As the moon orbits around the earth, it provides a natural light source for the earth and its inhabitants. Psychologically, the moon is symbolic of the mother and the mother image. This figure is a primordial element in the psyche of each individual. Depending on your nature, the mother figure may correspond to your biological mother, a grandmother, or a woman who cared for you in infancy and childhood. When you reach adulthood, this mother-figure and all the emotions and bonds associated with you may be transferred to something else: a spouse, a companion, an institution, a church, corporation, or political movement, a cult, etc. In short, any individual or structure likely to take on the mother’s duty of caring for and nurturing the vulnerable aspects of an individual. To be more down-to-earth, the mother figure corresponds to the habits which were learned and then definitively incorporated into the individual’s identity as you gradually became acculturated and progressed toward social independence. As a result, a strongly “lunar” personality often finds it difficult to adapt and is uncomfortable outside the secure setting of familiar routines. Closely tied to your past, you may be unwilling to detach yourself from it and embark on your life as an individual in the here and now. You still identify somewhat with your inner child and may display a child’s capricious behavior, indulging in moodiness and indecision. Your passivity may make you easily influenced, your sensitivity makes you subjective, and you hesitate to open up and lay your soul bare. In your daily life, psychic activity will rule. Your imagination, memory, sensitivity, sensation, and sentiment nearly overwhelm your psyche.

According to Greek myth, Mercury (or Hermes, whose name derives etymologically from the piles of rocks which marked trails and guided travelers) was the messenger of the gods. He carried orders from Olympus to the mortals on Earth. The child of the illegitimate union of Zeus with Maia, Mercury was born “unknown to the immortal gods” and had to win his place among them by trickery, cleverness, and cunning. This is why he became the vagabond deity of travelers and wanderers. He is the instinctive foe of the settled who see him as an outcast roaming on the outskirts of society: a pariah, a thief, and a swindler. As ruler of the sign of Gemini, the Twins, he symbolizes the brother—the alter-ego who teaches us as much as we teach him and is associated with adolescence, a period of intense intellectual discovery. Mercury thus symbolizes lively, sparkling wit, mobility in any form, mental exchange, and interaction. As a result, a person strongly ruled by Mercury is quite likely to be clever and skillful. If Mercury is “afflicted” in one’s chart, their intellectual velocity may sometimes become mere mental hyperactivity. In any case, these skills are a great resource in the social realm. You communicate easily and effectively, orally or in writing. Your ability to unite and transmit would be a good resource in diplomatic or commercial endeavors.

As one of the planets historically thought to be on the outer limits of the solar system (until the “modern” planets were discovered), Saturn has always been associated with the moon, itself a peripheral heavenly body because it belongs to Earth and not to the solar system. Therefore, both Saturn and the moon are aspects of a protection principle (the moon encompasses the earth in the same way as Saturn and its rings encompasses the solar system). Like the moon, Saturn rules a security/insecurity dialectic, but where the moon’s concerns the private, intimate aspects of the individual, Saturn influences social and collective security. Saturn can be thought of as the polar opposite of the moon (the archetype of the mother, but also of the child, and therefore related to orality). The god Saturn ate his children in order to reign and thus, represents the archetype of the mother (motherhood), the grandmother, and the sage (wisdom). The domination of Saturn thus indicates a maternal complex or, at least, an issue related either to the biological mother or to the symbolism of motherhood. This influence may result in a problem of identity and difficulties in aging which will make themselves evident in personal crises at every passage of this planet, every seven years—thus at the age of 7, at 14 or 15, and 21, 28, etc. Depending on the psychological context in which you are developing, you may overcome or overcompensate your identity complex and gradually acquire a strongly structured personality, or, conversely, remain in a state of immaturity which would probably be detrimental to your destiny.

Ayomide Banjoko, you should be aware of the fact that the ninth house is an area of the sky which is especially important in your theme, because it contains several planets, including the one which rules your rising sign.

According to traditional astrology, this area is ruled by Sagittarius, the ninth sign of the zodiac. Its chief attributes are moral and political judgment (laws, ethics, and politics as a means of improving society), dreams, distant journeys, studies such as religion, philosophy, priesthood, spiritual guidance, and wisdom. More specifically, we can interpret astrology as demonstrating that the life and consciousness of an individual gravitate around two fundamental principles: the self (the Ascendant) and others (the Descendant). In life, everything begins in us and proceeds outward, but it is reflected, experienced, and renewed by our relations with others. Indeed, once you grow beyond the subjective field of your ego and reach adulthood, you must be able to adapt and modify your abilities in such a way as to fulfill a specific function in the outer world. The reference framework you use to judge your worth is not only your personal life, but the huge complex of values, principles, and laws which regulate life in a community. The ninth house rules this much broader framework, which includes law as well as philosophy, psychology, science, religion, mysticism, occult studies, etc. An individual with a great deal of activity in this area of their astrological chart will probably feel a strong desire for personal expansion. An idealist, you will seek out experiences which reveal knowledge and meaning to you and give you a better indication of your purpose in living. The difficulties you are likely to face will be hidden behind what appears to be success. They may arise from your expansiveness, which is sometimes uncontrollable, or disproportionate. Although at the outset, your ambition and desire for personal development are a source of strength, they later become powerful enough to cut you off from yourself. If you identify too strongly with the flattering self-image reflected by the community, you may gradually begin to neglect your personal essence. Because this perverse tendency to confuse form with function is reinforced by modern society’s emphasis on packaging and advertising, you are liable to lose yourself completely. A state of expansion could be expressed as a psychic inflation (a loss of oneself in an abstract ideal, or a delusion of grandeur) or as a partial loss of yourself due to over identification with your personal mask (or persona). This house thus reveals that nothing is more difficult than failure in a period of success. Ambition, which may be a compensatory personal over evaluation, sometimes transforms understanding, a principle of cohesion and love, into personal power.

Ayomide Banjoko writes:
The second house is an area of the sky which is especially important in your theme.