Scorpionic America Revisited
Based on the Work of David Solte (1949 - 2002)
This page is an adjunct to the six pages on this site that are devoted to the master celestial alignment of the next five years: the hugely auspicious and potentially transformative Chiron-Neptune conjunction of 2009 - 2011. This page looks at the meeting of Chiron and Neptune in relation to the work of the acclaimed and beloved Biblical scholar, mythologist, astrologer and spiritual polymath David Solte. His writings, published in The Mountain Astrologer prior to his untimely passing in 2002 at the age of 51, have been much discussed and admired ever since. His persuasive view of the USA as a Scorpio country born in November 1777, not a Cancer born July 4, 1776, gains increasing attention now as his Scorpionic America chart proves an uncannily accurate picture of where the USA is now, and where it is going in the years just ahead.
My first meeting with David Solte, in Los Angeles in June of 1995, had nothing to do with his Scorpionic America Project, or with astrology. We talked about sacred art and spiritual sound science, especially about his view of the ancient Egyptian ritual play as an alchemical tool that used precisely-aligned frequencies of color, sound, aromas and herbs, sacred geometry and planets to cleanse fear and pain from the body’s cellular memory, and lift one and all into states of love, health and serenity. Both sides of David’s mind – his sure intuition and exact knowledge – have guided me since in my journey through the ancient Egyptian music.
Our discussions of Scorpionic America began the next day, and continued through his untimely passing. Many of us to whom he was a generous soul and a treasured colleague have felt in the years since that not only has a beloved friend gone away – but he has taken with him the insights that he would soon deliver about the things that mattered to him most, at the time when they would be most needed. While none of us wishes to presume that he or she’s the one to deliver now what David intended to write himself, it is nevertheless time now, in 2008, for his ideas to be re-examined at a moment that he thought crucial to the unfolding of America’s destiny.
David and I were like-minded on three core premises:
1.) A nation’s birth chart, like an individual’s, does not reveal all of itself from the beginning, but unfolds in changes as the native moves toward maturity, so that what was latent in youth may manifest only in later life.
2.) A nation’s history, like an individual’s life, moves over time toward the fulfillment of a spiritual purpose; and the choices a country makes, like a person’s life choices, will move it toward achievement or loss, healthy relationship or estrangement, success or suffering.
3.) Both nations and individuals live through a series of ordeals that define their purpose and their possibilities. On the subject of what ordeals we considered likely for the United States in the early 21st century, David and I did not talk much about economic hardship, armed conflict at home and abroad, social and cultural unrest or environmental emergency, though all of these symptoms have manifested, or may soon as the country’s people have missed their opportunities to make more enlightened choices. Rather, the main ordeal is spiritual, in the tension and pain of fighting against insights that one does not want to accept, and the weariness that comes from resisting, much too stubbornly and for far too long, the changes in one’s actions that must come when one finally stops kicking against the pricks, and hoists aboard the truths that can no longer be denied.
David saw the early 21st century as the time when the United States would experience the consequences of its imperial vision and its violent history, and would have the chance to move into a new role of spiritual leadership, born from the healing of its own wounds and a new realization that all of Earth’s nations and life forms are so interdependent that no country or species will last long without – much less against – the others. Our purpose here, then, is to look at the Scorpionic America chart, especially in relation to the Chiron-Neptune conjunction in 2010, and see how clearly the choices that now face the United States are coded in the map of its birth.
Scorpionic America
David's rationale for devising the chart we're about to view was that the Declaration of Independence, while perhaps the most eloquent mission statement in history, was not the actual birth announcement of the new country, and was not designed to lay out how the new nation would be composed, or how it would work. The document released on July 4, 1776 was not even aimed mainly at an American audience. Its point was to deliver to other nations, whose recognition of the new country would be crucial to its survival, the “causes that impel [us] to the separation” from British rule.
The work of building the foundation would begin in York, Pennsylvania, well away from British military and money centers in New York and Massachusetts. More than a year after July 1776, by which time it was getting clear to everyone that we’d better create some rules and agreements if we’re going to come through this in one piece, the Articles of Confederation were adopted by delegates from the 13 colonies, many of whom had signed the Declaration, and would live through the coming turmoil to craft the Constitution in 1787. All the Constitution's cleverly counterpoised powers and limits, checks and balances were based on principles that had been fashioned and agreed a decade before at the new nation’s true moment of birth, when, by David’s reckoning, the Articles of Confederation were approved on Nov. 15, 1777 at 12:46pm.
The new nation was born a Scorpio with Sun square its Aquarius Ascendant. Thus, even before the committee of parents were thinking of a name for their child, the soul conflicts in this very assertive new baby – such as whether to build stone bastions of its own power and wealth, or stoke fiery engines of liberation for itself and others -- were encoded in its nature from the start. Much of its future history would be a matter of how the powerful fixed-sign dynamics of this chart would play out.
From the Dove of Peace to Muscular Uncle Sam
There was a time in the early 19th century, when there was no national anthem yet, and Americans sang “Hail Columbia, happy land!” Their national symbol was a nurturing female peace icon whose name came from columba (Latin dove). She was costumed like a composite of Isis, Demeter and the Virgin Mary: dressed in blue, crowned with stars and holding a cornucopia that poured out all of her limitless fecundity in everything from bumper crops to brave, optimistic children.
The shift in national identity and symbolism from female to male, blue to red, homemaker to conqueror, began with the arrival of Uncle Sam, whose red stripes fit the nation’s new image as well as its flag. In the late 19th century, as the USA began the imperial expansion that has continued since and is ebbing now, it was getting clear to eloquent men like Mark Twain that something in the national psyche and ethos was changing profoundly. Now, as we begin to consider the Scorpionic America chart in relation to America’s near future, we can address the pivotal question that this chart poses: Did America start as a Cancer country and turn into a Scorpio country? Or – was it really a Scorpio country all along? And does it happen at least sometimes that a nation’s chart, like a person’s, may not seem to fit him well in early life, but that he grows into it by and by until it fits him like a perfectly tailored sidereal glove?
The Scorpionic America Chart
Nov. 15, 1777, 12:46pm EST in York, PA (39N58, 76W44)
Some of the features in this chart could not have manifested early in the county’s history, but are most emphatically in play now:
1.) America is Aquarius rising with Sagittarius on the Midheaven, as befits a visionary enterprise born in revolution, founded on principles of social justice and equality, and marked by a love of novelty, a spirit of innovation, a ready adaptability and a genius for creating cutting-edge technologies, especially the electronic technologies of computers and telecommunications that largely define America's industrial position today. The effects of the Sagittarius MC are evident in the country's history too, in its optimistic confidence, its ambitious imperial vision, its desire for high prosperity and for recognition as the major international player it has aspired to be ever since the 1890's.
As of this writing in early 2008, transiting Neptune is crossing the Ascendant of the Scorpionic America chart. He will cross it again in September and December 2008, and will be within about 2° of America's Ascendant for the entire year to come, and again from October of 2009 through January 2010. This transit could not be more appropriate to the situation of the country's people now, as many of them begin to awaken to the reality that they will no longer be able to maintain their homes, lifestyles and social status, any more than their country will be able to maintain its position in the world. The probable manifestations of a Neptune-Ascendant combination, wrote the iconic astrologer Reinhold Ebertin, include "An abuse or betrayal of confidence, falsehood, deceit, the experience of disappointment and disillusionment." There will be many more depressing discoveries in this vein during the years to come, as the stunning criminality of predatory lenders, and politicians who enable them, continue to come to light. And there's more, as we'll see below at the end of this section. America's Aquarius Ascendant is linked with two other chart points in a combination that will be powerfully activated and stressed by the great Chiron-Neptune conjunction of 2009 - 2011.
2.) The well-favored 8th house, with a close Mercury-Saturn conjunction in Scorpio trine the North Moon's Node in Cancer in the 5th, promises that this country’s genius for opportunistic business, its resiliency and tenacity in the face of all challenges, will have a transformative effect on other people’s money, and will bring upheavals in other nations and lives. Venus in Libra in the 8th, trine the Aquarius Ascendant, helps explain the enduring sex appeal America has had ever since jazz and Hollywood movies both got hot.
3.) The less than lovely conjunction of Mars with the Moon's South Node (Dragon's Tail) in Capricorn in the 11th house suggests that quarrelsome habits and outright violence will impede friendship with individual countries, and smooth relations with the world community at large. One line that surely applies here is John Foster Dulles’ notorious principle that “America does not have friends, it has interests.” One can, in fact, track the history of America’s military adventures (as opposed to its legitimate military obligations) by noting which planets are moving in stress to the middle of its 11th house. It is no accident that from July of 2003 through June 2004, Saturn in Cancer transited opposite Mars and the Dragon’s Tail in the USA’s natal chart. By this time, two things were getting disturbingly clear. Iraqis were greeting American troops by throwing something less friendly than roses. And American allies were under very heavy pressure to support the USA’s effort.
4.) The chart has a brilliant grand trine in air among the Moon in Gemini in the 3rd house, Neptune in Virgo in the 7th and Pluto in Capricorn in the 12th. Here is another feature of the Scorpionic America chart that the USA could not manifest early in its life, but would begin to display from the 1930’s, when FDR was the perfect radio voice for a country that was very effective in using the mythic tones and symbols in Plutonian propaganda to galvanize the mass of its people. Yes, some features of the natal grand trine appeared right at the country’s birth, notably the Neptune-Pluto trine’s promise of a new society based on progressive principles that are spiritual as well as political. But it would not be until later, when modern media were born, that America's grand trine would achieve its full impact in lively communications that stoke an endless craving for novelty (Gemini Moon) and deliver magical illusions and that appeal to the imaginations of people everywhere (Moon trine Neptune) – while Pluto, from his undisclosed location in the 12th house, pursues his power agendas with a relentless passion.

5.) The last of the five features of the USA’s natal chart that we’ll look at here is a T-Cross – among the Sun in Scorpio in the 9th house, Jupiter in Leo in the 7th and the Ascendant (Asc) in Aquarius. Yet again, some behaviors that were unlikely in the nation’s early history, when it was young and vulnerable, and needed to tread softly among stronger adversaries, have come to the fore since the 1950’s, and manifest increasingly as arrogant, defiant posturing (Sun square Jupiter), overestimation of one’s capacities (Sun square Asc) and an excessive desire to be of importance (Jupiter opposite Asc), all combining to exasperate friends and make enemies even more implacable. As we’re about to see, the T-Cross is under almost continuous stress from 2008 to 2010. The dynamics of the Chiron-Neptune conjunction of these years will play out in relation to the T-cross, beginning with the American Election of 2008, and it will catalyze the core of the mundane and spiritual changes that are about to arrive.
How Does the Chiron-Neptune Conjunction Play in Scorpionic America?
We'll look briefly at this question by placing the Scorpionic America chart alongside a chart cast within the hours of exact conjunction between Chiron and Neptune in February 2010:

At Right: Chiron conjunct Neptune:

Feb. 17, 2010, 6:35pm EST Washington, DC (38N54, 77W02)
Please Note that the chart at right is several hours earlier than the chart shown in Chiron - Neptune Act 2: February, 2010. Both charts are within the conjunction's window of exact alignment. The chart above highlights the conjunction's relationship to the configuration of the Scorpionic USA chart.
The Chiron-Neptune chart (right) has many strong resonances with Scorpionic USA. The tremendous Sun-Chiron-Neptune-Ascendant conjunction of 2010 is aligned with Scorpionic America's T-cross, square the USA's natal Scorpio Sun and opposite its Jupiter in Leo. The implications are easy to see. With Neptune in 2010 opposite America's natal Jupiter, we are likely to see in the years ahead the financial and political consequences of deceitful business practices, fevered speculation and the malfeasance of corrupt, wasteful government -- and those are only some of the probable effects of a Neptune-opposite-Jupiter transit. Malaise is in the diagnosis too, with the Sun-Chiron-Neptune cluster of 2010 all square to the Scorpio Sun in America's birth chart.
Yet these dismal details do not tell the full story. The triple conjunction in Aquarius in February, 2010 is the motor of a powerful first-house chart that suggests a new paradigm for America’s way of conceiving itself, and projecting its power in the world: this time, finally, as a spiritually uniting and healing force that applies the country’s measureless creativity and resilience to the service of the planet by spiritual and medicinal means. The very close house alignment between the Scorpionic America chart and this one (both Aquarius rising, Sagittarius Midheaven) suggests that a cycle is now complete, and renewal is coming. Not only does the quadruple conjunction align with Scorpionic USA’s T-cross, but altogether five planets in this 2010 chart form harmonious 120° trines to planets in the Scorpionic America chart, highlighted by Venus-Jupiter transiting trine to natal Mercury-Saturn. There is an excellent opportunity here for the United States to reintegrate itself into the community of nations for the benefit of all, and to assist the coming moment of planetary transformation in the positive, brave spirit that has always been America's home tonality, the true optimistic major key of its music.
This page will be updated as events related to the Scorpionic America chart continue to unfold. For pages on the Chiron-Neptune conjunction of 2009 - 2012, see the links below.
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Copyright 2008 Dan Furst. All Rights Reserved.