Three church windows, one of them broken by shellfire

The image

Three tall windows of coloured glass, set side by side as in a church wall. Two are whole; the third has been hit during a bombardment and carries the damage, though it is still in place. The picture is described here as an image only: it shows broken glass in a standing building, not harm to anyone.

Before October 2026 our table gave this degree a shortened line that lost both the windows and the damage; it was replaced with the present one.

Meaning

Our keyword is "Faith wounded, faith standing", and our keynote: beauty built for the spirit survives, though not untouched.

Stained glass is light shaped by a belief, made slowly and meant to last. The image puts three of them in a row and lets one carry the marks of a violent time. We read it as the difference between being damaged and being destroyed. What was made with care can lose a pane and still let colour through, and the window that took the blow may be the one people look at longest. One way to see the degree is as a picture of conviction that has been tested by circumstances and kept its shape, with the crack now part of its story.

Hill's rule sets each degree between two others, the one before as its history and the one after as its aim. Before it comes Capricorn 1, the chief who asks that his rank be recognised; after it, Capricorn 3, a soul that is open and ready to learn. Taken in her order, a claim to standing is followed by a test of what stands, and then by an openness that the test has made possible.

As a reading aid, the opposite degree is Cancer 2, a man held in the air above a wide, flat land. Where the windows are close and particular, the man in the air sees the whole country at once; between them the page holds the near view and the far one.

In a chart

A planet or point anywhere from Capricorn 1°00′ up to, but not including, Capricorn 2°00′ takes this degree. The rule is to count the degree a position is in from one, so a Moon at Capricorn 1°55′ reads Capricorn 2, and so does one at Capricorn 1°57′. Close to either edge, a small change in the birth time or the ephemeris moves a placement into the next image: into Capricorn 3 after Capricorn 1°59′, or back into Capricorn 1 before Capricorn 1°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 Capricorn 2 carries the image, keyword and keynote above, with Capricorn 1, Capricorn 3 and Cancer 2 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

Capricorn 1 and Capricorn 3, read beside this degree after Lynda Hill, who calls them its Karmic Condition and its Quest Degree sourced

Degree opposite

Cancer 2, 180° away, offered as a reading aid; it is arithmetic, not a rule of Jones's our construction

A position at Capricorn 1°00′00″

Our engine, Hill's rule and every calculator we checked read it as Capricorn 2; the Sabian Assembly's sunrise page reads it as Capricorn 1. A computed chart practically never lands on it disputed

Our table before 10 October 2026

The former line 'Three roses.' reduced the image of three stained-glass windows, one damaged by bombardment; corrected on 10 October 2026 sourced

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: Beauty built for the spirit survives, though not untouched.

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

• Capricorn 1: Asking to be seen the degree before, which Lynda Hill reads as its background
• Capricorn 3: Open spirit the degree after, which Hill reads as where it is heading
• Cancer 2: Overview the degree opposite, read beside it as a reading aid
• Capricorn in the natal chart the sign these thirty degrees belong to