The Time of the Hierophant
The Saturn and Jupiter conjunction has brought many things to my mind. I am not a scholar of astrology or of the tarot, but both contain powerful symbols with which I create art and meaning out of the questionably meaningless struggles of life. Our nation, our world, is at a crucial juxtaposition. It is hard not to see my own struggles as an echo of these global events. It is the Time of the Hierophant.
The Hierophant is the champion of an ordered society, where social obligations and duties are meted out and enforced, much as Saturn holds us to task for our wavering discipline and recklessness. These dogmas are the creation of abstract thought and reason brought to the task of defining the meaningless, like Jupiter, and like Jupiter’s energy can as easily lead us down the primrose path as towards truth. Answers. Not necessarily true answers, but comforting answers.
In harmony, the Hierophant can symbolize the energies of Saturn and Jupiter held in balance. Saturn codifies beliefs laid out by Jupiter, and then the Hierophant governs them until Jupiter’s yearning for newness and fresh roads to traverse threatens to overturn them. Without Saturn’s maturing influence, this flush of ripe energy wrought by Jupiter will lead to neither growth nor peace, but way must be made for growth.
It’s rather like a benevolent dictator.
Out of balance, the Hierophant is anything but benevolent. If you fit into the mold cast by the Hierophant’s dominant cultural messaging, well and good. You probably are a firm believer in their truth and righteousness. However, if you are like me; A pansexual, polyamorous, transgender woman artist,a pimple on the butt of the current Hierophant’s clear dogma, being under the yoke of the Hierophant is anything but pleasant or reassuring.
For those of us cast by dogma into the role of the sinner, The Hierophant is a cruel slave master. A ruthless dictator. Trauma, invisibility, helplessness, and hopeless despair are our lot. We are trouble, and the brave amongst us poke our finger in the eye of our tormentors and laugh because we know what a sham the social ‘order’ is. We are the proof of the lies cast by the Hierophant’s shadow. It is tempting to outright reject the Hierophant and want to bring them crashing down in flames.
This is our dangerous moment.
A sitting president threatens our most cherished democratic ideals, climate change brings devastation, a pandemic sweeps the world, wreaking change and mayhem and testing our social institutions, and meanwhile, black transgender women are at the epicenter of a massive culture war, facing daily violence and the threat of legal erasure. The energies of Saturn and Jupiter are creating eddies and storms, and it is only the beginning.
The Order of the Hierophant, if it does not transform and make way for a new narrative, will seek to enslave and promote it’s ‘true’ vision at any cost. While the world spins out of control and new ideas whirl about in the myriad weavings of abstract ideas, the stern Saturn must exert its power to bring conventionality. Will it be new conventionality, addressing the trauma of slavery and colonialism, environmental danger, overpopulation, and the oppression of hetero/mono normative narratives, or an emergence of new strict authoritarianism and renewed marginalization of the oppressed? The sword of Damocles is swinging. Where will it fall? Sometimes I feel that I am right under its point and the rope is fraying.
“There’s a difference between relationship anarchy and relationship incoherency” -April Arcus 2019
This is the dilemma of playing out on our global stage. It is a problem when dogma becomes too rigid, used as a weapon to bludgeon the powerless, but it is equally as dangerous when an order fails and there is no belief system to bring balance to our interactions with each other and the world.
When our dreams of a new tomorrow race in a thousand directions at once, we threaten to bring the storms that can destroy everything we cherish. Fool that I am, have I fought so hard for freedom, only to walk off the edge of a cliff into the darkness with my gaze on lofty and incoherent visions?
