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Astrology is a group of systems, traditions, and beliefs in which knowledge of the relative positions of celestial bodies and related information is held to be useful in understanding, interpreting, and organizing knowledge about personality, human affairs, and other terrestrial events. A practitioner of astrology is called an astrologer, or, less often, an astrologist. Historically, the term mathematicus was used to denote a person proficient in astrology, astronomy, and mathematics.
Although the two fields share a common origin, modern astronomy is entirely distinct from astrology. While astronomy is the scientific study of astronomical objects and phenomena, the practice of astrology is concerned with the correlation of heavenly bodies (which historically involved measurement of the celestial sphere) with earthly and human affairs.[ ][ or divination.]
The word astrology is derived from the Greek αστρολογία, from άστρον (astron, "star") and λόγος (logos, "word"). The -λογία suffix is written in English as -logy, "study" or "discipline".
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Beliefs
The core beliefs of astrology were prevalent in most of the ancient world and are epitomized in the Hermetic maxim "as above, so below". Tycho Brahe used a similar phrase to justify his studies in astrology: suspiciendo despicio, "by looking up I see downward". Although the principle that events in the heavens are mirrored by those on Earth was once generally held in most traditions of astrology around the world, in the West there has historically been a debate among astrologers over the nature of the mechanism behind astrology and whether or not celestial bodies are only signs or portents of events, or if they are actual causes of events through some sort of force or mechanism.
While the connection between celestial mechanics and terrestrial dynamics was explored first by Isaac Newton with his development of a universal theory of gravitation, claims that the gravitational effects of the celestial bodies are what accounts for astrological generalizations are not substantiated by the scientific community, nor are they advocated by most astrologers.
Many of those who practice astrology believe that the positions of certain celestial bodies either influence or correlate with human affairs. Most modern astrologers believe that the cosmos (and especially the solar system) acts as a single unit, so that any happening in any part of it inevitably is reflected in every other part. Skeptics dispute these claims, pointing to a lack of concrete evidence of significant influence of this sort.
Most astrological traditions are based on the relative positions and movements of various real or construed celestial bodies and on the construction of celestial patterns as seen at the time and place of the event being studied. These are chiefly the Sun, Moon, the planets, the stars and the lunar nodes. The calculations performed in casting a horoscope involve arithmetic and simple geometry which serve to locate the apparent position of heavenly bodies on desired dates and times based on astronomical tables. The frame of reference for such apparent positions is defined by the tropical or sidereal zodiacal signs on one hand, and by the local horizon (ascendant) and midheaven on the other. This latter (local) frame is typically further divided into the twelve astrological houses.
In the past, astrologers often relied on close observation of celestial objects and the charting of their movements. Today astrologers use data provided by astronomers which are transformed to a set of astrological tables called ephemerides, showing the changing zodiacal positions of the heavenly bodies through time.
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Traditions
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There are many different traditions of astrology, some of which share similar features due to the transmission of astrological doctrines from one culture to another. Other traditions developed in isolation and hold completely different doctrines, although they too share some similar features due to the fact that they are drawing on similar astronomical sources.
Significant traditions of astrology include but are not limited to:
Medieval & Renaissance horoscopic astrology
Modern tropical and sidereal horoscopic astrology
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Horoscopic astrology
Horoscopic astrology is a very specific and complex system that was developed in the Mediterranean region and specifically Hellenistic Egypt sometime around the late 2nd or early 1st century BCE. The tradition deals with two-dimensional diagrams of the heavens created for specific moments in time. The diagram is then used to interpret the inherent meaning underlying the alignment of celestial bodies at that moment based on a specific set of rules and guidelines. One of the defining characteristics of this form of astrology that makes it distinct from other traditions is the computation of the degree of the Eastern horizon rising against the backdrop of the ecliptic at the specific moment under examination, otherwise known as the ascendant. Horoscopic astrology has been the most influential and widespread form of astrology across the world, especially in Africa, India, Europe, and the Middle East, and there are several major traditions of horoscopic astrology including Indian, Hellenistic, Medieval, and most other modern Western traditions of astrology.
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The horoscope
Central to horoscopic astrology and its branches is the calculation of the horoscope or astrological chart. This two-dimensional diagrammatic representation shows the celestial bodies' apparent positions in the heavens from the vantage of a location on Earth at a given time and place. In ancient Hellenistic astrology the ascendant demarcated the first celestial house of a horoscope. The word for the ascendant in Greek was horoskopos from which "horoscope" derives. In modern times, however, the word has come to refer to the astrological chart as a whole.
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The tropical and sidereal zodiacs
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The path of the Sun across the heavens as seen from Earth during a full year is called the ecliptic. This, and the nearby band of sky followed by the visible planets, is called the zodiac.
The majority of Western astrologers base their work on the tropical zodiac which evenly divides the ecliptic into 12 segments of 30 degrees each. The Sun's position at the March equinox, zero degrees Aries, marks the beginning of the zodiac. The zodiacal signs in this system bear no relation to the constellations of the same name but stay aligned to the months and seasons. The tropical zodiac is used as a historical coordinate system in astronomy.
Practitioners of the Jyotish (Hindu) astrological tradition and a minority of Western astrologers use the sidereal zodiac. This zodiac uses the same evenly divided ecliptic but approximately stays aligned to the positions of the observable constellations with the same name as the zodiacal signs. The sidereal zodiac is computed from the tropical zodiac by adding an offset called ayanamsa. This offset changes with the precession of the equinoxes.
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Branches of horoscopic astrology
Traditions of horoscopic astrology can be divided into four branches which are directed towards specific subjects or purposes. Often these branches use a unique set of techniques or a different application of the core principles of the system to a different area. Many other subsets and applications of astrology are derived from these four fundamental branches.
Natal astrology, the study of a person's natal chart in order to gain information about the individual and his/her life experience.
Katarchic astrology, which includes both electional and event astrology. The former uses astrology to determine the most auspicious moment to begin an enterprise or undertaking, and the latter to understand everything about an event from the time at which it took place.
Horary astrology, used to answer a specific question by studying the chart of the moment the question is posed to an astrologer.
Mundane or world astrology, the application of astrology to world events, including weather, earthquakes, and the rise and fall of empires or religions.
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History of astrology
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Origins
The origins of much of the astrological doctrine and method that would later develop in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East are found among the ancient Babylonians and their system of celestial omens that began to be compiled around the middle of the 2nd millennium BCE. This system of celestial omens later spread either directly or indirectly through the Babylonians to other areas such as India, China, and Greece where it merged with pre-existing indigenous forms of astrology. This Babylonian astrology came to Greece initially as early as the middle of the 4th century BCE, and then around the late 2nd or early 1st century BCE after the Alexandrian conquests, this Babylonian astrology was mixed with the Egyptian tradition of decanic astrology to create horoscopic astrology. This new form of astrology, which appears to have originated in Alexandrian Egypt, quickly spread across the ancient world into Europe, the Middle East and India.
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Before the scientific revolution
From the classical period through the scientific revolution, astrological training played a critical role in advancing astronomical, mathematical, medical and psychological knowledge. Insofar as the interpretation of supposed astrological influences included the observation and long-term tracking of celestial objects, it was often astrologers who provided the first systematic documentation of the movements of the Sun, the Moon, the planets, and the stars. The differentiation between astronomy and astrology varied from place to place; they were indistinguishable in ancient Babylonia and for most of the Middle Ages, but separated to a greater degree in ancient Greece (see astrology and astronomy). Astrology was not always uncritically accepted before the modern era; it was often challenged by Hellenistic skeptics, church authorities and medieval thinkers.
The pattern of astronomical knowledge gained from astrological endeavours has been historically repeated across numerous cultures, from ancient India through the classical Maya civilization to medieval Europe. Given this historical contribution, astrology has been called a protoscience along with pseudosciences such as alchemy (see "Western astrology and alchemy" below).
Many prominent scientists, such as Nicholas Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, Carl Gustav Jung and others, practiced or significantly contributed to astrology.•
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Effects on world culture
Astrology has had a profound influence over the past few thousand years on Western and Eastern cultures. In the middle ages, when even the educated of the time believed in astrology, the system of heavenly spheres and bodies was believed to reflect on the system of knowledge and the world itself below.
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Language
Influenza, from medieval Latin influentia meaning influence, was so named because doctors once believed epidemics to be caused by unfavorable planetary and stellar influences. The word "disaster" comes from the Latin dis-aster meaning "bad star". Adjectives "lunatic" (Luna/Moon), "mercurial" (Mercury), "martial" (Mars), "jovial" (Jupiter/Jove), and "saturnine" (Saturn) are all old words used to describe personal qualities said to resemble or be highly influenced by the astrological characteristics of the planet, some of which are derived from the attributes of the ancient Roman gods they are named after.
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As a descriptive language for the mind
Different astrological traditions are dependent on a particular culture's prevailing mythology. These varied mythologies naturally reflect the cultures they emerge from. Images from these mythological systems are usually understandable to natives of the culture they are a part of. Most classicists think that Western astrology is dependent on Greek mythology.
Many writers, notably Geoffrey Chaucer••• and William Shakespeare,•• used astrological symbolism to add subtlety and nuance to the description of their characters' motivation(s). Often, an understanding of astrological symbolism is needed to fully appreciate such literature. Some modern thinkers, notably Carl Jung, believe in its descriptive powers regarding the mind without necessarily subscribing to its predictive claims. Consequently, some regard astrology as a way of learning about one self and one's motivations. Increasingly, psychologists and historians have become interested in Jung's theory of the fundamentality and indissolubility of archetypes in the human mind and their correlation with the symbols of the horoscope.
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Western astrology and alchemy
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Alchemy in the Western World and other locations where it was widely practiced was (and in many cases still is) closely allied and intertwined with traditional Babylonian-Greek style astrology; in numerous ways they were built to complement each other in the search for hidden knowledge. Astrology has used the concept of classical elements from antiquity up until the present. Most modern astrologers use the four classical elements extensively, and indeed it is still viewed as a critical part of interpreting the astrological chart. Traditionally, each of the seven planets in the solar system as known to the ancients was associated with, held dominion over, and "ruled" a certain metal (see also astrology and the classical elements).
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The seven liberal arts and Western astrology
In medieval Europe, a university education was divided into seven distinct areas, each represented by a particular planet and known as the seven liberal arts.
Dante Alighieri speculated that these arts, which grew into the sciences we know today, fitted the same structure as the planets. As the arts were seen as operating in ascending order, so were the planets and so, in decreasing order of planetary speed, grammar was assigned to the Moon, the quickest moving celestial body, dialectic was assigned to Mercury, rhetoric to Venus, music to the Sun, arithmetic to Mars, geometry to Jupiter and astrology/astronomy to the slowest moving body, Saturn.
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Astrology and science
By the time of Francis Bacon and the scientific revolution, newly emerging scientific disciplines acquired a method of systematic empirical induction validated by experimental observations, which led to the scientific revolution.•• and it has been criticized as being unscientific both by scientific bodies and by individual scientists.•• In 1975, the American Humanist Association published one of the most widely known modern criticisms of astrology, characterizing those who continue to have faith in the subject as doing so "in spite of the fact that there is no verified scientific basis for their beliefs, and indeed that there is strong evidence to the contrary". Astronomer Carl Sagan did not sign the statement, noting that, while he felt astrology lacked validity, he found the statement's tone authoritarian. He suggested that the lack of a causal mechanism for astrology was relevant but not in itself convincing.•
Although astrology has had no accepted scientific standing for some time, it has been the subject of much research among astrologers since the beginning of the twentieth century. In his landmark study of twentieth-century research into natal astrology, vocal astrology critic Geoffrey Dean noted and documented the burgeoning research activity, primarily within the astrological community.
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Claims about obstacles to research
Astrologers have argued that there are significant obstacles in carrying out scientific research into astrology today, including funding,[H.J. Eysenck & D.K.B. Nias, Astrology: Science or Superstition? Penguin Books (1982) ISBN 0-14-022397-5][G. Phillipson, Astrology in the Year Zero. Flare Publications (London, 2000) ISBN 0-9530261-9-1] lack of background in science and statistics by astrologers,[ There are only a handful of journals dealing with scientific research into astrology (i.e. astrological journals directed towards scientific research or scientific journals publishing astrological research). Some astrologers have argued that few practitioners today pursue scientific testing of astrology because they feel that working with clients on a daily basis provides a personal validation for them.]
Another argument made by astrologers is that most studies of astrology do not reflect the nature of astrological practice and that existing experimental methods and research tools are not adequate for studying this complex discipline.[M. Urban-Lurain, Introduction to Multivariate Analysis, Astrological Research Methods, Volume 1: An ISAR Anthology. International Society for Astrological Research (Los Angeles 1995) ISBN 0-9646366-0-3][G. Perry, How do we Know What we Think we Know? From Paradigm to Method in Astrological Research, Astrological Research Methods, Volume 1: An ISAR Anthology. International Society for Astrological Research (Los Angeles 1995) ISBN 0-9646366-0-3] Some astrology proponents claim that the prevailing attitudes and motives of many opponents of astrology introduce conscious or unconscious bias in the formulation of hypotheses to be tested, the conduct of the tests, and the reporting of results.
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Mechanism
Many critics claim that a central problem to astrology is the lack of evidence for a scientifically defined mechanism by which celestial objects can supposedly influence terrestrial affairs.[ Though physical mechanisms are still among the proposed theories of astrology,][Dr. P. Seymour, Astrology: The evidence of Science. Penguin Group (London, 1988) ISBN 0-14-019226-3][ Some have posited acausal, purely correlative, relationships between astrological observations and events, such as the theory of synchronicity][ Maggie Hyde, Jung and Astrology. The Aquarian Press (London, 1992) p. 24-26. ] proposed by Jung. Astrophysicist Victor Mansfield suggests that astrology should draw inspiration from quantum physics.[Geoffrey Cornelius, The Moment of Astrology. Utsav Arora, another meditation research specialist and astrologer, argues, "if 100% accuracy were to be the benchmark, we shoud be closing down and shutting all hospitals, medical labs. Scientific medical equipment and drugs have a long history of errors and miscalculations. Same is the case with computers and electronic. We dont refute electronic gadgets and equipment just because it fails but we work towards finding cures for the errors." The Wessex Astrologer (Bournemouth, 2003.)] Still others have argued that empirical correlations can stand on their own epistemologically, and do not need the support of any theory or mechanism.[ To some observers, these non-mechanistic concepts raise serious questions about the feasibility of validating astrology through scientific testing, and some have gone so far as to reject the applicability of the scientific method to astrology almost entirely.][ Some astrologers, on the other hand, believe that astrology is amenable to the scientific method, given sufficiently sophisticated analytical methods, and they cite pilot studies they claim support this view.][D. Cochrane, Towards a Proof of Astrology: An AstroSignature for Mathematical Ability International Astrologer ISAR Journal Winter-Spring 2005, Vol 33, ] Consequently, a number of astrologers have called for or advocated continuing studies of astrology based on statistical validation.[M. Pottenger (ed), Astrological Research Methods, Volume 1: An ISAR Anthology. International Society for Astrological Research (Los Angeles 1995) ISBN 0-9646366-0-3]
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Research claims and counter-claims
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Several individuals, most notably French psychologist and statistician Michel Gauquelin, claimed to have found correlations between some planetary positions and certain human traits such as vocations. Gauquelin's most widely known claim is known as the Mars effect, which is said to demonstrate a correlation between the planet Mars occupying certain positions in the sky more often at the birth of eminent sports champions than at the birth of ordinary people. Since its original publication in 1955, the Mars effect has been the subject of studies claiming to refute it, Effect size studies in astrology conclude that the mean accuracy of astrological predictions is no greater than what is expected by chance, and astrology's perceived performance has disappeared on critical inspection.•• They also claim that statistical research is often wrongly seen as evidence for astrology due to uncontrolled artifacts.•
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See also
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Further reading
David Berlinski, The Secrets of the Vaulted Sky: Astrology and the Art of Prediction. Harcourt (USA, October 2003) ISBN 0151005273.
Geoffrey Cornelius, Moment of Astrology. Wessex Astrologer Ltd. (UK, August 2005) ISBN 1902405110.
Nicholas De Vore, Encyclopedia of Astrology. Astrology Classics (New York, 2005) ISBN 1933303093.
J. C. Eade, The Forgotten Sky: A Guide to Astrology in English Literature. Oxford University Press (USA, 1984) ISBN 0198128134.
Abraham Ibn Ezra, The Beginning of Wisdom. ARHAT Publications (USA, 1998) ISBN 096622664X.
Michel Gauquelin, Cosmic Influences on Human Behavior. Aurora Press (Santa Fe, NM; June 1985) ISBN 094335823X.
Michel Gauquelin, The Scientific Basis of Astrology. Stein and Day Publishers (New York, 1970) ISBN 0812813502.
Robert Hand, Horoscope Symbols. Schiffer Publications (Altgen, PA; March 1987) ISBN 0914918168.
Johannes Kepler, On The More Certain Fundamentals of Astrology (1601) (Latin: De Fundamentis Astrologiae Certioribus). Kessinger Publishing (USA, January 2003) ISBN 0766133753.
William R. Newman & Anthony Grafton (Editors), Secrets of Nature: Astrology and Alchemy in Early Modern Europe. MIT Press (Cambridge, MA; March 2006) ISBN 0262640627.
Garry Phillipson, Astrology in the Year Zero. Flare Publications (London, 2000) ISBN 0953026191.
Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos. Harvard University Press (Cambridge, MA; October 1980) ISBN 0674994795.
Richard Tarnas, Cosmos and Psyche: Intimations of a New World View. Viking (New York, 2006) ISBN 0670032921.
Theodore Otto Wedel, Astrology in the Middle Ages. Dover Publications (Mineola, NY; 2005) ISBN 048643642X.
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