This series of three in-depth webinars on the planetary symbol of Jupiter were given by world renowned astrologer Liz Greene for MISPA and the CPA in 2021. Duration: 7 hours 1 minute
Jupiter: ‘Great Benefic’ or the Joker in the Pack?
Jupiter, known in Greek myth as Zeus, king of the gods, has been perceived for centuries as the ‘Great Benefic’, and many astrologers assume that this planet will always herald good fortune, opportunities for betterment, and material and emotional rewards. Sometimes this interpretation is entirely valid. At other times it isn’t, as anyone tracking the 2020 transit of Jupiter conjuncting Saturn and Pluto in Capricorn might have observed. Hopes that the pandemic would soon be over were dashed as cases of Covid-19 began to spike again and move into a second wave, while virulently partisan politics, conspiracy theories, and burgeoning fear and rage generated destructive divides between individuals, families, communities, and nations. When Jupiter transits in aspect to natal planets, the same contradictory picture emerges. Sometimes great opportunities arise. Sometimes the transit coincides with the collapse of relationships, financial hardship, the onset of serious illness, and even death. Sometimes both extremes occur at once. And in natal charts, Jupiter aspects are not always benign in the accepted sense. Take, for example, the natal Moon-Jupiter conjunction in Adolf Hitler’s natal chart, or the Sun trine Jupiter in Donald Trump’s. What does Jupiter really symbolise? These three seminars explore the enigmatic, paradoxical, and unpredictable Jupiter in the hope of finding a clearer understanding of this tricky and magical planet.
Jupiter Part 1: The Head that Wears the Crown
‘Open your mouth and shut your eyes and see what Zeus will send you.’
– Aristophanes
The first seminar of this series explores Jupiter’s mythology and psychology, and the individual expressions of the planet in the natal chart by house, sign, and aspect. We consider the terms so often used in relation to Jupiter – expansion, growth, abundance – from different perspectives, questioning what we mean by these terms, how we make assumptions based on our personal beliefs, ideals, and expectations, and how we often fail to understand ‘expansion’ in relation to talents and abilities, conflicts and hurts, and the human inclination to attempt to compensate for inner wounds and lack of self-esteem. We also explore Jupiter’s relationship to the old planetary delineation of the ‘Seven Sins’, which equated Jupiter with Gluttony and the inability to tolerate limits.
Jupiter Part 2: When You Wish Upon a Star
‘Zeus does not bring all men’s plans to fulfilment.’
– Homer
The second seminar of this series explores Jupiter’s transits and progressions and the meaning of other transiting and progressed planets moving into aspect with Jupiter in the individual birth chart. We also consider the interaction of Jupiter in one natal chart with planets in another person’s chart in synastry, and the implications of these cross-aspects in relationship. Jupiter returns to its natal place every twelve years, and we examine this planetary cycle in terms of what it might symbolise in the development of the individual’s life and the opening of doorways both dark and light on the human journey.
Jupiter Part 3: The One with the Thunderbolts
‘When Jupiter and Saturn meet,
What a crop of mummy wheat!’
– William Butler Yeats
The third seminar of this series explores the cycles of Jupiter in terms of the collective psyche, not only through its twelve-year transit through the zodiacal signs, but also through its cyclical conjunctions with Saturn, Chiron, and the outer planets. We focus particularly on the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction of December 2020 in Aquarius, the meaning of these conjunctions as described in older astrological literature, and the inauguration of a twenty-year period in which the meaning of the conjunction gradually unfolds in both the individual horoscope and the movements and shifts of the collective. Finally, we examine the symbolism of this conjunction as the beginning of a Great Mutation: the first conjunction in the element of air (with only one exception) for two centuries, and the first Great Mutation from earth to air in 800 years, the last one having occurred in 1225.