Universal Hermetics - the Ship of Life
The second stage of Analysis is to look at how well, or badly the planets are able to help us steer our way through life. The metaphor is that we are a ship, sailing to our destination or purpose. The metaphor clearly shows two sides of life. Firstly our ability to control what happens to us by 'steering' an appropriate course through our own actions. The second is that there is a world beyond the ship, that contains both hazards and rewards. The trouble is that these hazards and rewards are not under our control, they befall us, either as the result of someone else's actions or by the vagaries of nature.
Thus I might by a lottery ticket which wins me a million pounds, or oil might be found on my land. On the other hand I might be in a car crash and seriously injured, or catch a serious disease. How I handle those two extremes is important at another level. Even a serious injury may lead to a new and profitable dimension - simply look at the stories of many of the paralympic athletes.
This is a completely new technique to me. It looks promising in principle but the real test is going to be in applying it to several charts and see if it resonates both with the native and with their history. As it's completely new, I have no experience in it's usefulness, so please give me feedback in terms of whether it seems to fit. If it doesn't there are really two options, it either doesn't work and I'll not bother incorporating it into my practise or I'm not interpreting it correctly. The answer to those will come with trial and error.
The approach works as follows (as I currently understand it)
The ship is steered by a Helmsman - the Helm is the first house. So planets, if any, in the first may take this role. In the absence of planets in the first, steering falls to the Ascendant ruler. If the ruler is configured to the Ascendant, they can operate the helm remotely, from their place in the chart. If they are not configured then there may well be problems. The helmsman is not steering the ship so there's a danger of 'shipwreck' In which case the ship is dependent on fair winds and favourable currents - fortune. The Lord of the Ascendant is seen as the 'First Officer' of the ship in Schmidt's account of this approach.
Fortune here is represented by the Lot of Fortune. If this is configured to the Ascendant there's a chance to see what's happening with the wind and weather and at least try to take advantage. The ruler of Fortune acts as the look out at the sharp end of the ship and if configured to the Ascendant can relay messages about coming changes in the wind and weather - that is opportunities or threats in the environment may be spotted and either taken advantage of (opportunities) or avoided (threats) - this seems to fit in with a modern view of marketing and 'environmental scanning'. However if the Lord of Fortune cannot see the Lot of Fortune (in an averse house from the Lot) then opportunities or perils in life may only be spotted at the last moment, causing consequent trouble. The Lord of Fortune is seen as the Second Officer of the ship.
The the steering of the ship shows the means by which the native moves to their destination (destiny in life) but the destination itself is set by a planet Schmidt describes as the 'Political Officer' (from the Greek Oikodespotes). I don't like the term Political Officer, as politics to the Greeks was something quite different from what we mean today. It's more concerned with organising things so that we can live a fit life for a human. Now I'm sure that's what Schmidt means here but it's not how a modern mind would interpret the term. Perhaps Managing Director would be one more suitable for the modern mind and I'll use it instead, because despite the change of metaphor it's not likely to jar.
The MD is ideally the Domicile Lord of the Sect Light - so if you were born during the day and the Sun is in Virgo, your MD is Mercury. The only exceptions seem to relate to situations where the Sect Light is not in an effective place (6th, 8th, 12th or 2nd)
The MD may be assisted by a 'cooperating officer' who is usually the Bound lord of the Sun. Sometimes the Bound Lord (or ruler of the Terms of the Sect Light) and the Domicile Lord may be the same planet, in which case it plays both roles.
There now comes a section which I can understand but has some significant uncertainty about how it works in practice. In order to get to the destination as quickly and safely as possible the ship needs the wind to blow from the right place (behind the ship or a following wind). However if the wind is blowing from the wrong place the ship may find it difficult to make progress or get blown of course.
According to Schmidt the Wind is associated with the Trigons (triplicities). Indeed it seems that the Greeks associated directions with the winds that blew from them, but by later Hellenisitic times the Trigons were more associated with the elements than with winds and it's by no means clear quite what role they played. Delphic Oracle uses the placements of the Trigon Lords of the Sect Light to assess how well the wind is blowing. Here placement is relative to the horizon, that is in which houses the three Lords lie. If they are badly placed the ship has to be rowed, to make any progress. So going back to the example of the Sun in Virgo during the day. Virgo is an Earth sign and the three Trigon rulers are: Venus (by day) Moon (by night) and Mars (co-operating) Each of these three needs to be assessed to establish whether the wind is favourable or not and if not, who is going to row (it will be the co-operating Trigon Lord, so Mars will have to roll up his sleeves and man the oars). How long the ship has to be rowed depends on the position of the three Lords. Thus if Venus is angular the ship will start out well with the wind behind it but if the Moon is cadent then things will slow down and possibly drift off course, Mars will have to row for a bit. If Mars is in a succedent sign then the rest of the voyage will be reasonably on course, if not quite as fast as the first part.
The use of the three Trigon Lords to look at the three stages in life was common. The Trigon ruler of sect rules the first part of Life, the out of sect ruler takes the second part of life and the co-operating or participating ruler takes the last part.
So the next step is to apply this to Ronia