On the Lord of Divination: Fire and Saturn
Exploring divination by element and the planets that rule them.
This essay is Part II of a continuing series exploring the Lord of Divination in astrology. If you are interested in learning about what that is, how to calculate yours and what, exactly, your Lord of Divination signifies, check out the last installment in the series.
The Lord of Divination is determined through the triplicity lords of the 9th house. In this newsletter, we will be focusing on the divinatory practice of Fire risings and their corresponding Lord of Divination, Saturn. By whole sign houses, one’s first house and one’s ninth house, where the Lord of Divination is decided, always share the same element. Risings of the same element also have the same planet acting as their Lord of Divination. I use this pattern to explore what divination through the elements look like and what support/shape the ruling planet gives the element.
If you use quadrant houses, which may shift the sign ruling your 9th house, then use that too! Even if you don’t have a fire rising, check your quadrant houses to see if your 9th house is ruled by a fire sign. In that case, this information will be relevant to you too.
Most of what I speak about will be framed using Gaston Bachelard’s books on the elements. Bachelard is a poet and philosopher, not an astrologer, but the elements are fundamental to human consciousness and why not get out of the strictly astro cave every once in a while? The language of the stars is spoken everywhere.
May this assay warm and illuminate your understanding of the element 🔥
Sudden Insight
There are two primary sects of Zen Buddhism. One is called Soto and is known for its gradual approach to practice. It emphasizes “just sitting,” slow movement and objectless meditation rather than focusing on awakening or some specific state. It instead takes a gentle, incremental approach. Rinzai, the other popular sect, is known for its contrasting style. It is characterized as being Zen for the samurai class, so takes a more aggressive approach to spiritual realization. Rinzai practitioners are known for loud chanting, fast walking meditation, being struck while meditating and the use of koans, or spiritual riddles that lead to sudden insight rather than gradual.
Rinzai practice makes me think of what it is like to divine by fire. Bachelard emphasizes that fiery reverie is marked by its speed: “If all that changes slowly may be explained by life, all that changes quickly is explained by fire”. Anyone who has thrown a match into a grill or seen a pile of papers become engulfed in flames can attest to how rapidly fire can grow. Bachelard connects this speed to “the desire to change, to speed up the passage of time, to bring all of life to its conclusion”. There’s an impatience, a foresight, of the change that is to come and an impetus to get to the new state quickly. You may find your insights come at your very quickly after they are called. If you are a fire rising, you are probably good at intuiting on your feet, so to speak.
Anything touched by fire is transformed, and quickly. In practice, this may mean insights come through suddenly or all at once. There may be an impatience or a desire for things to happen quickly. One potential reason for this speed is fire’s relationship to desire.
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