Similarly, we will only have a lunar eclipse if a Full Moon falls near a lunar node. So if we do experience a solar eclipse, that simply means that a New Moon has fallen close to a lunar node. Where they are not out of synch is the lunar nodes-as we have learned, the nodes are where the Moon’s orbit actually crosses the Ecliptic, or aligns with it. The answer is because, even though Sun and Moon are lined up, the Moon is little above or below the Sun-remember: the plane of the Moon’s orbit and the Earth/Sun plane are out of synch by about five degrees. That means that the Sun and the Moon are aligned in the same degree of the Zodiac. What many do not realise is how close we come to a solar eclipse every month. A solar eclipse, as everybody knows, is a big deal. Solar and Lunar Eclipses fit into all this nodal theory in a fairly obvious way, if you think about it. Yet another way to see this: is that the nodes take just under nineteen days to move through one degree.
That works out to 18.5997 years- 18 years, seven months, and a few days.Īnother way to see this: it takes either lunar node about a year and a half to move retrograde through each sign of the Zodiac. Instead they move slowly retrograde, taking 6793.39 days to get back to where they started. In other words, the places where the Moon’s orbit crosses the Ecliptic-the nodes-do not remain in the same degree of the Zodiac for eternity. Similarly as the Moon speeds around the Earth every month, the plane of its orbit is gradually sliding backwards in the opposite direction. As it gradually runs out of momentum, you see it begin a slow counter-clockwise wobble before it topples over. Say it is rotating really fast in a clockwise direction. It only actually crosses the Ecliptic twice each month, once going up, once going down. The Moon itself could be anywhere in its journey around the circle. Where it sinks below the Ecliptic, we define the South Node. More precisely, where the plane of the Moon’s orbit rises above the plane of the Ecliptic, we define the North Node. Where it crosses heading south, this is regarded as the Moon’s south node, Ketu. Where the Moon crosses the Ecliptic heading north, that is regarded as the Moon’s north node, Rahu. Now lets come back to the topic at hand, the lunar nodes, Rahu & Ketu. And here we shamelessly indulge in the European colonial fantasy that north is “above” and south is “below!” So half the time the Moon is above the Ecliptic, half the time it is below. (5E 8′ 40″) They do not “lie flat,” in other words. Here is the critical point: the Plane of the Moon’s Orbit is inclined by about five degree to the Ecliptic. It is helpful to remember that even though in reality the Moon’s orbit is a lot smaller than the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, when they are both projected onto the inside of the imaginary Celestial Sphere, they are the same size. We project it out onto the Celestial Sphere as well, just like with the Ecliptic. Again, imagine that as the Moon does so, it too sweeps out another flat circle of glass. That cycle takes just under 27 days, eight hours. Where the Plane of the Ecliptic touches the Celestial Sphere, we have the “highway” in the sky that the Sun follows in its yearly path. In our Earth-centered perspective, we project this Plane of the Ecliptic out onto an imaginary Celestial Sphere-a kind of vast starry ball with us inside, right in the center. Imagine that as the Earth swings around the Sun, it sweeps out a flat circle of glass. What we actually see is that the Sun circuits the same band consisting of signs and constellations, also known as rashis and nakshatras, each year. Since astrology is Earth-centered, we stick with that visual illusion in our language and perspective. For millennia, our ancestors assumed it was the other way around-that the Sun orbited the Earth. The Earth orbits the Sun, but since we are sitting on planet Earth, it doesn’t look that way. Lets have a closer look at their significance and determine which is the better calculation for them, Mean Node or True Node?
They are deemed to be critical points in a birth chart, paving the way for karmic analysis and judgment. So, what exactly are the nodes of the Moon? Well, they are shadow, not physical, planets, also known as Rahu, the North Node, and Ketu, the South Node.