The Solar/Lunar rela­tion­ship is the arche­typ­al cycle, the mas­ter cycle, upon which all oth­er Astro­log­i­cal cycles are based. Every month we see the beau­ti­ful pageantry played out before us of the New Moon, First Quar­ter, Full Moon, Last Quar­ter and back to New Moon rhythms of the month­ly cycle.

At each moment of the cycle, at each turn­ing of the wheel, a very spe­cif­ic ques­tion and answer is offered to us by “the lights” in sky. The New Moon rep­re­sents a begin­ning, when a new impulse and ener­gy is released into our real­i­ty. The First Quar­ter rep­re­sents a turn­ing point, the turn­ing of a cor­ner or cross­roads, of the work­ing out of that orig­i­nal impulse. The Full Moon is the moment of rev­e­la­tion, the point at which the orig­i­nal impulse or idea has come to full, objec­tive man­i­fes­ta­tion for all to see. The Last Quar­ter is anoth­er turn­ing point, but this time, instead of a choice of which way to go in order to build out from and ful­fill the orig­i­nat­ing idea, now the issue is to take the real­iza­tion expe­ri­enced at the Full Moon and incor­po­rate that under­stand­ing into the unfold­ing cycle of life. Final­ly, we come to anoth­er New Moon, anoth­er release of poten­tial which will guide us dur­ing the next month­ly cycle.

We are able to take this basic cycle rela­tion­ship, and the mean­ings gen­er­at­ed by each cycle moment or phase of the Sun/Moon cycle, and apply those inter­pre­ta­tions to the oth­er plan­e­tary pair cycles. The basic tem­plate pro­vid­ed by the Sun/Moon cycle can be our guide for the under­stand­ing of each plan­e­tary combination.

At the same time, we must be aware that the inher­ent mean­ing of each com­bi­na­tion of plan­ets will deter­mine the con­tent, that is, it will denote the theme of what is devel­op­ing in the var­i­ous phas­es of any cycle. But the pur­pose and mean­ing of each phase in the cycle will fol­low this tem­plate found­ed by the exam­ple set forth by the Sun/Moon cycle.

Astrol­o­gy is, in part, a sci­ence of cycles. The pri­ma­ry cycle with­in Astrol­o­gy is the cyclic rhythm of our jour­ney from Dark­ness to Light. As we look at the var­i­ous com­bi­na­tions of the plan­ets day after day, we can always come back to this fun­da­men­tal truth that is revealed to us by the dance of the Sun and Moon.