Changing of the Gods focuses on the “world transits” of the planets Uranus and Pluto, which together archetypally reflect “revolutionary transformation.” Each time these planets have come into axial alignments, a zeitgeist has manifested on Earth in concentrated periods of revolution, upheaval, and social breakthroughs that have changed the course of world history. About the Series During these periods, observers regularly see massive transformations in the areas of scientific and technological innovation, social and economic justice, women’s rights movements, black liberation movements, and the emergence of new paradigms that change how we view ourselves and reality as a whole. Sound familiar? The last time it happened was the 1960s. What is the revolution today? What is the transformation?
Episodes
Across Uranus-Pluto transits, history rhymes with recurring cycles bursting with radical social thought and the explosion of mass social movements for justice and freedom – qualities associated with Uranus. Each time there’s also an evolutionary transformation on huge scales – Pluto. Richard Tarnas guides us through an archetypal comparison of today’s radical movements with the 1960s. History doesn’t just rhyme – it practically plagiarizes. One consistent correlation is the renaissance of youth movements. We meet contemporary youth movement leader, hip-hop artist and climate activist Xiuhtezcatl Martinez to see the revolution now. We look back to the uncanny echoes of ‘60s youth movements.
Across Uranus-Pluto transits, history rhymes with recurring cycles bursting with radical social thought and the explosion of mass social movements for justice and freedom – qualities associated with Uranus. Each time there’s also an evolutionary transformation on huge scales – Pluto. Richard Tarnas guides us through an archetypal comparison of today’s radical movements with the 1960s. History doesn’t just rhyme – it practically plagiarizes. One consistent correlation is the renaissance of youth movements. We meet contemporary youth movement leader, hip-hop artist and climate activist Xiuhtezcatl Martinez to see the revolution now. We look back to the uncanny echoes of ‘60s youth movements.
Uranus-Pluto cycles consistently show a pattern of a revolt to overcome extreme inequality and ruling elites: the 99% against the 1%. We track the arc of social movements that were catalyzed in the West by the French Revolution and that have recurred across subsequent transits in the clash between democracy and plutocracy.
Once again history rhymes as Uranus-Pluto transits coincide with the cyclical rise and intensification of Women’s Rights Movements. From the French Revolution to today, during each transit there’s a dramatic resurgence of feminism and peak thresholds in the quest for equal rights for women – Uranus. Each time, there’s also the shadow side of patriarchal backlash to retain power – Pluto. African American Ifa-Orisha priestess Luisah Teish recounts the spellbinding West African Myth of Oshun and the Divine Feminine that sets the archetypal stage for the episode.
Richard Tarnas describes how Uranus-Pluto transits have consistently coincided with most of the major historical cycles and breakthrough eras of Black liberation and civil rights movements, from abolitionism to Black Lives Matter. In each transit, clusters of world-changing events and iconic historical figures have surged into prominence. Each time there’s a dramatic intensification and magnification of the struggle for liberation – Uranus – and a Plutonic backlash by elites to retain power by sowing racial division.
During Uranus-Pluto transits, the Plutonic archetype brings into play what Carl Jung called “the shadow of the human psyche.” Pluto is the id, the instincts and the underworld in all senses. When Pluto is activated, we see a pronounced psychological tendency in the collective psyche to project these shadow qualities with unusual potency onto whomever people see as “other.” This Plutonic shadow correlates with an eruption of ancient resentments and hatreds against “othered” groups. It empowers, on large scales, the impulse for scapegoating, feeling victimized, and violence and repression.
As Richard Tarnas illustrates, Uranus-Pluto transits correlate closely with the liberation (Uranus) of the instincts (Pluto). This has manifested in sexual liberation movements including gay and transgender rights and today’s transformation around gender fluidity. The transits have also correlated with the liberation of consciousness, as exemplified in the widespread popular use of marijuana and psychedelics that have surged in the 1960s and again today.
Do Uranus-Pluto world transits consistently coincide with game-changing technology revolutions that irrevocably transform society? As Richard Tarnas describes, the Uranus archetype is associated with radical technological invention and disruption, while Pluto empowers these changes on massive, transformative scales. Because the archetypes are multivalent – light and shadow and everything in between – we explore the shadow side of the abuse of technology in the Plutonic “shadow side” of raw power and domination. “What the hell happened in 2007,” asks acclaimed journalist Thomas Friedman, saying that 2007 may mark the single biggest revolution in technology since Guttenberg invented the printing press.
We revisit a driving question from Episode 1: What’s the worldview that brought us to this brink, and is there another worldview emerging today that could lead to a very different and restored world? Richard Tarnas opens with the Parable of the Two Suitors, a metaphoric view of the current scientific paradigm shift. He describes how Uranus/Pluto alignments of the past 500 years have coincided with dramatic consistency with key milestones in the major revolutions and paradigm shifts in Western scientific thought that have dramatically changed our worldview and cosmology.
In this climactic episode, we weave together the threads of our cosmic mystery story to explore the mystery of consciousness itself. If planetary configurations and transits do correlate with archetypal human consciousness, is consciousness a fundamental part of the fabric of the cosmos underlying both matter and psyche? We plunge into the mystery with Chief Oren Lyons, Jeremy Narby and former quantum physicist Will Keepin. He describes the model of the famed physicist David Bohm, who sought answers from both science and spiritual masters.
