Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
Articles

Leo 24: Neglect of the Body for the Spirit

Citation Formats

General Reference

APA Style

BibTeX

Learn More
Leo 24: Neglect of the Body for the Spirit

A man sits in total concentration on inner spiritual attainment, so thoroughly focused inward that his appearance and cleanliness have been entirely neglected, the body left unattended while attention goes somewhere the image cannot show directly. This closes both Mars's decan and Mars's term at once, the final degree where the same planet governs both counts together before the last stretch of the sign changes term rulers again.

Wheeler's picture, produced in Balboa Park in 1925, is read here through Rudhyar's 1973 language, a reading that does not flinch from what the withdrawal costs, unlike some of the more purely celebratory readings elsewhere in the sign. The shadow is stated almost as plainly as the image itself: a spiritual attainment purchased by neglecting the body is still, on its own terms, a neglect, and the degree does not obviously promise the trade is worthwhile. Leo, a sign that generally insists on cutting a good figure, is handed here its most extreme opposite, dignity abandoned entirely in favor of something the sign cannot show off to anyone watching. Jones's own 1953 approach, more counseling-oriented than Rudhyar's, would likely have asked what the man should do once the sitting ends, a question this particular image, taken purely on its own terms, does not obviously answer.

Cross-Tradition Connections

Article On

Sources
Comments (0)
No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.
Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.

View At A Past Year

The atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.