It’s kind of a slow week in the night sky, if there can ever be such a thing. The planet Saturn ended its retrograde last week, the same day that the Moon came Full near Uranus. We’re past the peak of this month’s second meteor shower, and while the world of astrology is abuzz with the apparent movement of the dwarf planet Pluto, I want to talk about Andromeda, the constellation of fixed stars that is crossing the zenith this month, making this an ideal time to see it.
One hundred years ago next month, astronomer Edwin Hubble announced his discovery of the spiral nebula Andromeda, proving for the first time that our own Milky Way was but one of many galaxies in the vast universe. This was a groundbreaking discovery that opened the world of space beyond our own galaxy.
During the 100 years since Hubble’s announcement, astronomers have realized the existence of anywhere from 200 billion to two trillion galaxies, demonstrating an exponential growth in human awareness about what’s “out there.” The ancients experienced an intimacy with the celestial world, ascribing qualities to it that were matched by the soul capacities of human beings, which leads to the question: have our capacities for “being human” matched the growth rate of our discovery?
In his Enneads, the 3rd century Neoplatonist Plotinus surmised that the universe extends as far as the soul goes, but no further. The boundaries of its existence are determined by the degree to which, in going forth, it has the soul to keep it in being.
You can find Andromeda riding on the back of the winged white horse Pegasus, long associated with the idea that horses have the wisdom to carry us beyond the known world.
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