The eighth house is Pluto's natural home among the houses, and Robert Hand is careful about what that does and does not mean. The effect, he says, is simply to make its action more intense, for good or bad. Being in its own house is not a guarantee of a good outcome, only of a strong one.
A relationship with an eighth house Pluto will have many major changes and periods of transformation, and the placement gives intensity to whatever emotional involvement the two have.
What This Placement Describes
Pluto in a composite chart is death and regeneration. Something goes out of existence and a new order comes into being, and Hand treats this as essential rather than unfortunate, since it prevents the stagnation that follows when a way of life has outlived its purpose. His handling rule is to let go of whatever is going through the crisis, because holding on to what is properly dead does not save it and makes things worse.
The composite eighth house has two layers. One is joint resources, hard to separate from the second house in a composite chart since the two people cannot be told apart and all finances are therefore joint. The other layer matters more here. Traditionally the house of death, it really means the passing away of any old order and the building up of a new one, which is why Hand calls it the house of major transformations. A strong eighth house more often marks a relationship of great significance that brings major psychological change than one loaded with property.
How It Tends To Play Out
The central effect Hand describes is exposure. In a relationship with this placement, the innermost psychological drives of both people get brought out into the open and examined. He does not pretend this is comfortable. He says the process may not always be pleasant, and then says it is good to have it happen from time to time, and that allowing it means learning a great deal about oneself. His image for it is worth carrying: in many ways this relationship is a mirror in which each can see their own soul reflected. He attaches an instruction to that image. Remember it when tempted to blame each other for problems.
In a sexual relationship the intensity is particular. Sex becomes more than sex, a pathway to self transcendence, a way of being carried out of ordinary concerns into an experience beyond them. Hand adds a realistic note. Pluto is not easily put into words, so the two probably will not think about this in philosophical terms. They will simply feel that sex means more to them than to most couples.
In other kinds of relationship, the eighth house Pluto can create a curious bond that seems to hold the two together even when they do not want it to. Hand refuses the fatalistic reading directly. The feeling of being trapped is not really the case. What is more likely is that both derive an obscure satisfaction from what they do to each other and have built a dependency on that basis. Honesty about it makes it workable. It is not fate that created this relationship, it is the two people, with their acknowledged and unacknowledged needs.
The Opposite House
The paired house rule comes out of the mechanics of the composite. Any pair of planets has two midpoints, the nearer is used, and the farther keeps some effect that grows as the two natal positions approach opposition. So an eighth house Pluto should also be read through the second, and where the two natal Plutos are near opposition, reading both is essential.
The composite second house is values and whatever the relationship holds, and Hand asks for both houses to be consulted on financial matters anyway. His Pluto in the second can make acquiring property an overriding passion, and says the relationship is likely to change what the two consider important. Read as an axis, the second is what is held and the eighth is what has to be given up.
Hand gives no threshold for when the second reading takes over and no method for blending them. Both stand.
Where It Gets Difficult
The difficulty is that nothing here stays private. A relationship that surfaces the deepest drives of both people is doing something valuable and is also uncomfortable to live inside, and the discomfort is not evidence that anything is wrong.
The dependency Hand describes is the sharper problem, mainly because it is so easily mistaken for destiny. His answer is unusually firm for a 1975 astrology text. The bond is authored, not imposed, and honesty about what each is getting out of it is what makes it possible to deal with.
He does not write this placement as damage. He writes it as intensity with a use. The house sets the issue. Whether the energy is experienced as difficult or easy is described by the aspects to Pluto, which Hand treats as a separate question.
Recommended Reading
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- Robert Hand, Planets in Composite: Analyzing Human Relationships (1975), chapter fourteen.
- Robert Hand, Planets in Composite: Analyzing Human Relationships (1975), chapter four, on the composite eighth house and the paired house rule.
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Next: Composite Chart Placements and How to Read a Composite Chart.