Carl Jung: The secret powers of the sun are in Aries 1.

To B. Baur

Dear Dr. Baur, 29 January 1934

Best thanks for your kind information.

So far as the argument of the precession1is concerned, this is no objection to the validity of astrology but rather to the primitive theory that the stars themselves radiate certain effects.

The precession argument says that a person born today in Aries 1, when ostensibly Aries has risen one degree over the Eastern horizon, is not born at this point of time at all but in Pisces 1.

The secret powers of the sun are in Aries 1.

Moon for instance in Cancer 7, Venus, Jupiter in similar positions, are therefore not right astronomically and so cannot be derived from these merely apparent and arbitrarily fixed positions.

Choisnard quite correctly says: "Le belier reste toujours a la 12(partie du zodiaque," etc., obviously meaning that "sun in Aries" is not an astronomical statement but an indication of time.

It is "springtime" that contains the active forces no matter in which real astronomical zodion the sun is standing.

In a few thousand years, when we say it is Aries time, the sun will be in reality in Capricorn, a deep winter sign, though the spring will not have lost its powers.

The fact that astrology nevertheless yields valid results proves that it is not the apparent positions of the stars which work, but rather the times which are measured or determined by arbitrarily named stellar positions.

Time thus proves to be a stream of energy filled with qualities and not, as our philosophy would have it, an abstract concept or precondition of knowledge.

The validity of the results of the I Ching oracle points to the same peculiar fact.

Careful investigation of the unconscious shows that there is a peculiar coincidence with time, which is also the reason why the ancients were able to project the succession of unconsciously perceived inner contents into the outer astronomical determinants of time.

his is the basis for the connection of psychic events with temporal determinants.

So it is not a matter of an indirect connection, as you suppose, but of a direct one.

Conjunctions, oppositions, etc. are not in the least affected by the fact that we arbitrarily designate Pisces 1 as Aries 1.

With best regards,

Yours sincerely,

C.G. Jung ~Carl Jung, Letters Vol. I, Pages 138-139