Hi
One of the important issues with aversion is to remember that dispositors do exactly that, they dispose, they are stewards, they manage their sign.
All the aspect words (remember, ad spectus = to see, looking at) in the Greek language have two meanings: 1st. some form of looking/seeing, and 2nd: witnessing, giving testimony (epimartureo if I'm not mistaken, the word merter comes from it, which is giving testimony in a very special way).
For a planet being able to perform this 'managing' of its sign, it must be able to see the sign (aspect is). When in aversion, it cannot see its sign, therefore does not know what is going on there (it is also in aversion to any planet possibly there), AND it cannot testify for it.
Mitigation of aversion is mentioned by many authors, yet never actually given in examples. But I have discovered how one of these works.
The following I wrote on that topic on another forum: her goes
Recently I have been studying book 7 of Valens about timing of planetary positions and aspects, using the ascensional times of the z?idia and the minor periods of the planets.
Some things have come to my notice that I?d like to share with you.
The most important issue of this is that I think I figured out that the mitigation of aversion by means of signs of equal ascension, most probably means that this mitigation is only active in specific times, and (perhaps) not all the time.
Here?s how that ?discovery? went.
Valens talks a lot about effects of malefics being assuaged and mitigated by benefics. Now, at first I thought he was talking about the usual effect of a malefic ? being active at a certain time ? being configured with a benefic. Thus the configured benefic helps to reduce the bad effects of the malefic at work, by means of being configured.
But this is not what Valens is talking about in this book. What he actually means is that a benefic becoming active in the same times, can help reduce or ?break down? the effects of the malefic.
Suppose Saturn is active in the 45th year. Now to Valens it is of major importance to find out if this Saturn is active alone, or together with one of the benefics in this year. He says (I quote from Robert Schmidt's translation):
?For this reason the compiler said that some stars are unprotected, some protected.
They are unprotected whenever the malefics effect something in chancing to be present alone;
but they are protected whenever, while the malefics are bringing [events] to completion, a benefic breaks down their power by supervening.
Whenever in the case of a nativity a figure of a benefic is found and has mastery over the times, the good will be full;
similarly also if the times of the testimonies of malefics are CO-BUSY, both [good and bad] will come about according to the nature of the stars and the zoidia.? (my emphasis)
Now what this means is that the benefic needs to be CO-BUSY with the activated malefic to be able to ?supervene? and break down or mitigate its bad influence. In other words, it also needs to be active in our hypothetical 45th year, together with the activation of Saturn.
Suppose Saturn where to be in a trigonal figure with Jupiter. This aspect will, to a certain extent, have an influence on Saturn. Valens (page 21):
?? those co-present or testifying are less powerful for beneficence or malefaction, but all the same they have strength, and especially whenever (as we said before) they occupy the z?idion or exaltation or trigon of a sect-mate?? Yet this positive trine influence seems to be strongly reduced if Jupiter isn?t also activated at the same time.
The simultaneous activation of Saturn and Jupiter can be because of many, many reasons. Jupiter might be the ruler of Saturn, or vice versa. Jupiter might be in a sign or a configuration that also gets activated in the 45th year.
Valens uses many, many devices for calculation of the periods of activation based on the following principles, and let?s use Saturn as the example here:
1. The minor period of the planet involved, so Saturn, 30 years, so when the native turns 29 (being in the 30th year), Saturn is active.
2. The ascensional time of the sign Saturn is placed in. When the ascensional period of the sign expires, Saturn is active in that period.
3. The minor period of the planet that rules the sign that Saturn is placed in. When the minor period of this dispositor expires, Saturn is active in that year.
4. The ascensional time of the sign where the planet that rules Saturn is placed in.
5. The sum of the minor period of Saturn and the minor period of the planet that rules the sign that Saturn is placed in.
6. The sum of the ascensional times of the sign where Saturn is in and of the sign where the planet that rules Saturn is placed in.
7. The sum of the minor period of Saturn and the ascensional time of the sign where the planet that rules Saturn is placed in.
8. The sum of the minor period of the planet that rules Saturn and the ascensional time of the sign Saturn is placed in.
9. Each of the values of the above 8 points can be divided as well, according to Valens (page 43): ?
Having found these precepts, then, with much suffering and much searching, and having made additional distinctions, we have exemplified them by means of the nativities??) divided by half, one-thirds and two-thirds (Valens: ?[chapter] 6. Teaching Concerning the Successful and Unsuccessful Times in Relation to 1/2, 1/3, and 2/3 of the Ascensions and the Periods of the Stars?
Valens? many examples show this technique at work and they are quite compelling. Including for example the nativities of no less than 6 sailors of the same vessel having all escaped pirates and shipwreck during the same voyage but at different times of their lives, as they all were of a different age and had different configurations at work during the voyage. Very interesting example.
Okay, back to mitigation through ascensional times.
It was the above realization that made sense of the mitigation of aversion through equal ascension. Valens makes a big deal of planets being at work ?in the same times?. Signs are activated according to their ascensional times. We all know that Aries/Pisces, Taurus/Aquarius, Gemini/Capricorn, Cancer/Sagittarius, Leo/Scorpio and Virgo/Libra share equal ascension. Four of these pairs are signs that are in aversion to each other: Aries/Pisces, Gemini/Capricorn, Cancer/Sagittarius and Virgo/Libra. But because they share their ascensional times, whatever planets are in those signs ? however much in aversion ? will start working and get activated when the year of the ascensional time of their respective sign arrives. Then they are at work together. And I assume that whenever this ascensional period ends, the co-working ? and thus the possible mitigation - also ends.
So in a sense we cannot say that during the ascensional-time-activation of the averse planets they ?start seeing each other?, because they remain averse and thus blind to each other. But we can say that due to heimarmene (?) the averse planets are active together, in the same timeframe. And when it is a malefic and a benefic being at work together, the benefic ?accidentally? breaks down the malefic effect. Again, not because of aspectual relationship, but because of simultaneous activation.
We probably all know that many Hellenistic authors ? including Valens ? mention the factors that mitigate aversion, but as far as I know Valens never actually uses them, which sheds doubt on whether or not these mitigating factors were actually endorsed by him at all. I believe he did use them, but merely in the chronocrator context, as explained here.
Valens says explicitly (book 7 page 21):
??and in another manner they [the stars] are intense [in regard to their] testimony if they are found in z?idia of equal ascension or in like-engirding z?idia, and especially whenever the z?idia are found to be pivotal or busy.?
The like-engirding z?idia also make sense in this chronocrator context. All of the like-engirding z?idia have different ascensional times, but they are ruled by the same domicile lord, which always gives its own minor period (and the fractions Valens suggests) for its signs in this timelord method. So any planet in Aries or Scorpio is active after 15 years, the minor period of Mars, even though these signs are averse. The same goes for the other like-engirding images.
Again, this mitigation might only be working in timelord context, not as a natal constant.
So, planets being in aversion under mitigating circumstances might simply be a natal promise. Namely, the promise that these two planets will eventually become active in the same timeframe(s), during one?s life.
When that timeframe has passed, they return to being in aversion, or rather: during the period of activation, their aversion does not hinder them in being active at the same time. They remain however, for all intents and purposes, in aversion natally.
The significance of this ?activation together? can be rather remarkable whenever the two planets in aversion have a rulership relation to each other.
