A butterfly that grows a third wing

The image

The picture is impossible and precise in its detail: not just an extra wing but a third one, and on the left. A butterfly is built in pairs, so the new wing spoils its symmetry even as it adds to it. The image does not say whether the creature can still fly, or whether it flies differently. It shows only the addition and where it grew.

This is the second butterfly in Libra; the first, at Libra 1, is pierced by a dart. Both come from the session in 1925 in which Elsie Wheeler described each image to Marc Edmund Jones.

Meaning

One way to read the third wing is as talent that does not fit. An unusual ability sets a person apart and may carry them further than others, yet it also makes ordinary balance harder. Our keyword is "Unusual endowment", and our keynote says an extra capacity is both a gift and an imbalance. A placement here can be read as a gift that needs learning to use, a difference to be integrated rather than hidden, and the long work of finding a way of flying that suits a body built unlike the rest. The left side, where the wing appears, is left open to interpretation.

Lynda Hill sets Libra 24 between its Karmic Condition, one degree back, and its Quest Degree, one degree on. Before Libra 24 stands Libra 23, the proud rooster Chanticleer; after it, Libra 25, an autumn leaf read as a message. Taken together they move from a creature delighting in its gift, to one unbalanced by its gift, to a single falling leaf that carries meaning for anyone who notices.

The degree opposite is Aries 24, a net curtain at an open window, billowing out like a horn of plenty, our "Receptive abundance". As a reading aid, the two pictures share a sense of more: abundance that comes in through an open window, and an excess that grows from within.

In a chart

A planet or point anywhere from Libra 23°00′ up to, but not including, Libra 24°00′ takes this degree. The rule is to count the degree a position is in from one, so a Moon at Libra 23°59′ reads Libra 24, and so does one at Libra 23°59′. Close to either edge, a small change in the birth time or the ephemeris moves a placement into the next image: into Libra 25 after Libra 23°59′, or back into Libra 23 before Libra 23°00′. That is why the chart shows the minute beside the degree. In EsoTerrier's Sabian chart the Sun, the Moon and the Ascendant are read first, then the Midheaven and the planets; each placement in Libra 24 carries the image, keyword and keynote above, with Libra 23, Libra 25 and Aries 24 beside it.

Correspondences

Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.

Where the image comes from

Recorded by Marc Edmund Jones in Balboa Park, San Diego, in 1925, as the clairvoyant Elsie Wheeler described the picture she saw for an unseen card; one of 360 done in a single day; published by Jones in 1953 sourced

Degree before and after

Libra 23 and Libra 25, read beside this degree after Lynda Hill, who calls them its Karmic Condition and its Quest Degree sourced

Degree opposite

Aries 24, 180° away, offered as a reading aid; it is arithmetic, not a rule of Jones's our construction

A position at Libra 23°00′00″

Our engine, Hill's rule and every calculator we checked read it as Libra 24; the Sabian Assembly's sunrise page reads it as Libra 23. A computed chart practically never lands on it disputed

How the schools read it

Marc Edmund Jones (1953)

Gives the degree a symbol line, a commentary, a one-word keyword and a positive and a negative reading. We quote none of it.

Dane Rudhyar (1973)

Rewords the image and adds a keynote and a commentary of his own, numbering the degrees as Jones did. In copyright to 2068; not used, and the place he gives the degree in his own structure is not shown.

Lynda Hill (1995, 2004)

Uses the symbols as an oracle, with her own commentary, and reads each degree beside the one before and the one after. Her rule and her two names are cited here; her text is not used.

The Sabian Assembly

Jones's own study group serves the 1953 image and keyword of a degree in its oracle, without commentary, on purpose.

EsoTerrier

Our keynote: An extra capacity is both a gift and an imbalance.

Claims about it

• The image line on this page, or on any site, is Elsie Wheeler's own wording.

  false

  What the record shows: Her words survive only as Jones's pencilled notes of 1925. Jones reworded them in 1931 and 1953, Rudhyar in 1936 and 1973, and Hill in her books.

• Reading the degree before and the degree after is part of how the zodiac is built, or of Jones's method.

  false

  What the record shows: It is Lynda Hill's practice, and the two names are hers. We show the two degrees with her name.

• Dane Rudhyar's 1973 lines are the Sabian symbols and free to print.

  false

  What the record shows: They are his rewording, with his own keynotes and commentary, renewed in 2002 and in US copyright to the end of 2068. None of them is used here.

Elsewhere on EsoTerrier

• Libra 23: Proud crowing the degree before, which Lynda Hill reads as its background
• Libra 25: A sign in nature the degree after, which Hill reads as where it is heading
• Aries 24: Receptive abundance the degree opposite, read beside it as a reading aid
• Libra in the natal chart the sign these thirty degrees belong to