The fourth house is readily known as the house of home and base of operations; the environment and domestic affairs are catered to in the fourth house as are matters for home consumption. This is the house that rules land, vehicle, mother, cow, and mines – in their different forms. It is also the locale of government lands, such as “crown land”. When it comes to looking at climate change, we dig a little deeper than “happiness from parents, many brothers, materialistic”, the accoutrements that go with a good home. In this instance, we take a Leo lagna and look to Scorpio as 4th House with Mars and Sun the benefics with Sun being the best. Mercury and Venus are malefics. Jupiter, the Moon and Saturn are neutrals for Leo ascendant. What are the important matters for 4th house and climate change?
Whereas Scorpio is the traditional eighth house, Lorded by Mars and exaltation of Ketu doubling as sign of Moon and Rahu in debilitation; and sign of water element, in this instance, we look to Scorpio as the 4th House, with Leo Lagna. Facing North, Scorpio is of fixed nature, of warming degree +1, signifies renewable energy by way of water, and clean water at that. As every action produces a reaction, events and activities in this house would be of long-term effect; due fixed nature, malefics here will require remedies and long-term engagement; benefic influences are positively enhanced with human intervention. It is a sign of great results with close attention to detail and rigour in ongoing efforts.
Scorpio as the fourth house might well be the house of the fire brigade drills, being of pitta (heat) dosha, and water nature. It could well be that the bodily fluids may run hot for those with Scorpio as their 4th. In Vedanta, it is taught that anger boils the blood and expires three months of spiritual effort. Yes, one loses three months benefits of archanam (prayer), puja (offerings to the gods) and seva (selfless service). It is known that if one takes the blood of an angry person and gives transfusion to a hamster or guinea pig (they can live with human O type blood group), they will die within 24 hours, such is pitta and malevolence of the blood that boils with anger.
Water, Water, Water
We scribe during World Water Week 2017, which is convening under the theme, ‘water and waste: reduce and reuse’. The Week’s theme, Water and waste: Reduce and reuse, really touches the very core of our daily lives. To reduce, some drastic changes will be necessary – especially by the main water users, including industries, energy producers and the agriculture sector. Changes are also needed in how we think about reuse of water: It is very important to try and change the mind-set around waste. Rather than presenting us with a problem, we can view waste as an asset also becoming an opportunity for renewable energy.
Other topics to be addressed during the week include: water and climate; water as a connector between the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement; drinking water and sanitation; water security; water and food/nutrition; innovative financing and green bonds; water cooperation; water integrity; pricing of water and valuing water; water and migration; pharmaceuticals and water; and water and faith.
The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) released a report on ‘Thirsting for a Future: Water and Children in a Changing Climate,’ which calls for greater attention to the fate of children as more than one-quarter, around 600 million globally, will be living in areas of water scarcity by the year 2040.
Drinking water and sanitation: The global water and sanitation crisis is mainly rooted in poverty, power and inequality, not in physical water scarcity. It is, first and foremost, a crisis of governance. Poor resources management, corruption, lack of appropriate institutions, bureaucratic inertia, and insufficient capacity lie in many places behind the lack of sustainability of services, which also undermine the arrival of new investments. These are all matters of Scorpio, secrets, hiding the truth, maintaining the status quo (inequality) and depriving natural resources from others. Better water governance is needed.
Water and Waste: Reduce and Reuse
Two types of wastewater are created in a home: greywater and blackwater. Greywater is wastewater from non-toilet plumbing fixtures such as showers, basins and taps. Blackwater is water that has been mixed with waste from the toilet. Because of the potential for contamination by pathogens and grease, water from kitchens and dishwashers should be excluded from greywater and considered as blackwater. It’s estimated that just over half of household water used could be recycled as greywater, saving potentially hundreds of litres of water per day.
We look to Saturn in 4th house and we experience rigidity, structure, foundations and limits. Saturn sets karmic limits and restricts the boundaries of traditions: buildings, vehicles, and as the 4th is also a house of education, there will be limits to schooling boundaries and innovation in education. Saturn will uphold convention, conservative practices of the past and find it difficult to envisage new accoutrements around the home (new water tanks, grey water treatment plant, washing machines that store and reuse grey water). There will be roots, ruts and routines upheld by Saturn. Effort to overcome the fixed nature of this sign is needed; learning of new disciplines, extending one’s social capital beyond school learning are matters needing application and effort.
The fourth is also the house of conveyances (things that move you from place to place; in the old days, these would include elephants and palanquins…), vehicles and similar forms of locomotion. Vehicles today have internal combustion piston engines and operate using fossil fuels, which are not renewables. Fixed forms of transport such as railways and tramways now source their energy from solar panel farms, thus becoming independent of the grid. Denmark’s entire electric railway system is now serviced by independent renewable energy. Melbourne’s tram network – the largest in the world – will soon be “off the grid” and using renewable energy as source of power for the trams.
The trams of Melbourne will soon be running on renewable energy…
Motor vehicle pollution contributes significantly to climate change, which results from a buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Burning fossil fuels in cars releases carbon dioxide, which is the largest source of greenhouse gas emission – heat is trapped in the atmosphere and unable to escape and returns to the oceans as increased temperature. While current solutions seek to burn fuel more efficiently, and to burn cleaner, these are solutions that smack of the rigidity of Saturn in the 4th house. Entirely new vehicles are needed; vehicles which the 4th house can deliver with innovation and change; hydrogen burning vehicles produce H2O, which is basically, water. No harm to the environment with hydrogen burning vehicles.
Another major issue with climate change is due digging holes in the ground – that is – mining for fossil fuels. Coal, oil, gas, shale oil, all these forms of fossil fuels are non-renewable and have deleterious impact on our planet, our lives. Lead in petrol was introduced to early model cars to help reduce engine knocking, boost octane ratings, and help with wear and tear on valve seats within the motor. The leaden fumes led to damage to childrens brains. Moreover, it was thought that lead increased criminal actions.
Lead can be absorbed into bones, teeth and blood. It causes kidney damage, inhibits body growth, causes abdominal pain, anaemia and can damage the nervous system. More than a century ago, a royal commission recommended to British ministers that women shouldn’t work in lead-related industry because of damage to their reproductive organs. So all these matters come from burning fossil fuels, and harming our planet. Once again, the old roots, fears of insufficiency, pinch, cramp and scarcity with respect to sources of energy for home heating, locomotion, vehicles and energy need to break free of the restrictions of Saturn in the 4th house and move beyond resistance to socializing education, the limits of Saturn and formal, non-formal and informal forms of learning.
Planet Saturn also rules agriculture, mines, coal, crops and earth. There is much waste in water delivery to farms, with losses due evaporation (heat, pitta energy from the Sun). Open channels and irrigation channels full of weeds and mud cause losses and slow down delivery of water to farming properties. Main irrigation channels need cost-effective environmentally neutral delivery systems to avoid losses to evaporation. The rigidity of stultifying thought about costs, innovation and change (Saturn and limits; respecting traditional financial and funding boundaries and traditional forms of delivery of water) is a cost to the community that must be overcome.
Much attention must be paid to matters of the 4th house and climate change. While we live in a warming world, there are human rights to clean water and water for sanitisation, as well as clean cooking stoves. There are matters of a fixed nature (water delivery, water waste around the home, responsible uses of water in industry and agriculture, and movement to renewable sources of energy – hydropower and hydroelectric schemes of generating energy. The planets may raise us up, they may pull us down. Presence of Saturn in the 4th house – said to be neutral or benefic – needs strenuous efforts to elicit positive, uplifting, planetary-transforming benefits to all who live on the Earth our Mother. Engaging the help of Saturn can produce long-term benefits in the 4th house.
Saturn and its dispersal of light can be engaged for the benefit of humanity…
