Sol And Luna

Sol and Luna are the two major personifications of the partners of the coniunctiosun and moonwhich in alchemy are specifically associated with the opposition of the sexes. The sun is conceived of as masculine and the moon as feminine. We can say that the moon, Luna, is a personification of the feminine principle:

LUNA AS COUNTERPART OF SOL

Luna, as we have seen, is the counterpart of Sol, cold, moist, feebly shining or dark, feminine, corporeal, passive. Accordingly her most significant role is that of a partner in the coniunctio. As a feminine deity her radiance is mild; she is the lover. Pliny calls her a “womanly and gentle star.” She is the sister and bride, mother and spouse of the sun CW14 ¶ 154

THE SONG OF SONGS

To illustrate the sun-moon [Sol-Luna] relationship the alchemists often made use of the Song of Songs (Canticles), as in the “confabulation of the lover with the beloved” in Aurora consurgens CW14 ¶ 154

In Athens the day of the new moon was considered favourable for celebrating marriages, and it still is an Arabian custom to marry on this day

Sun and moon are marriage partners who embrace on the twenty-eighth day of the month

According to these ancient ideas the moon is a vessel of the sun: she is a universal receptacle of the sun in particular; and she was called “infundibulum terrae” (the funnel of the earth), because she “receives and pours out” the powers of heaven

Again, it is said that the “moisture of the moon” (lunaris humor) takes up the sunlight, or that Luna draws near to the sun in order to “extract from him, as from a fountain, universal form and natural life”

She also brings about the conception of the “universal seed of the sun” in the quintessence, in the “belly and womb of nature”

WHAT THE PSYCHE SAYS ABOUT

THE NATURE OF THE MOON

We hear a lot of talk about the feminine principle these days, and this material in Mysterium Coniunctionis gives us an opportunity to approach the question of what the feminine principle is from a strictly empirical standpoint rather than from the standpoint of a preconceived theory. It gives us the chance to examine what the psyche itself says in alchemy about the nature of the moon, how the psyche itself describes the feminine principle ML p.105

FEMININE PRINCIPLE MORE DIFFICULT

TO DEFINE THAN MASCULINE

Perhaps the best way of approaching it is to notice what particular effects are attributed to Luna. One thing quickly becomes apparent: Luna or the feminine principle is much more difficult to define than is the masculine principle. That would correspond to its nature which doesn't lend itself to definition. What we can do is examine the effects of Luna as elaborated in alchemical symbolism ML p.105

MOON AS MEDIATOR, INTERCESSOR

AND GATEWAY

There is the fundamental idea that the moon is the mediator, intercessor and gateway between the realm of celestial influences and the earthly realm. I would remind you again of the geocentric image of the universe in which, according to antiquity, the moon was set ML p.106

ALL TRANSMISSION OF MATERIAL MUST

PASS THROUGH THE MOON

The planetary spheres are arranged concentrically around the earth, and the moon's sphere is closest to the earth. Therefore all influences, all transmission of material or effects between heaven and earth must pass through the moon. That is the only way to get to earth from the upper regionsyou have to go through the moon. In psychological terms, we can say that the feminine principle is the funnel or gateway between the personal and the transpersonal psyche. And what is communicated between those two realms can be positive or negative. Lunacy can be transmitted, for instance. Or grace can be transmitted, usually symbolized by dew which is thought to drip off the moon down to the earth ML p.106

CROUCH IN THE MOONLIGHT AND

BAY LIKE A DOG

In one of his seminars Jung gives us a negative example of what is transmitted by the moon ( Analytical Psychology: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1925, p. 97 ). It is a story about a man in bed in the middle of the night who saw moonlight streaming in. He had the thought that he could crouch in that moonlight and bay like a dog and still wouldn't be mad because he knew what he was doing. But then he did it, and he became mad. That story is a kind of parable of one aspect of moon functioning ML p.106

PLANTERS ADVISED TO CONSIDER

PHASES OF THE MOON

In folklore, planters are advised to consider the phases of the moonthe full moon is best for planting above-ground crops and the dark of the moon is best for planting root crops. Medicines are supposed to have their best effect when they're taken at the full moon. Erich Neumann gives a very nice account of the psychological implications of this feature of moon symbolism in his essay, “On the Moon and Matriarchal Consciousness” ML p.108

CREATIVE PROCESS FULFILLS

ITSELF AT NIGHT

Neumann says: It is not under the burning rays of the sun but in the cool reflected light of the moon, when the darkness of unconsciousness is at the full, that the creative process fulfills itself; the night, not the day, is the time of procreation. It wants darkness and quiet, secrecy, muteness, and hiddenness. Therefore, the moon is lord of life and growth in opposition to the lethal, devouring sun. The moist night time is the time of sleep, but also of healing and recovery.The moon-god, Sin, is a physician.The realms of healing and healer, healing plant and recuperative growth, meet in this configuration. It is the regenerating power of the unconscious that in nocturnal darkness or by the light of the moon performs its task, a mysterium.from out of itself.This is why healing pills and herbs are ascribed to the moon, and their secrets guarded by women, or better by womanliness, which belongs to the moon. ( Spring, 1954, pp. 83ff. ) ML p.108

ALL DESCENDING ENTITIES ARE

DESTINED TO INCARNATE

As is evident from the moon's position between the earth and the upper regions, all descending entities that are destined to incarnateto take on material form, earthly existencehave to pass through the moon in order to achieve incarnation. That is the symbolic reason why the Virgin Mary is equated with the moon. She served the function of the moon to bring about the incarnation of Christ ML p.108

ANY MANIFESTATION OR STRUCTURE

WHICH SOLIDIFIES OUR LIFE

To expand on this a bit, it is expressing the psychological fact that any specific form, manifestation or structure which solidifies our life energies into some particular concrete expression belongs to the nature of the feminine principle. So one of the features of the feminine is that it concretizesthat is another word for incarnating, for coagulating. Any entityit might be patriotism to a country, service to a Church, community or particular institution, or to some particular cause, family, vocation, avocation, or to a personal relationshipany particular form that is capable of enlisting our commitment, of concretizing our life energy, pertains to the feminine principle. Even such apparent abstractions as science or wisdom or truth or beauty or liberty are examples of the coagulating power of Luna if they actually have the power to organize one's life energy in a concrete way and evoke a commitment from the individual ML p.109

A FORM OF RELATIONSHIP ENERGY

To say it another way, the power to evoke a commitment of libido is a form of relationship energy, which ties in with the fact that Jung has defined the feminine principle as the principle of relatedness. Thus we can say that relationship, in the broadest sense of the wordthe capacity to relateis a feature of coagulatio, it promotes coagulatio ML p.109

MOON CAN COAGULATE OR DISSOLVE

But the moon also promotes solutio because of its association with water, sea, tides, the sap of plants and with dew. So in some circumstances it can coagulate, and in some circumstances it can dissolve; in some circumstances it can concretize and bring into reality psychic potentials, and in some cases it has the effect of dissolution ML p.109

TWO SIDES TO SOLUTIO

There are two sides to solutio: one side is when something hard is melted and made soft and gentle, and that's the aspect where grace and renewal is brought by the dew of the moon, or by the water of the moon. But in other cases the solutio aspect is a negative and dangerous feature, and that's illustrated by the myth of Diana and Actaeon ML p.109

ACTAEON COMES UPON DIANA

NAKED IN HER BATH

Actaeon was a young hunter out with his pack of dogs when by accident he came upon Diana, the moon, naked in her bath. To punish him for her embarrassment, she turned Actaeon into a stag who was then dismembered by his own dogs. In other words he was subjected to dissolution ML p.109

SYMBOL COMPLEX OF

MOONWATERBATHDISSOLUTION

This myth is an example of the symbol complex of moon-water-bath-dissolution. Actaeon would represent the young ego that prematurely stumbles upon the full intensity of the archetypal lunar principle and cannot stand the effects of it. He undergoes dissolution from the impact of that encounterhe's fragmented and dismembered by the dogs. One could say that he falls into an identification with the instinctual factors the dogs represent. Dog, water and moon are all symbolically synonymous ML p.109

LUNAR DEW BAPTIZING

MALE AND FEMALE PAIR BELOW

This same image of moon, water and being attacked by animals is illustrated in a significant picture reproduced in Psychology and Alchemy (fig. 008.2) . In this picture there is the upper region with curlicues, and coming down through it is the sun. Beneath the sun is the moon, and liquid drips from that moon-form. That's the lunar dew, the lunar water, coming out of the moon and baptizing a male and female pair below. At the same time as they are being baptized by this lunar water, they are also being bitten in the heel or calf by animal-like figures on either side ML p.110

ML Pg 110 (q) FigNo008.2

Brother-sister pair attacked

Theatrum chemicum britannicum, (1652)

FALLING INTO THE MOON BATH

So they are going through an experience similar to that of Actaeonthey're falling into the moon bath and are being bitten by the instinct animals. Simultaneously we also see a frog, one of the cold-blooded creatures associated with the moon, coming up from the bath. The frog very often represents, or points to, the process of transformation ML p.110

TAROT CARD ENTITLED

THE MOON

Another example of the same sequence is the Tarot card entitled the Moon (fig. 008.3) . In this card the moon is dripping dew down to the earth, and two dogs or wolves are looking up at the moon; crustacean-like creatures are crawling out of the water toward the moon. That is part of the same symbolism ML p.111

ML Pg 111 (s) FigNo008.3

Tarot Moon Card

A.E. Waite, Pictorial Key to the Tarot,

MYTH OF ENDYMION AS

A MOON MYTH

The myth of Endymion is another moon myth that illustrates a different side of the dangerous aspect of the moon. Endymion was a shepherd who was lying asleep one night in a cave when Selene the moon saw him, and came down to lie by his side. In order to keep him to herself, she kissed his closed eyes and he fell into a deep sleep from which he's never awakened. So the moon can visit him whenever she chooses. This is a version of the story of the mother and her perpetually young son-lover. Of course the way that is achieved is that the son-lover has to die young, and then he never grows old ML p.111