The Sign of the Fishes

   (Astrology) The astrological statements that were quite possible in antiquity all point to the prominent double aspect of the birth that occurred at this particular moment of time, and one can understand how plausible was the astrological interpretation of the Christ-Antichrist myth when it entered into manifestation at the time of the Gnostics. AION 79

Significantly enough, Jesus’ partner in the ceremony is called Barabbas, “son of the father”.

Although no connection of any kind can be proved between the figure of Christ and the inception of the astrological age of the fishes, the simultaneity of the fish symbolism of the Redeemer with the astrological symbol of the new aeon seems to me important enough to warrant the emphasis we place upon it. If we try to follow up the complicated mythological ramifications of this parallel, we do so with intent to throw light on the multifarious aspects of an archetype that manifest itself on the one hand in a personality, and on the other hand synchronistically, in a moment of time determined in advance, before Christ’s birth. Indeed, long before that, the archetype had been written in the heavens by projection, so as then, “when the time was fulfilled,” to coincide with the symbols produced by the new era. AION 92

It becomes a matter for astonishment only when, through the precession of the equinoxes, the spring-point moves into this sign and thus inaugurates an age in which the “fish” was used as a name for the God who became a man, who was born as a fish and was sacrificed as a ram, who had fishermen for disciples and wanted to make them fishers of men, who fed the multitude with miraculously multiplying fishes, who was himself eaten as a fish, the “holier food,” and whose followers are little fishes, the “pisciculi.” AION 92

Astrologically interpreted, the designation of Christ as one of the fishes identifies him with the first fish, the vertical one. Christ is followed by the Antichrist, at the end of time. The beginning of the enantiodromia would fall logically, midway between the two fishes. We have seen that this is so. The time of the Renaissance begins in the immediate vicinity of the second fish, and with it comes that spirit which culminates in the modern age. AION 94

Part 9 – The ambivalence of the fish symbol

(The) doubling of the shadow often met with in dreams, where the two halves appear as different or even as antagonistic figures. This happens when the conscious ego-personality does not contain all the contents and components that it could contain. Part of the personality then remains split off and mixes with the normally unconscious shadow, the two together forming a double – and often antagonistic – personality. AION 120

The Messiah became, in Christianity, the second Person of the Trinity, the human figure split off from the fish hints at God’s incarnation. What was previously missing in the God-image, therefore, was the human element. AION 121

It is significant that the opposites have to work together for a common purpose when it comes to helping the one god. AION 123

The coincidence of opposites is the normal things in a primitive conception of God, since God, not being an object of reflection, is simply taken for granted. As the level of conscious reflection, however, the coincidence of opposites becomes a major problem, which we do everything possible to circumvent. That is why the position of the devil in Christian dogma is so very unsatisfactory. When there are such gaps in our collective ideas, in the dominants of our conscious orientation, we can count with absolute certainty on the existence of complementary or – to be more precise – compensatory developments in the unconscious. AION 124