Venus Transit

8th December 1631 (14 degrees Sagittarius)

4th December 1639 (12 degrees Sagittarius)

     * 121.5 years

7th June 1761 (15 degrees Gemini)

3rd June 1769 (13^th degrees Gemini)

     * 105.5 years

10th December 1874 (16 degrees Sagittarius)

6th December 1882 (14 degrees Sagittarius)

     * 121.5 years

9th June 2004 (17 degrees Gemini)

6th June 2012 (15 degrees Gemini)

     * 105.5 years

11th December 2117 (18 degrees Sagittarius)

8th December 2025 (16 degrees Sagittarius)

However this pattern is part of a much larger pattern. Prior to a Venus Transit in 1518 the pattern was 8, 113.5, 8 and 121.5 years. The current pattern will continue until 2846. Yet despite the fact that the gap between these 8 year apart pairs may alter slightly, the overall pattern of two Venus Transits, 8 years apart in Gemini and then over a century later in Sagittarius continues unaltered. So while this is a rare cosmic event, it is very predictable and within its own pattern is very normal. The reason I say this is that many of the 2012 conspiracy theories sight this rare Venus Transit as something the Mayans predicted and is therefore another proof that the end of the world prophecies are right. Yet it’s not a one off event and from the dates above you can see that we’ve had these twice a century, since the dawn of time and to date nothing has blown up.
 
However this won’t be repeated again in our lifetime and as the second in this current pair, what the 2004 Venus Transit opened, this next Transit will close or bring to completion. To go into a Venus Transit consciously, aware of what’s happening and when, will allow us to fully harness its energy and impact.
 
On an Astronomical level the Venus Transit has a close association with New Zealand history and we owe our discovery to the 1769 Transit. In August 1768 the Royal Academy sent Captain James Cook to Tahiti to witness this event first hand. Cook’s mission was to reach Tahiti by June 1769 and construct an astronomical observatory so that he could view Venus passing across the face of the Sun, as a dark spot against the Sun’s giant orb. This wasn’t a simple case of stargazing, rather an attempt to measure the size of the solar system. One of the great unknowns of the 18th Century was how large was the solar system? Astronomers at the time knew that including Earth 6 planets orbited the Sun, but as Uranus, Pluto and Neptune had yet to be discovered, from Saturn out was the vast unknown. Venus was the key. In 1716 Edmund Halley (of Halley’s comet fame) hypothesised that by taking note of the time Venus began transiting across the face of the Sun to the time she exited on the other side, from different locations on Earth, that astronomers could calculate the distance to Venus and therefore the scale of the rest of the solar system would fall into place.
 
The biggest problem was that Venus Transits are extremely rare and unfortunately Halley never actually lived to see one for himself. Observatories were set up all around the world, for if Cook and the other observers failed to collect this valuable data, no astronomer alive on earth at the time would get a second chance, which wouldn’t come for another 105 years, in 1874. Cook got to Tahiti 2 months early and his log of the event states “This day prov'd as favourable to our purpose as we could wish, not a Clowd was to be seen … and the Air was perfectly clear, so that we had every advantage we could desire in Observing the whole of the passage of the Planet Venus over the Suns disk: we very distinctly saw an Atmosphere or dusky shade round the body of the Planet which very much disturbed the times of the contacts particularly the two internal ones."
 
The ‘dusky shade round the body of the Planet’ that Cook referred to was a problem, because it distorted their data, with the ‘two internal ones’ he referred to being his own and the ship’s astronomer’s, out by 42 seconds; in a transit that only lasts around 6 hours. This wasn’t just a problem for Cook, with 76 points around the globe also failing to get a precise reading, with the mystery of the size of the solar system having to remain a mystery for another 105 years, when photographs of the 19th Century Venus Transits finally captured the needed data.
 
That mission complete Cook opened a sealed envelope to discover his next mission, which was to sail deep into the Southern Ocean to find the mythical great southern continent, that great minds of the day said must be there, in order to balance the land mass in the northern hemisphere. Instead Cook sailed down and discovered New Zealand and the rest is history.
 
The Venus Transit on the 6^th June 2012, which will begin at 10.15 am (New Zealand time) and end at 4.43 pm, is only the eigth since the invention of the telescope and the seventh humans have seen. Click here for viewing options.
 
Astrologically this is a Venus/Sun conjunction, which we experience on an annual basis and therefore is not a rare transit in itself, but usually Venus will pass over or under the Sun and only in a Venus Transit will she cross in front of the Sun. Here Venus and the Sun’s gravitational corridor or paths intersect in the most powerful way possible. In the space of just a few hours the Sun and Venus’ resonance converge to a point where they become one, rather than two sets of resonance working in partnership.
 
When you have over 6 billion people on the planet, all being impacted by this powerful Venus/Sun convergence at the same time, it is bound to have a global impact. The Sun is a masculine energy and the life force of the solar system, providing the life force that surges through our systems and keeps the planets themselves in orbit and as such is the centre of everything. On the other hand Venus is the ultimate female energy, so coming together will bring these two energies together in a harmonising way, helping to neutralise the Pluto/Uranus square building at the time. I think that the best way to anticipate this Venus Transit is to ask questions, for questions open the mind and the heart and leave us open to experience its full potential, rather than having our hearts and minds already made up. On one hand this might bring a lot of unification at a time when there are not only some interesting developments in Gemini, but also at what is likely to be a time of pressure from the Uranus/Pluto square. On the other hand this could see us throwing our toys out of the playpen if we don’t get what we want, with self interest prevailing.
 
On the 12th June, just 6 days after the Venus transit Jupitier, planet of luck will return to Gemini, just 6 days after whatever is to be stirred up by the Venus Transit, has been. Yet even prior to this, on the 21st May we will also experience the last solar eclipse in Gemini before the South Node leaves on the 30th August. I see this Venus Transit as less a single event and more as part of a much bigger picture unfolding in Gemini and as a possible antidote for the Pluto/Uranus square. Not all Venus Transits are felt positively at the time and that was the case with the 2004 Venus Transit. But then Saturn had only recently moved through Gemini and apart from Venus only the Sun and Mercury were there, with nothing to hold onto whatever this stirred.
 
For everyone on the planet the experience will be different, both individually and collectively. A lot will be determined by the planets you have in Gemini and what aspects this will form to other planets in your chart. Whatever is triggered by the Venus Transit will be triggered in parts of your chart that Jupiter will form the same aspects to, capturing whatever is stirred and continuing to work on during his transit through Gemini, from the 12th June 2012 to the 26th June 2013.