The Hermit - Key 9

THE HERMIT / VIRGO / MABON

Purification in solitude, light in the darkness

Service of healing / Temenos

Self-conscious initiative, character, distinction, discretion, direction, skill, dexterity, potential with restraint.

MABON begins at the end of Virgo, at the Libra cusp, Key 11

"Yud" ("yod," or "yad") is an open hand, as Kaph is a cupped hand.
Yud is the primary component - the first letter in the Tetragrammaton, and a symbol of Divine Essence.
Yud is the sense of touch, and the touch of coition - sex. Yud = seed.
Yod's "hand" is the meditative aspect of "Hand." In Hindu ritual, Mudras are symbolic hand gestures, designed to connect external actions with spiritual ideas, focusing the mind on God.

This image and others available as posters
Yud is seen as the "Command Letter" of the Hebrew alphabet, with all of the letters constructed from yods as basic components. The Yod is always at the top, in "Heaven."

Yud shows the diversity of creation ascending to the mystic origin point in the Crown of Sepher Keter. Yud is a single tongue of flame, leaping into manifestation from the womb of the infinite.
The virginal aspect of The Hermit alludes to the "Divine Marriage," the union of male/female, the realm of the androgyne.
The Hermit's "9" is a trinity of trinities, the last of the single digits, which shows a kind of completion.
The "9" is also reminiscent of the nine months of pregnancy, the sequestration of the womb, followed by Libra, the emergence into the world of people.
The Hermit is alone, in the icy, rarefied peaks, holding a beacon for those who follow. He is robed in grey, referring to the concealed knowledge, and the supernal Keter/Chochma/Binah triad.
The Hermit is ancient - his knowledge precedes everything. His lamp holds a six-pointed star, showing interlocked triangles, and the number 6, hinting at the sixth sign, Virgo.
His staff refers to the archetypal world, the will, and is a wand. Rods (or wands) appear in Key 0, Key 1, Key 7, Key 9, and Key 21. The Magus, who holds a rod, is Mercury, which is exalted in Virgo.
This is the world of interior thought and reflection; the wellspring of ideas and personal transformation.

Philosopher at Meditation, Rembrandt van Rijn

There is an element of humility in Key 9 and Virgo, that can be characterized by the maxim: "Walk softly and carry a big stick." Have great knowledge, but don't go trumpeting it around.
Virgo is during the Jewish month of Elul, the time of preparation for the Days of Awe; the time of deep inner analysis, of looking at ways we have missed the mark and how we need to realign ourselves so that we may return to our highest spiritual mission. It is a time of frank inner examination, of reassessing the sincerity of our motives, and of making corrections to our behavior and working towards being our better selves. It is a time for putting actions to our words.
This constant inner analysis of Virgo can be overdone, and Virgos are prone to neuroses that others would call petty.
The Hermit's solitude is the relinquishment of human love in exchange for divine love. His is the solitude of meditation, as opposed to the erroneous, egotistical solitude in The Tower, Key 16.
9 is the number of the ninth Sepher, Yesod.
The virgin is a symbol of "temenos," or sacred space, also the precinct of meditation in seclusion. The virgin's impregnability was invoked at the gates of cities, and on the prows of ships, with likenesses of women.
The temenos is also associated with Keys 7, 11, 14.
In solitude we confront ourselves. If we cannot be alone, how can we be with others? When we make peace with being alone, then we better appreciate being with others. Social life is a blessing, but there is a time and place to be alone. The Hermit depicts that place.

Here is a meditation video I made combining the letter "Yud" with a breathing practice, pulling together ideas of Mercury/Breath and focus/Yud.

"A man should keep for himself a little back shop, all his own, quite unadulterated, in which he establishes his true freedom and chief place of seclusion and solitude."
Montaigne

VIRGO
August 23rd to September 22nd.
Ruled by Mercury.
I analyze.
Servant or slave.
Mutable Earth. Physicality, practicality, stability, seriousness, all characteristics of earth, diversify in Virgo, into networks and arrangements of objects, ideas, data, numbers, or facts. Virgo is the harvest, the dusty late summer, when things dry out and the corn is ready.
Virgo (Sixth house, or planets in Virgo) creates an emphasis on mundane order. This can manifest as efficient, helpful, serviceable, and useful benefits for the community.
Elizabeth Regina I (September 7, 1533-1603), daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, reigned over and transformed England for 45 years and died a virgin. Her restraint, judgement, monumental learning, steady hand, and inner torment all tell a Virgoan story. It was observed that at the age of 6 she had the gravity of a person of 40.

"The Ermine Portrait"
Nicholas Hilliard (1585) Hatfield House
Virgo, when active in the chart, is focused, refined, detailed, kind, caring, cool, clever, skilled, sensible, wry, wise, a healer, a hard worker, a designer, writer, mathematician, reserved, a purist, modest, pragmatic, discriminating, intuitive, has a sharp memory, compassionate, sensitive, philosophical, intellectual, witty, orderly, unpretentious, yielding, strategic, scientific, artsy-craftsy, mechanical ability, enterprising, friendly, always learning, good with the hands, productive, conservative, focused, linear/flexible, and helpful.

Unfavorable Virgo can be manipulative, wimpy, picky, fussy, dour, boring, staid, obsessive, brittle, unfocused, mired in detail, too selfless, easily used, too-high expectations, depressed, perfectionistic, doesn't stand up for self, thinks too much, lonely, too many rules, a martyr, bad planning, diffused resources, lives in fantasy, argumentative, nervous, low self esteem, impatience, exaggerating, lazy, mental conflicts, pessimistic, or doesn't understand pleasure.

A maze is a Virgo image, as is the quiet retreat at the center.
Domains of Virgo are data management, libraries, languages, medicine, research, the arts, music, culture, teaching, counseling, writing, monasteries.

Virgo, ruled by mental Mercury, is a flexible, practical energy. Developed Virgo is compared to Egyptian perfection, with delicate detail incised in stone. Mercury shares rulership with Gemini and Virgo, and when not held down by earth or unrooted in the air, Virgo/Gemini can shine.
Virgo experiences the connection between spirit and matter, but finds devotion difficult due to the Mercury influence.
Lessons for Virgo include widening horizons, setting higher goals, consistency, staying focused, completing things, and learning to raise their values from an earthly to a spiritual aim.
Virgo is symbolized by a virgin, holding a sheaf of wheat. This describes gathering, pulling together of resources. It also is purity, safety, and impregnability. Virgo is the first sign symbolized by a human figure. She holds a sheaf of wheat, representing the harvest, and the ordering, of her season.
The virgin symbolizes a 'temenos,' or sacred space - protected dry ground, that with the water of its axis, Pisces, can achieve soaring heights of meditation and spiritual penetration.
The temenos is also associated with Keys 7, 11, and 14.
In the Near East the Virgin was considered to be continually anxious to experience new phenomena, ripe for the plucking, in search of new ideas and experiences. This differs sharply from the prim western concept of Virgin Birth; these twin personae are typical of Virgo's Mercury rulership.
The earth of Virgo is like a dry lakebed, with its reticulated patterns of cracked mud, creating a network, or labyrinth of lines.
Like all three earth signs, Virgo has a tendency to stay put, in one way or another. With Virgo, if afflicted, it's often a mental immobility, causing the native to fritter away energy in insignificant trivia, or to stay forever in dusty, uninspired obscurity.
Virgo rules the hands and digestion.

The hands articulate mental forms, like Gemini's language, related to Virgo through Mercury.
For Virgo, the Shadow takes the form of a profound doubt that life will be OK unless you keep everything "Just So." Your fear of collapse and confusion makes Other too confusing, too unsettling, and can allow you to be messy or indiscriminate in specific parts of your life. Work with your shadow, and the people you project it onto, by learning to trust, and not trying to control every tiny detail. The more you deny your Shadow, the more it will manifest itself and attract what you will interpret as disruption or pain.
D. H. Lawrence, a noted Virgo, typifies the gentle, lyrical, sensitive, romantic, intelligent, and retiring Virgo.

The Sixth house has the character of Virgo: planets in this house are concerned with Duty; in mundane astrology called the 'house of service;' shows who the native serves, and is served by. It is the house of self-adjustment, it shows work and working conditions in the life, health, nervous temperament, inhibitions. The sixth house has more control over its difficulties than the twelfth house. The Virgo/Pisces continuum houses the serve/suffer parts of life.
The earth triplicity is Virgo (mutable) followed by Capricorn (cardinal) , and then Taurus (fixed).
In the natural order of the signs, Virgo is earth, preceded by Leo (fire), and followed by Libra (air).
The opposite axis, or antidote to Virgo, is Pisces.