According to traditional sources, the New Moon represents the end of one cycle and the beginning of another new 28-day cycle. It is often viewed as a symbol of endings and new beginnings. The nighttime darkness of the New Moon symbolizes the mysterious watery depth of the unconscious – the transpersonal realm where personal identity and individual boundaries dissolve and the sense of direction and ego are lost for the purpose of cleansing away the past in order to prepare the way for the future.
Archetypally, the New Moon symbolically represents:
- the fetus in the womb (Moon) waiting to be born into a new life (Sun),
- the Gnostic Marriage of Sol (the Sun) and Lunar (the Moon) – the alchemical marriage of male and female,
- the Greek goddess Hestia (Vesta) – the crackling blaze of the home hearth,
- the interplay of instinct (Moon) and ego (Sun), of soul (Moon) and spirit, yin (feminine) and yang (masculine) principles, Mother (Moon) and Father (Sun) or Man (Sun) and Woman (Moon), and existence (Moon) and meaning (Sun).
The April 5th New Moon at 15°16′ Aries conjuncts the fixed star Alpheratz – a fortunate fixed star of the nature of Jupiter and Venus. The archetypal dynamic of the Sun-Moon in Aries combination with Alpheratz augurs a confrontation with the father principle in its positive form as we are challenged to make something manifest in the world. Out of the confusion, fluctuation, and uncertainty of the previous New Moon just prior to the Astrological New Year, future developments are in the offing, where we are being asked to take a standpoint in the world in order to become more effective and powerful, and to set the direction and tone to the year ahead. This could be concretizing a creative idea into a legitimate project, taking a leadership role in a new venture, founding a new business, or perhaps moving forward with a move and establishing a new home. Despite being in grip of larger collective forces at work in the world, the April New Moon is asking us to confront worldly life again operating with a higher set of ethical principles by which to live by.
The effects of the April 5th New Moon will last four weeks up to the May 4th New Moon. The best time for making a fresh start and for beginning new projects is during the first two weeks of this new moon cycle. This waxing phase of the Moon lasts from April 5th to the April 19th Full Moon.