Ivan was born in the Moscow Kremlin, at six in the evening on August 25, 1530. At that moment, Capricorn was in the ascendant, and the Sun and the moon were in conjunction in Virgo. Legend has it that a terrible thunderstorm raged as the mother labored to give birth to the new prince, and mystics were seeing terrible omens. Ivan was destined to be the first Tsar of Russia, and among history’s most notorious figures. His life would be one of almost supernatural evil. Before his birth, his father, Grand Prince Vasily III, had married a woman in a ceremony not sanctioned by the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Patriarch of Jerusalem had warned him that his child would be unholy, and would bring chaos, terror and death on a vast scale to Russia, but Vasily ignored him. He needed a male heir, and he was going to get it. And this cursed child would now be that heir to the throne of Moscow’s empire. It was not a promising start. It would be over 50 years later, but this same boy would hold his own dead son in his arms, in the Moscow Kremlin, not far from where he was born, and he would be begging god for forgiveness for his many crimes. It would be too late. The Karmic law of retribution went into effect. Ivan would soon die, his dynasty would collapse and Russia would be thrown into anarchy, war and famine.
Ivan’s grandfather, Grand Prince Ivan III ( ruled 1462-1505), had restored Moscow to greatness after years of being subordinate to the Tartars, who had conquered Russia in the 13th Century. But the zenith of Tatar domination of Moscow was long past. Ivan III’s armies had met the Tartars on the field of battle, but the Tartars fled. After this, Moscow was able to be free of foreign domination. Ivan III was also the first to use the title Tsar, meaning Caesar, but it was not official. But Ivan did lay the foundations for the total autocracy, where the whole of the land was subservient to one man, him. He also strengthened the institution of serfdom, which was similar to.
