Planetary Conditions

A planet within roughly 8° of the Sun is considered combust — traditionally read as "burned up" or overwhelmed by solar glare, its own significations weakened or distorted by the Sun's overpowering presence. Combustion is one of the oldest weakening conditions in the traditional astrological toolkit, going back to Hellenistic sources.

But there is a narrow exception: a planet within about 17 arcminutes (roughly 0.3°) of the Sun — essentially sitting right at its heart — is instead called Cazimi ('in the heart' in Arabic-derived terminology), and is read as one of the strongest, most fortunate placements possible, as if the planet has been granted direct access to solar power rather than being drowned out by it. The difference between a planet being crushed by the Sun and empowered by it comes down entirely to exact orb.

A planet is called peregrine ('wandering' or 'foreign') when it holds none of the five traditional essential dignities in the sign it occupies — no rulership, exaltation, triplicity, term, or face. It isn't damaged the way a planet in detriment or fall is; it simply has no home-field advantage at all, and traditional astrologers read peregrine planets as unpredictable or directionless, since they lack any dignified foothold from which to operate consistently.

Two planets are in mutual reception when each sits in the sign ruled by the other — for example, Mars in Cancer (ruled by the Moon) while the Moon sits in Aries (ruled by Mars). Traditional astrology treats mutual reception as a kind of dignity-sharing arrangement: each planet, though technically "visiting" a foreign sign, is welcomed as an honoured guest by the very planet whose home it occupies, softening what might otherwise be an uncomfortable placement for both.

A planet is out of bounds when its declination exceeds the Sun's maximum declination (roughly 23.5°) — meaning it has moved outside the band of sky the Sun ever travels through. Modern astrologers, following research popularised by Michael and Jeffrey Wolf Munkasey, read out-of-bounds planets as operating outside normal social rules, for better or worse — untethered from the Sun's usual regulating influence.

Separately, the Void of Course Moon describes the period after the Moon makes its last major aspect in a sign before it moves into the next one — a stretch traditionally considered poorly suited for starting anything new, since "nothing will come of it" is the classic verdict. It's one of the most commonly checked conditions in electional astrology (choosing an auspicious time to begin something) precisely because it's easy to calculate and widely believed to matter.