a simple statement that that person’s consciousness is looking for new ways to understand the nature of their life at that point? And that the sign that it is transiting through will determine the quality and type of that information?

Let’s say you have Cancer on your 3rd house and let us assume that maybe you have had some difficulties in your biological family. Now let’s say that the transit of Mercury moving through the 3rd house correlates to a period of time in which the person naturally reflects on that early environmental experience, and as a result seeks new ways of understanding (Mercury) that experience in his or her life. Is it not possibly a time in which the person may attempt to initiate conversation with those parents, maybe a time in which a new book on the psychological dynamics between children and parents was read, or maybe going to a seminar, workshop or class for this purpose?

Audience: I see the impulse to gather more information and churn it around to communicate more, but isn’t that focus of understanding going to be based upon a Jupiter transit?

Jeffrey: The connection to a larger understanding would be. The collection of information is Mercury.

Audience: In the case of a Mercury transit as to the 3rd house or anywhere else, is there really any desire for understanding attached to it?

Jeffrey: Of course. I mean that is the very nature of going back to where we started. Why would I call this a blackboard? For me to feel secure I have to intellectually organize my reality, to give it names. Then later on Jupiter kicks in and simultaneously links it with abstract concepts and beliefs.

Another example: what if we transit Mercury in Scorpio through the 12th House. What would we anticipate? And let us say that it is going to be there at least a month. And what would happen if it went retrograde there?

Audience: Intellectual chaos, but eventual transformation. That could be a tremendously evolutionary leap depending on how you dealt with it. If you go inward it would kind of be like a sifting through, a travel through space, but eventually when the transit leaves then the person is going to come back out having better knowledge.

Jeffrey: Yes, but it presumes that the person allows for a metamorphosis of pre-existing intellectual structures that are limited to be dissolved. If there is an allowance of that dissolution then it can translate into inspiration, new inspired thought. On the other hand, the person may experience within him/herself all kinds of thought demons in their consciousness which they can not trace the origin of. They might at that point feel like they are a prisoner (12th house) of their own mind. Or, depending on how it is handled, it might be a time frame in which the individual attracts to him/herself people, based on their own inner need, who have all kinds of highfalutin 12th House way of explaining reality (Mercury) that now confronts the person’s existing intellectual structure. Of course, in typically Scorpio language, the person may say “Why is this happening”?

How many of you have Mercury retrograde in your chart? Some of you probably do and don’t know it. How many have a retrograde planet forming an aspect to your Mercury, your Mercury itself not being retrograde? Almost all of you now have Mercury retrograde! These are called oblique retrogrades.

Now when you have Mercury retrograde at birth just think of the retrogrades as an arrow, an arrow that is pointing to Jupiter. In other words, it is attempting, through its left brain function, to make it “non-rational”.

Evolutionary speaking, this particular symbol means to intellectually/philosophically simplify. It means evolutionary that there have probably been some prior lives in which the person has not been intellectually discriminate, and has collected at random too much information and data to the point where the intellect has been overwhelmed and confused.

As a result the individual comes into life into which he or she must exercise extreme discrimination in terms of what information it allows itself to bring in that is specific to the person’s evolutionary purposes. This is why typically, not always, but typically retrograde people, when they go through a learning experience, if that information is not pertinent to their personal purpose they are going to have a very hard time taking it in. They just tune out.

Audience: “Why is that?”

Jeffrey: Why? Because they are trying to only select information that is pertinent to their personal purpose.

Audience: “Where does that come from – connected to your own personal purpose?

Jeffrey: Well, I just gave the answer a moment ago, that in most cases ..

Audience: I need to hear that again, I have Mercury retrograde!

Jeffrey: That typically these people, prior to this life, have indiscriminately selected and collected too much information and data to the point where the mental apparatus is overloaded. Confusion, too many competing perspectives, intellectual doubt.

As a result they come into a life in which they must exercise extreme discrimination in terms of what information they take in which is now specific to their personal purpose. This is why we have advocated for many years that, at least in this type of society, there should be schools for Mercury retrograde people, taught by Mercury retrograde teachers! It makes logical sense. Where is the school? You start one. Somebody has to. We’ll call it Mercury retrograde school.

Audience: To help people discriminate, is that what you are saying?

Jeffrey: No. It simply requires very personal attention in education; to teach the child or the adult what they are interested in at the time they are interested in it. Then they will take in what is being taught wholesale. It is almost like a photographic memory at that level.

But you have to remember that you have a natural dynamic of Gemini/Sagittarius/Virgo and Pisces. If the person is in fact not interested in what they are hearing they tune out. They kick in Pisces/Neptune. They space out and they have fantasies or imaginations that are more interesting than what they are being exposed to. Any more questions?

Audience: Yes, I would like to know what is your idea, what do you think about the idea of Pluto being exalted in Gemini?

Jeffrey: You want my opinion? Bullshit. To me there are no such things as falls and exaltations. It is just what it is. This is old time astrology.

Well, we must conclude this lecture now. I hope you have all found something interesting here today, and thanks for coming. God Bless.