Understanding the Fourth Quadrant

I found the fourth quadrant the most difficult quadrant to understand and still grapple with it from time to time. Certainly, nobody will ever be able to accuse Dobereiner of talking down to his students.

Assigning the physical to the first quadrant made sense when I began to study this system. After all traditional astrology always said that the ascendant represents a person's physical attributes and personality. But traditional astrology fails miserably when it comes to completing the meanings contained within the the other two houses in this quadrant. Assigning money and possessions to the second house also leaves me cold as does the assignment of the lower mind and communications for the third.

It's not that the assignments are wrong actually but what is missing is why these assignments have been made in the first place. Somewhere along the line astrology, just like the Bible lost a lot in the translation. And now astrology has become kind of like drinking a glass of milk and never knowing that it came from a cow.

The meanings contained within the houses making up the second quadrant have also been handed down to us in a watered down version. Dobereiner describes that The Fourth House is where emotions are concentrated, and that certainly makes sense since the Moon is the ruler of this house, and then it is in the Fifth House where the emotions are expressed in a creative form, like an inborn talent. He also explains that the Fifth House is where we can find a "person's bearing, which comes not from the fact that he moves, but from the way he moves." Certainly love affairs and gambling will always rule this house but these assigned activities by themselves will never be able to explain the deeper meaning contained within.

Then next the Sixth House which rules work and service is described by Dobereiner as the house where "adaptation to the prevailing circumstances in order to survive" occurs. This is where the talent and creativity in the Fifth House must result in a practical useful way that works. It is through working that we are able to survive. Just tell any Virgo that being born under this sign makes him a survivor and see what happens.

I have already gone over the third quadrant in detail in other blogs so I will just skim over for now. The Seventh House is where we encounter ideas, the Eighth House is where we commit to those ideas, and the Ninth House is where the understanding which results from those ideas occur. All the ideas that are encountered through the third quadrant are processed in the second. So all ideas manifest in the second quadrant.

It is here that we come to the difficult fourth quadrant. This quadrant is where what has been created in the second quadrant is used for. The Tenth House is the where a "significance which sets standards and has connotations for others" occurs. In traditional astrology the Tenth House is the house of destiny. In Dobereiner's system the Tenth House represents "the final significance of what has been brought into being." Either way the meaning is clear and establishes the Tenth House as a place of prominence establishing a person's status in life.

The Eleventh House is where the suspension of polarities occur. In other words things begin to change and take on a different form and it makes sense that the ruler of this house is Uranus. In this stage one breaks away from convention and conformity. This is the stage of development where an individual breaks away from "being tangled up in emotions." This is why Aquarians are often accused of being cold and indifferent. But it is also why they can give of themselves for a cause. This is a very impersonal phase of development but the phase which will in the end have a lasting effect for the greater good because what begins to occur in this house is a willingness to elevate oneself out of "the lowlands of emotions." I have been told by people with Eleventh House Sun's that they always find themselves in situations where they are used by other people. When describing this fact it was never a complaint but rather a statement of fact.

The Twelfth House is "the function resulting from all that has gone before...the dissolution of the bonds of conformity." This is the final developmental phase. This is Neptune's realm and Pisces home. This is a phase that is difficult to explain because it cannot be understood. Dobereiner explains that the ruler of the First House in the Twelfth House would described a person who comes into the world feeling misunderstood. The word misunderstood really can help the astrologer understand what being psychic or spiritual might be like for a person living in a very practical world.

And so when approaching a chart begin to look at the first quadrant first to see the type of person you are dealing with then look over to the third quadrant to see how he thinks and then look to the second quadrant to see what form of expression these ideas will take and then look over to the fourth quadrant to see if what this person is giving expression to will have a lasting effect in the world.... or as Dobereiner puts it, "becomes immortal."