From: cam@castle.ed.ac.uk (Chris Malcolm)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan,alt.magick,alt.astrology
Subject: Re: Old Stars, New Stars  (was Re: HALLOW'EEN)
Date: 4 Oct 92 17:05:01 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

In article <BvLHrK.LtE@ddsw1.mcs.com> eshin@ddsw1.mcs.com (Eshin-Fun) writes:
>>>cam@castle.ed.ac.uk (Chris Malcolm) writes:

>: As far as I know Hindu astrologers are the only ones who use stellar
>: relationships in natal astrology. Western astrological practice is
>: concerned with the relationship of the planets with the tropical
>: zodiac, which has nothing to do the with positions of any stars, being
>: enitrely a local solar system phenomenon.<<<

>Perhaps it is you who is out of date.

[Eshin-Fun goes on to mention the following examples.]

>Fagan-Allen houses which uses sidereal computations...

>sidereal house system...

>intercepted sign of Ophiucus....

These are all minority practices. You cannot draw conclusions about
the general tradition of Western astrology citing the practices of
recently established minority groups. For example, the Hamburg school
thinks any kind of zodiac at all is nonsense, and bases everything on
inter-planetary relationships.

>There is also the practice of using certain stars (Regulus for example) and
>asterioids that never were part of the original tropical considerations.

The minority of Western astrologers who use certain individual stars
interpret them, just as they do the planets, as influences coloured by
their position within the framework of the tropical zodiac. The
asteroids which a minority of Western astrologers use have solar
system orbits just like the planets, and are once again interpreted,
just like the planets, as sources of influence coloured by their
positions within the tropical zodiac.

I think you are confused about this sideral/tropical issue because you
think that astrology supposes influences to emanate from the signs (or
constelleations) themselves. This is not the case. The planets (and
moon and sun) are the primary sources of influence. These influences
are coloured by the angular relations between the planets, by their
angular relations to the start of the daily cycle (houses), and by
their angular relations to the start of the yearly cycle (tropical
zodiac). There is a small group of Western astrologers who add to this
their angular relationships to the Great Yearly cycle, i.e., the
sidereal zodiac, which they interpret as bearing on the spiritual
development of the soul of the native. To suppose that astrologers
intepreting the position of a planet in a sign are attributing some
special influence to that position in the sky is as silly as supposing
that astrologers who interpret house positions are ascribing some
special significances to the mountain masses and seas of the earth.

Of course the great popularity of newspaper sun-sign "astrology" has
persuaded a lot of common folk, and a lot of simple-minded and
uneducated astrologers, that the signs of the zodiac (or the
constellations) are supposed to have some special influence of their
own, rather than being a way of indexing progression through the
harmonic divisions of a cycle, and that these influences derive from
the visible denizens of those segments of the sky, the stars. This is
no more than a popularised mistake, and you will not see it made in
any of the astrological textbooks recommended by the serious
astrological training schools which offer recognised qualifications.

>>>: Ptolemy's "Tetrabiblos", written 2,000 years ago ...
>: ... knew about the precesssion of the tropical zodiac

>2,000 years ago in Ptolomaic times Aries >was< 0 degrees on the ecliptic of
>the Vernal equinox. Astrology did not then have a "Tropical" term.

A zero tropical correction is not the same as the non-existence of a
tropical correction. The observational records of the library of
Alexandria which Ptolemy was using went back at least several hundred
years, quite far enough for the precession of the equinoxes to be very
clearly evident.

>>>: I am afraid that it is your understanding of astrology that is more
>: than 2,000 years out of date.<<

>And I am afraid your understanding of astrology is not only bias but
>unrealistic. You are not following the changes that have taken place in the
>last thirty years or so.

I have been talking about the Western tradition of astrology as
derived from Ptolemy 2,000 years ago. I'm quite aware of the
developments of the last thirty years, which are rather insignificant
in that time scale, and have little to do with the question under
discussion, which is whether or not the _tradition_ recognised the
precession of the zodiac.

>: You are absolutely right. Astrology did once make this error. But it
>: noticed and corrected this error more than 2,000 years ago.

>Astrology did not make an error. Human frailties did. The correction of the
>ecliptical movements was not really popularized till a few years ago when
>this argument was made a public scandal.

A public scandal? Correction of ecliptical movements made a few years
ago in response to it? This is nonsense. If it were true you would be
able to cite a set of astrological ephemerides of say, ten years ago,
which contained this error, and another recently published set, which
corrects this error. There are no such ephemerides.
-- 
Chris Malcolm    cam@uk.ac.ed.aifh          +44 (0)31 650 3085
Department of Artificial Intelligence,    Edinburgh University
5 Forrest Hill, Edinburgh, EH1 2QL, UK                DoD #205