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Pandora’s Box: The Mysterious 8th House

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Pandora’s Box: The Mysterious 8th House is a 360° analysis of the 8th house, the place in the chart which includes sensible issues like death, debts, possessiveness, entanglements, sexuality or boundary crossings. It links the somewhat fatalistic Hellenistic view of ‘descent into the underworld’ with more modern psychological interpretations of shadow work, transformation and resilience. The deeper one digs, the more complex this house becomes, and ancient and modern approaches complement each other rather than contradict themselves.
With biographical examples of fascinating personalities like Jane Goodall, Kaiser Wilhelm II, Truman Capote, John Dee, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and Adolf Eichmann, the book is complemented by a detailed chapter of planets in the 8th house, 8th house rulership factors in the chart, and transits to the 8th house. Martin Sebastian Moritz’ book is both entertaining and insightful, a good read that will challenge any level of astrologer – particularly those in the thrall of the 8th house.
Includes a Foreword by Lynn Bell

Martin Sebastian Moritz

Martin Sebastian Moritz

Martin Sebastian Moritz lives in Hamburg and Berlin. He started out as actor and dancer before his life took a different turn and he decided to study ...

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Martin Sebastian Moritz shares that he ‘…wanted to write this book to dig up as many aspects about this fascinating place in the chart as possible, in order to offer greater clarity.’ From my perspective he successfully hit the mark!

He begins by providing background and depth about the 8th house, setting the stage for what is to follow.  For example, in the Introduction of Pandora’s Box, a section entitled ‘Looking behind the mirror: The 2nd house’, contains what might be the most useful description of 8th and 2nd house polarity that I have come across. Perhaps this is a function of the author’s skill in writing clearly about the very complex, and often daunting, 8th house and all it represents. The introduction alone is worth picking up the book!

Not surprisingly, a book on the 8th house has the potential to stir up all manner of issues and emotions. Personally speaking, I won’t say issues that have been forgotten or buried, because the chapter ‘Gateway to Another World’ was in many ways validating. Here, I found a precise description of my own contemplations, and experience, as I continue to live with the aftermath of losing a loved one. Moritz ponders the notion of our own questions about ‘what happens after death’ together with some perspective on how an individual’s life experience may be influenced as a result of ‘loss and mourning’.

Through each section of the book, there are a variety of interesting chart examples, accompanied by revelatory detail about the people and stories represented. Some are a bit dark, and potentially disturbing, but Moritz handles these with skill and sensitivity. One cannot help but reflect on the idea that ‘the unconscious forces of the 8th house shape our lives.’  While some examples could be considered repellent, the significance of what might be revealed and healed by exploring 8th house matters is well worth considering.

So many of us shy away from issues within this scary 8th house domain, whether from fear, discomfort, or something else. However, the choice of ‘Pandora’s Box’ as the title for this book is incredibly appropriate. If we draw elements of the myth into the current reality of our environment (personal and collective), we might consider that Pandora opening the lid on what was ‘forbidden’ suggests that the ‘evil’ unleashed cannot be buried or hidden, it must be faced. In reading Martin Sebastian Moritz’s book, I am struck by the notion of ‘hope’…the item which remained at the bottom of Pandora’s Box. And, isn’t hope something we could all use a little more of?

Jayne Logan www.astrobookclub.com

 

Martin Sebastian Moritz comes to us with impressive credentials. Martin has a background in the arts as well as being a consulting psychological astrologer based in Hamburg and Berlin, specialising in couples therapy. He lectures all over Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the UK as well as contributing to astrology magazines. In the Foreword, well known astrologer Lynn Bell gives this book a glowing reference, writing that a book like this, on the 8th house has never been written before and that as both therapist and astrologer, Martin has helped to create a book of depth and insight into the complex psychological experiences that underlie human existence.
In his preface, Vampires in the 8th house, Martin acknowledges that the inspiration for his book came from a webinar Lynn Bell gave on vampires and how we can be ‘emptied out’ by charismatic and seductive individuals. Martin explains that energy exchange is a core topic of the 8th house. And the energy can be in the form of sex, money, or anything that has any value for the individual. For Martin, Lynn’s explanation of the Hellenistic approach to the 8th house helped him immeasurably in gaining a better understanding of this fascinating house. The 8th house was called Epikataphora (meaning ‘to be cast down’, which Lynn further developed as a descent into the underworld.) It was feared as an evil, life-sucking ‘empty place’.
In his Introduction Martin elaborates on the way Greeks regarded the 8th house as being the place where we like to project our longings and repressed feelings onto other people and the tendencies to ‘fixation’. He cites the myth of Pandora’s Box where the curious Pandora yields to temptation opening the box after which it emptied all its evil contents into the world exposing the world to vice, sickness and death. At the bottom of the box, there was one single precious thing left behind: hope. This story exemplifies the main eight steps in and out of the 8th house: Mystery, Taboo, Temptation, Self- conquest, Shadow, Crisis, Guilt, Transformation.
Martin gives many fascinating insights into famous and infamous people alike and their entangled relationships in his book to further illustrate the complex and manifold properties of the 8th house. In his first chapter, Gateway to Another World, Martin analyses the natal chart and transits of John Dee, the well-known Elizabethan astrologer, astronomer and mystic, who had a stellium in the 8th house – Sun, Mercury, Jupiter and Black Moon Lilith. Martin gives a fascinating account of Dee’s association with a young medium called Edward Kelley and how together they become consumed with conducting seances which leads them to the brink of exhaustion and madness. The composite chart of Dee and Kelley has 5 planets in the 8th house – Sun, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter and Black Moon Lilith.
Another very interesting case study is that of the Swiss-born doctor Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, famous for her book, On Death and Dying, in which she outlined the 5 stages of grief. Martin discusses her resilience in respect of her 8th house Saturn.
In Chapter 4, Apocalyptic Times – The Long Shadow of the Third Reich, Martin analyses the natal chart of the Nazi criminal, Adolf Eichmann, who has Mars in Taurus in the 8th house. Martin traces Eichmann’s life from being a misfit and victim of bullying as a child to a rising star in the  National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP). Martin also analyses the foundation of the NSDAP which has Moon in the 8th house.
Under the chapter Entanglements, Martin analyses the charts of Queen Victoria’s family revealing their symbiotic relationships which include themes of abandonment, claustrophobic conditions, a vampiric relationship and pathological grief, all signatures of strong 8th house placements.
Other interesting case studies include Jane Goodall who has Pluto and Lilith in the 8th house, and Sylvia Plath, the American poet who had Sun in Scorpio in the 8th house who took her own life at age 30. Martin includes a chapter on transits through the 8th house and concludes by sharing part of his own life’s journey with his own natal chart which has Venus, Saturn, Chiron and North Node in Aries all in the 8th house.
As someone with Sun and Mercury in the 8th house, I can really recommend Martin’s book to any astrologer who wishes to delve deeply into this mysterious house. I thoroughly concur with Lynn Bell’s words in praise of Pandora’s Box, “Catching a glimpse of your own shadow side is breathtaking. For me it is essential reading.”
Ann Robertson for the FAA Journal

The 8th house is powerful, raw, and visceral. Most astrology books are not.
Approaching the house of birth, sex, and death in anything but a very direct way is bound to fall short of its meaning, and we’re left with a ‘lite’ version of a heavy place. Fortunately, Martin Moritz has tackled the 8th house head-on, providing a book that helps us to understand it from both historical and contemporary perspectives. Well, perhaps not ‘head-on’, as that’s one of the problems of the house – it can’t be approached directly, as it forms an awkward quincunx to the ascendant.
In fact, Moritz changes lenses swiftly during the course of the book, dealing with different facets of the 8th house in a way that creates a kind of kaleidoscopic effect. He presents a section on death and dying, highlighting Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, then moves into the financial aspects of the house, along with the emphasis on power and control. But he returns to the theme of death many times as the book progresses, weaving a tapestry that becomes apparent as the book concludes. Before we’re done, we understand how the 8th house isn’t only about the individual things we associate with it, but rather its coherent underlying theme.
While there are sections that are more or less expository, most of the book is presented in stories that illustrate the essential theme of the 8th house by exploring subthemes. The author gives us a short biography with relevant facts, then goes into the natal chart. That’s a strategy that allows for the reader to feel the meaning first, then shift into a more analytical mode and approach the information astrologically. Since the focus is on one part of the chart, we don’t get overwhelmed by data. The discussions are supported by charts and a listing of relevant 8th house aspects – both of which are very helpful.
About halfway through the book, Moritz considers what he calls “entanglements”, which is a good choice for many relationships that have an 8th house flavor. This section makes for interesting and slightly unnerving reading – I expect especially for folks with strong 8th house placements. We don’t get to see much of the positive potential of the 8th house from the examples given, but I’m sure they are there.
A more positive chapter follows, as the author explores Resilience and Transformation. The message is that there is potential for growth if we go through the difficult challenges of the 8th house with openness and willingness to change. The tenacious and courageous stars of this (rather short) chapter are RuPaul and Jane Goodall.
The book ends with three chapters that serve as a kind of reference, one on planets in the 8th house, one on rulership combinations, and a final chapter on transits to the 8th house. Although the reader can refer to these chapters for specific placements, they aren’t quite ‘cookbook’, and contain more biographical stories (I have nothing against astrology cookbooks, by the way: I think they can be very helpful). The final chapter, on transits, is very short and could have used a bit more elaboration and some examples. Still, there are some insights that are well worth reading.
The overall flavor of the book is more in line with psychological or evolutionary approaches to astrology, although there are frequent references to traditional astrology as well. While not explicitly organized historically or otherwise, the varying perspectives don’t conflict with each other.
As Moritz is German, the examples he uses are not the standard set of Hollywood celebrities, and he relies more on European royalty and figures from political history – not that they are obscure personalities. He translated his own book and added new chapters written in English, and it is a very smooth read.
It is a good book for beginning to advanced students, as well as professionals, and everyone will be able to take  something of value from the 8th house. My advice would be to order Pandora’s Box, and when it arrives, open it.
Reviewed by Armand Diaz

Psychological astrologer Martin Sebastian Moritz uses the myth of Pandora’s box as an organizing principle for this book about the 8th house, traditionally seen as a disreputable place. Moritz was inspired to research this book after watching a webinar with Lynn Bell, who wrote the foreword, about vampires and other individuals who leave one feeling drained. In her webinar, Lynn Bell pointed to the Hellenistic term for the 8th house “Epikataphora” which means “to be cast down,” as in a descent into under-worlds.
The 2nd house was seen as the house ascending from the underworld which is better, but the 8th, 2nd, 6th and 12th were all considered in ancient aspect theory to be aversive because they lack a clear line of sight with the Ascendant. The 9th, 8th and 7th are places where the sun has fallen from its zenith at noon, but the 9th and the 7th are not inconjunct with the Ascendant. The 8th house, Moritz notes, “is the place of shadow during a time of day of very bright light”. The 8th house has been associated with undesirable themes, from death itself, to crime, taboos, debts, and entanglements.
Moritz’ mentor Wolfgang Doebereiner called it the place of “tendencies to fixation”. Unlike the 2nd house, which is where our talents and resources are built, the 8th house, Moritz writes, “represents our ideas of how things in life and other people ought to be.” It’s where we get stuck. It’s where shadowy parts of ourselves live and are projected out onto
others. (The 8th house maybe also associated with
the occult, though Moritz doesn’t go there.)
In Greek myth, Pandora disobeys Zeus and opens a box she’d been ordered to keep shut, causing evils to spill out onto the earth. But there’s something else at the bottom of Pandora’s box. That is hope, and it’s also where Pandora’s Box ends, as the 8th is a house where one can remake oneself outside of society’s norms.
Moritz’ book is superbly written, a page-turner. There are a few client stories, though most of the examples are of public figures whose 8th house sagas played out in public, over many years, often enmeshed with other 8th house characters. The book was originally written in German, but when Moritz went to translate it into English, he found that to be not such an easy task. He rewrote it, obtaining a number of the European case studies and replacing them with some celebrity stories more familiar to a North American reader.
One is the story of Truman Capote, author of the non-fiction crime thriller In Cold Blood. In 1959, an entire family was murdered in their rural Kansas home. No motive was apparent. Capote flocked to Kansas to report on the investigation and trials. It is in an early chapter about Elisabeth Kubler-Ross that Moritz introduces the theme of resilience as 8th house work. Hope can be passive. Resilience connotes agency. Resilience, Moritz writes, is “the psychological ability to cope with a crisis and survive unscathed, or rather – like a phoenix from the ashes – rise again with new powers.” In his chapter on resilience, Moritz tells of two 8th house trail blazers. Primatologist Jane Goodall broke the mold as a female scientist, traveling alone into the African wilderness in the 1950s. She then had to confront the fact that her gentle chimps can also become killers.
At the end of the book, Moritz offers a bonus sidebar about Black Moon Lilith (BML) which he calls a “hot topic de jour in astrology.” Moritz has no conclusions about BML’s meaning in a chart, other than that it involves “values, sexuality, shadow work and transformation,” and is therefore relevant to the 8th house. While the Moon represents that which is most familiar to us, BML is what is hidden from view and thus difficult to feel consciously.
What I love about this book is that it is thoroughly modern psychological astrology and it is also true to the ancient low-down about the 8th as a house of troubles. When your circumstances have cast you down low into the 8th house, you can just stew in the underworld, or you can develop your 2nd house talents, and rise. If you dig through the shadows of the 8th house, there at the bottom of Pandora’s box lies hope.
Sara R. Diamond ©2022 For the NCGR member newsletter. All rights reserved.

Should this book come with a public health warning? The horoscope’s 8th house is a zone of horror if we are to believe certain sources. It is associated with death, taboo, debt and other life shadows; it is ‘the descent into the underworld’. Its potency as a harbinger of endings is never more apparent than in horary. Even in modern astrology, the 8th is a terrain of discomfort but also of challenging ‘transformation’ which accommodates both psychological and mystical undercurrents. Sex finds its place here, too, even if horribly.
Martin Moritz is a therapist-astrologer of immense sensitivity. Rather than contradict the ancient sages on the 8th – who would dare? – he sets out to synthesise modern and traditional perspectives through analyses and many case studies. The Contents page gives an early clue to his approach. In Chapter 1, among the subtitles are ‘Tendencies to Fixation’ and ‘The Values of Others’. Jump to Chapter 3 and ‘Client Hannah: Incest’ links a story of dysfunction with a natal Pluto-Saturn merger in 8th-house Leo opposed by Moon.
Chapter 4 takes us to Nazi Germany while Chapter 6 tackles US drag star RuPaul whose Saturn rules his 8th from the 7th. Aspect patterns with Saturn accord with RuPaul’s early-life shyness and his ‘inner saboteur’ – which Moritiz characterises as an ‘8th-house mechanism’. From this unpromising start, an 8th-house transformative energy produced the fierce and outrageous drag queen. The 8th hellhole is also a place from which to metamorphose, if you’re brave.
As Lynn Bell insightfully observes in her Foreword, Moritz explores the ‘living reality of the psyche’…he ‘examines how the unconscious forces of the 8th house shape our lives’. If the 8th plays host to fears, abuse and repressions, one antidote is the illumination of therapy – crisis requires recognition before release. This is a recurring theme of this book, and Moritz is to be congratulated for adding priceless emotional nuance to a much-misunderstood chart zone.
Victor Olliver for The Astrological Journal March-April 2022

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