Void of course

Meaning

The Moon moves fast, about 13° a day, and on its way through a sign it meets the other planets one after another by aspect. After the last of these meetings it still has some way to go before it leaves the sign, and during that stretch it makes no new contact. The Moon is then said to be void of course: it has finished its business in this sign and has not yet begun the next.

Tradition reads that stretch as a pause. What starts while the Moon is void is said to go nowhere, or to turn out otherwise than planned: a meeting that leads to nothing, a purchase that is not used, a plan that drifts. It is not read as a danger. It suits rest, routine work, finishing what is under way, reflection and anything that needs no result.

In a birth chart, a void Moon is a minor note. Modern astrologers read it lightly, if at all, and never on its own.

In practice

• How long: a void span can last a few minutes or more than a day, depending on where the planets stand. There is one before each of the Moon’s sign changes, so a dozen or so a month.
• What it is used for: choosing a time, mainly. Many people avoid launching a project, signing an important agreement or making a large purchase during a void Moon, and keep it for tasks already in motion.
• When it ends: the void ends the moment the Moon enters the next sign, and a new course begins.
• In horary astrology, where a chart is cast for the moment a question is asked, a void Moon is traditionally read as a sign that nothing will come of the matter, or that the situation will not change.

Origin and history

The idea is old. Hellenistic astrologers spoke of the Moon running in the void, kenodromia. In the definition of Antiochus of Athens, the Moon was void when it would complete no aspect with a planet within its next 30° of travel, whatever the sign.

The sign-based rule comes from medieval and early-modern horary astrology. William Lilly, in 1647, puts it this way: “A planet is void of course when he is separated from a planet, nor doth forthwith during his being in that sign, apply to any other.” He adds that matters go hard with a void Moon, though she still performs somewhat in Taurus, Cancer, Sagittarius or Pisces.

In the twentieth century the American astrologer Al H. Morrison made the void-of-course Moon widely known by publishing the void times in a yearly calendar. Astrologers still differ on which aspects and which bodies count; the modern calendars mostly use the major aspects to the Sun and the planets out to Pluto.

How Ulune calculates it

• The bodies: the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. Chiron, the nodes, the asteroids and the angles do not count.
• The aspects: the five major ones, the conjunction, sextile, square, trine and opposition, at the moment each is exact. Orbs play no part. The Moon’s meetings with the Sun count too, the New Moon and the quarters included.
• In the Calendar, a void span runs from the Moon’s last exact aspect since it entered its sign until it enters the next one. If it made no such aspect in the whole sign, the span starts at its entry. Each day’s Moon line says when the void begins, and its reading names the last aspect and when the void ends.
• In a birth chart, Ulune follows the Moon on the ephemeris from the moment of birth. If it perfects no major aspect to those bodies before leaving its sign, it is void. The Table’s Patterns part says yes or no, and names either the next aspect, with its date, or when the Moon enters the next sign. A wheel overlay can mark it too. Without a birth time it is marked ~.