Frederick Woodruff’s blog Astro Inquiry is always fascinating and today he dissects the enigma of Michael Jackson through his Jungian lens:
Michael Jackson, as I’ve noted earlier, was a Sun conjunct Pluto Virgo. Unless given almost shamanic-like life training, Sun Pluto individuals approach existence from an impetus that most of us can barely fathom. And if we can’t understand it, imagine what it must be like for them to actually live it.
When Pluto’s aura veils any of the personal planets, especially by conjunction or opposition, the individual becomes an accessory to deviant dreams and obsessional compulsions. Phobic of death, covetous of power, and awed by the sort of concentrated mega-wealth that’s usually associated with organized crime (Plutocrats anyone?), society just doesn’t know what to do when Pluto rears his head and begins infecting what should be, in the Sun’s case, the direct expression of one’s being-ness, one’s existence and the search for his or her vocation. With Pluto riding the Sun’s beams we have — well — Michael Jackson was a larger than life example of a Virgo Sun gone Pluto-maniacal.
Levy, in his essay, calls this the “great contamination of things.” When Virgo short circuits the surrounding world, the very realm that Virgo tries to purify and then differentiate from, becomes a threat. Levy writes: “Not only, as has been said, was it viruses, germs, and bacteria. But life itself as a germ. The living as a bacterium. Matter, objects, and the very air he breathed as soon as he ventured beyond his dear Neverland became a source of infection, pestilence, a macabre obsession…”
Levy describes the hyperbaric chamber (remember when those photos of Jackson surfaced?) where Michael would ‘recharge’ as a kind of gizmo that ultimately became a “preparatory part of a funeral ritual.” A literal Pluto-Sun-Virgo-like sarcophagus.
‘Other’ ultimately becomes a problem for the hyper-hybrid Virgo. As the sign preceeding Libra, Virgo has an attraction-repulsion reaction to the notion of relationship. Within their bubble of self-monitored and categorized reactions to life, Virgo longs for human intervention. A metamorphosis arrives, fully complete, in Libra. But not without trepidation and hyper-anxiety for Virgo.
All of the mutable signs struggle with this magnetic but ambivalent pull towards the sign they proceed. But no sign seems to suffer as much turmoil as Virgo. This back and forth ambiguity can be taxing and often reaches a demarcating distancing, as in Greta Garbo‘s famous: “I want to be alone.” Garbo radiated Virgo’s beguiling sphinx-like aura to the maximum. In fact, hermetic autonomy is the virgin’s idee fixe. A system utterly complete unto itself. Virgos don’t really need others but they’re infected by Libra’s notion of others as a life path. And so life, as other – as people, comes leaking in.
As the purest expression of the Virgo myth, take Jesus’s mother Mary. She accomplished the miracle of all miracles via the immaculate conception. She maintained her virgin state and yet bore a child. Michael Jackson attempted something similar. No one really knows who the father of his children are. Or for that matter the mother. Or rather, where the eggs came from that his ‘wife’ Debbie Rowe incubated.
read more here…
posted July 6, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Interesting analysis!
posted July 6, 2009 at 2:20 pm
Wow now I understand why my relationships with people is so weird.
I have a 29 Virgo ascendant as well as 29 Virgo Pluto.
It annoys the heck out of me when I attract people who think I can fix their problems. The relationships start out normally but always end up with them wanting something which they never vocalize (as if I can read minds).
Add to that my moon is in Pisces, Neptune in Sag,Venus, Mars and Saturn in Gemini so I am squared (T-squares, Grand Squares) and opposed to myself. *sigh*
posted July 6, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Gary Kent’s remark is right on target:
What a read. Thanks Frederick for helping fill in so many blanks. The world’s biggest star, the world’s biggest enigma: Jackson really did fly miles above the normal.
Absolutely breathtaking! The best yet to date of this amazing world icon and universal legend. I’d love to read more and more!!!! Thanks tons.
posted July 8, 2009 at 6:45 pm
I found Mr. Woodruff’s analysis to be cold, overwrought, and short-sighted.
Thumbs down.
posted July 13, 2009 at 8:19 pm
Lynn,
What do you suppose that Frederick meant by this statement: Unless given almost shamanic-like life training, Sun Pluto individuals approach existence from an impetus that most of us can barely fathom?
Does a person with Sun-Pluto need to experience some deep spiritual transforming process in order to handle the manifestations of such an aspect? If not, then what can the Sun-Pluto person do to mitigate or work with the energy of such a combination to keep from falling prey to obsessions and increased isolation like MJ?
posted July 14, 2009 at 6:59 am
Ebbie, people approach their lives and astrological configurations from a wide variety of perspectives, whcih is what makes it difficult to predict exactly how an individual relates to a specific planetary aspect. In addition, it depends on the rest of the chart and the sign that Sun/Pluto is in. Sun/Pluto in Scorpio is much more comfortable than Sun/Pluto in Libra because Scorpio shares the same intensity that Pluto demands while Libra prefers peace and harmony. That said, a Sun/Pluto person will nearly always experience continual transformation in their lives, and the need to let go of the past in order to achieve that transformation. Frederick is saying that the Sun/Pluto person lives deeply and intensely, but you are right that there is a calling to experience that depth in a process of continual transformation. Knowing this, the Sun/Pluto person can begin to let go and allow this process to more easily unfold, trusting that this is their destiny. They must at some point learn to walk willingly into the underworld just as Persephone did, and have the faith that they will emerge anew.
posted July 14, 2009 at 12:03 pm
Lynn,
Thank you for your response. I would suspect that those with the conjunction and opposition would have the most difficult time with the continual transformation. I would also suspect that surrendering to the process and trusting it would be just a difficult, particularly if the transformation is thrust upon them by outer circumstances.
Allow me to ask one more question. You wrote that these people “must at some point learn to walk willingly into the underworld just as Persephone did, and have the faith that they will emerge anew.” I am familiar with the Persephone myth. But what do you mean by “learn to walk willingly into the underworld”?