The Fixed Stars (abridged version)

By Bob Makransky

The strength conferred by a bright star conjunct a planet in your horoscope shows a place of protection, a safe haven in your chart. Bright stars show in what areas of life and in what ways you can proceed at your own pace and pursue your own aims, unim­peded and unthreatened. Even when a star has a nominally malefic meaning, nonetheless when it conjoins a natal planet it means protection, although in this case the protection will be a matter of closing up into oneself instead of reaching out to oth­ers (which is how the benefic stars operate through the planets they conjoin). Conjunc­tion with any bright star, whether nomi­nally benefic or malefic, must be deemed to be a powerful strength factor in a natal horo­scope because it symbolizes an easy adjust­ment to the indicated situations; which in turn tends to encourage or draw easy circumstances.

Exactly which areas of life are affected depend upon the planets and houses in­volved. For example, Prince Charles's Sun conjoins the star Agena on the 5th cusp (children, sports, love affairs), so these are the areas of the Prince's life where his PURPOSE is liberated, adventurous, idealistic, experimentative, young (i.e., protected). Similarly, planets conjunct bright stars in the 2nd house grant a facility for dealing with money matters (such as the Jupiter-Pluto conjunction on Regulus in the 2nd house of Bill Gates' chart); in the 10th house they make for a natural leadership ability and sense of group responsibility (such as the Uranus conjunction with Pollux on Mohandas Ghandi's MC); and so forth.

The manner in which the benefic influ­ence of the bright stars differs from the be­nefic influence of – for example – the angles, North Node, Part of Fortune, Venus, or Ju­piter is that these other benefic points are not so much places of protection as of opportunity. They don't shield us from the buffeting of circumstances so much as they give us some sort of advantage in coming to grips with them. Where these points fall (if they are well-aspected in the natal chart) we get our lucky breaks in life. 

By contrast, conjunction with a bright star is not so much a matter of increased luck as it is a matter of repose, ease, self-­adequacy and insulation from the cycle of rewards and punishments which drives most of our everyday existence. Conjunc­tion with a bright star endows a planet with a sense of refinement, ultimacy, art-for-­art's-sake. 

If this description sounds vague, it's be­cause the bright stars themselves vary con­siderably in their individual meanings. Some stars are benefic in influence, while others are decidedly malefic. However, even stars which normally produce un­happy events by primary direction must be considered to elevate the action of planets they conjoin in the natal chart, since they expand the scope of the planets outside the humdrum routine of everyday life, and fo­cus the planetary energies on higher, more abstract designs.

I suggest using orbs no greater than one degree for conjunctions with fixed stars; and, to gainsay Morinus' suggestion (in the quotation at the beginning of this section), to use only conjunctions (not other aspects). Since several pairs of bright stars are located very close together (in longitude that is – they're widely separated in the sky), it is suggested that conjunctions to Sirius, Spica and Fomalhaut only be considered when the planets involved occupy longitudes less than these stars; and that conjunctions to Canopus, Arcturus and Deneb only be considered when the planets involved occupy longitudes greater than these stars. That way we can more easily separate out the individual meanings of Sirius versus Canopus, Spica versus Arc­turus, and Fomalhaut versus Deneb.

Some of the work I have done with conjunctions of natal planets to fixed stars indicates that Morinus' view expressed in the quotation at the beginning of this section is quite correct: conjunctions of planets to fixed stars in Right Ascension (so that the planets culminate at the same moment as the stars) and Oblique Ascension (so that the planets rise at the same moment as the stars) are as efficacious as conjunctions in longitude; moreover the three measures have somewhat different flavors. 

Tables of positions and interpretations for the 20 brightest stars (all stars brighter than magnitude 1.5) are given below. Note that precession moves the stars forward in the zodiac at a rate of .014 degrees per year. The “Radix” entry for each star is a list of ideas associated with that star when it is found within one degree of conjunction with a planet in the horoscope. The “By Direction” entry lists the kinds of events which might be expected in the month or two following the conjunction of a bright star with an angle by primary di­rection. For instructions on how to calculate these directions see my free downloadable Primary Directions book posted at: http://www.dearbrutus.com/buyprimarydirections.html. Tables of the 137 brightest stars (all stars brighter than magnitude 3) are also included in this book.

Table of the Twenty Brightest Stars

(Longitudes of stars brighter than magnitude 1.5 as of January 1st of given year. The second column of the table shows the planet whose influence the star most nearly resembles, per Makransky. The third column is the Bayer designation of the star.)