Overview of Astrology –

Talk for Spectrum,
June 4, 1998

 

Astrology is illusion. Tonight we’ll briefly cover: What astrology is and Why it ‘works’. We’ll look at the relationship of astrology to the Seven Rays, the circulatory or etheric body, and the importance of determining the ‘point of evolution’ of what one is trying to observe through astrology. This will bring us to the difference between esoteric and exoteric astrology. And then we will look at the factors involved in horoscope interpretation. If time, examples of astrology and physiognomy: handouts. After a break, we’ll ensure some understanding of each astrological chart, and then proceed to ‘experience’ astrology up close and personal …

We live in a living universe. So our basic premise is that everything is alive: hylozoism.

Next, all existences, all lives, are ‘known’ by, or observed, as demonstrating a specific range of frequencies, or vibrations, or energies, or colors … so all existences have qualities or characteristics … and these characteristics are what we know another by. Astronomy tells us the spectral class of stars, its color, temperature, size and chemical composition, we can see the shape of galaxies and trajectories of comets, and these are qualities of these entities …But because we don’t interpret these characteristics in emotional or mental terms, anthropomor­phizing them in terms such as vices and virtues. A vice or a virtue are demonstrations of the same energy, but how the energy is used, selfishly or altruistically, is what determines our calling them a vice, or a virtue. The energy is what is characteristic of certain centers … we recall the energies of the rays, and can associate them with certain centers (although these change depending upon point of evolution; however),

So it is easy in viewing the cosmos to assume it isn’t alive or have characteristics because they are in larger, unanthropomorphized qualities we don’t readily see, so we can easily assume that characteristics that could affect us don’t exist. However, last week we did anthropomorphize … and learned of the mythological personifications of the planets, and saw that planets seemed to have vices and virtues, good and bad expressions … so we see that it may be possible to characterize the cosmos in terms we can understand.

This is a perspective that astrology, in the cosmological sense, can give us. It is the grandest of all sciences, once science re-recognizes it as such! Astrology and cosmology go hand in hand, and give us the widest perspective there is, a way to look at the psychology of the universe. As well, we can use it to interpret the microcosm: man.

As above, so below. This aphorism explains many things, and goes quite a way in easily illustrating WHY does astrology work? Now, within any system, in our own body, for example, there is a circulatory system. We have a nervous system, blood circulation system, and while not yet observed conclusively with instruments the scientific community approves of … many of us assume the existence of, and experience, the presence of an etheric body … all of these are examples that ‘life’ flows throughout a system – that is nearly a definition of life – a movement of energy. Likewise, within a nation, or a planet, or the solar system, there is a circulation of various energies that are necessary for it to maintain its form, sense the environment, and adapt and interact with it. So we see how energy within a system circulates

Between systems, we can see how any one life is qualified by the characteristics of the lives around and surrounding it. We are affected, by family and racial qualities, by our organiza­tional associations, and attributes of our national life. Planets are also qualified by the energies of its family life, the solar system. We aren’t indistinguishable blobs of matter that have no characteristics by which we can be known by, nor are we indepen­dent and unaffected by the emotional and mental energies (at least), of others – and hence it is logical to assume that …the planet (and thus the lives upon it, people … for example …) are affected by the electrical and magnetic and cosmic ray forces that surround it: other globes it may be specifically related to, the solar system as a whole, and constellational or other stellar energies. … likewise the solar system is encompassed within the galaxy and therefore colored by its characteristics as well. … as above, so below. Make sense?

 about Body and Soul. So there is the form and that which ‘ensouls’ form, or the living energy or principle of Life, our divine nature which manifests into different bodies. In the next meetings we learned about the rays and how they color, or give characteristics to our various bodies: physical, emotional, mental, and of the personality and soul lives. The soul ray, that characteristic associated more with our Life Principle, stays constant for many many lives, and this ray life may embody forms that are born ‘under’ any variety of astrological factors, which hold sway upon that form for any one lifetime. The personality and lower vehicle rays may or may not change each lifetime, depending upon the soul’s determination of what it needs to develop next.

Rays are energies that also circulate and condition our bodies and environment. The type of astrology we emphasize in our teachings are based upon the rays AND astrology. And the rays are primary. That’s why we talked about them first. The rays are not determi­nable from astrological indicators, and astrology cannot be deduced from ‘knowing’ the rays. Questions of rays and astrology?

Next, we had a meeting on Life, Death, and Reincarnation. In this meeting we discussed that each entity, primarily colored by a pattern of the 7 Rays that characterize its various bodies and ensouling life, periodically takes a form in order to gather knowledge and experience. Now, we are viewing astrology now in the way it relates to one incarnation (and not so much as a cosmological map). The astrology that we are discussing primarily is dealing with the nature of the form through which the soul lives. And this ‘taking of form’, or the process of incarnation and ‘being born’, is a process that not only humans do, but also organizations are ‘brought into being’, cities are founded, countries are said to be ‘born’, and planets, as well, (we are told) have ‘birth charts’, which are said to indicate the qualities or characteristics of that moment life was breathed into the form. SOME OF THE characteristics of the entity, are qualified by the moment of its birth. The more the entity is identified with, or oriented towards form existence and not life, the more it is oriented towards body, not soul, the more the birth chart can indicate the ‘destiny’.

The reason that it can do this is because there is some type of harmonic that is existing each moment. Each moment carries the qualities of that moment. Thus, the astrological chart “works”, because it holds the pattern of that moment. Does this make sense?

And, as said, the rays are primary to the astrological elements, thus ‘all’ cannot be known about an entity by the horoscope. The rays tell a big part of the picture about any entity. The other crucial factor is “point in time” of the involving or evolving soul. You must know if the orientation is towards form or towards life. The point in evolution is a simple assessment of whether we are dealing with a cannibal, a well-intentioned but materialistically oriented good citizen, a struggling disciple trying to discipline himself every which way, or an Avatar, such as the Christ. As we would treat these people differently, and expect different things from them, so we interpret their chart differently.

If we look at the chart of a baby, we can’t know its point in evolution really. We can guess by the parents it has chosen, but this isn’t always a good indicator … often we have to guess and wait to see how the soul starts to demonstrate its own sense of who it is as it begins to grow up.

For now, we’ll just consider charts of people we likely know: somewhere between cannibal and fairly advanced disciples. This isn’t a judgment made, as in good or bad, but an assessment of orientation of use of energy – inward, toward the self, or outward towards the good of the whole.  Okay?

Astrology has proven itself to be, in competent hands, however, an exact tool for predicting and interpreting timing and quality of events and circumstances and personality characteristics. The competence of the astrologer is usually the weak link, not astrology itself. This is like mathematics – it’s a perfect tool, but to someone who doesn’t know how to use it, it’s a garbage pail of numbers and symbols …

So, this brings us to the horoscope – something that can look like a bunch of squiggles on a page to someone who hasn’t studied the language and techniques required to understand and use it. (To this person, it is a wealth of information, and you may want to not let out your information lightly, to just anyone asking for your birthdate … such as we did when you entered here the first evening. Because, now we know …)

So, to the chart. The horoscope is a chart of the birth of the form of something. It’s also called a natal chart. (And sometimes called a Saturn chart, as it deals with existence in time and space. And in this way it is a karmic-type chart, as the lessons that the soul decided to expose itself to, chose the timing of its re-entry into incarnation. In this way we can view the chart over time to see upcoming challenges and opportunities.

Any questions on why a chart might work – important to know what we are deaing with before we just get into the pieces of it  we assume that the soul makes the choice, within probably a limited number of options because the slow moving planets, for example, will necessarily be in one sign if the soul wants to incarnate in a certain decade with the rest of its soul group, etc. So it is a limitation upon the soul, and qualifies the form it must work through.

So keep in mind that even this ‘more accurate’ sidereal astrology is still illusory, as the signs could still be said to be arbitrarily arrived at, and are certainly arbitrarily divided into 30 degrees, as some signs, such as Virgo, cover maybe 60 degrees or more, and smaller constellational configurations can take up just 20 degrees or so.

In practice, tropical astrology, the one admittedly based upon a thoughtform, works. That is the experiences and the expectations match. And the normal exoteric astrology mostly matches to those who are involved with form. Esoteric astrology, that oriented more towards the soul and consciousness, can also ‘work’ when applied to those who are living ‘above the diaphragm’, or working off a different set of centers in themselves, as in the zodiac.

Now for nuts and bolts – What does a chart shows us? It gives us a map, from the location of birth, it shows where all the planets, sun and moon, ‘appear’ to be against a zodiac of signs. This is an illusion. The visual relationship of the planets to one another is accurate enough, but the background of signs is not what you see when you go outside and look. This highlights the difference between tropical and sidereal?

Explain? Short digression but crucial to understanding our ‘place’ and current energies – The vernal point, where the Spring solstice occurs, is set at 0 degrees Aries. It ‘really’ is at about 2 degrees Pisces, because the wobble of the earth around the north pole causes a “precession” backwards through the signs of this vernal point. The Aquarian Age starts, because this vernal point ‘enters’ Aquarius, (at the 30th, not the 1st degree). And our best estimate is that this exactly occurs in 2117 – however, there are indications of the Aquarian Age now, and the effects of the 5th and 7th ray, as we see in the burgeoning of materialism and totalinarianism. If humanity was more evolved, we will see greater insights of science and recognition of brotherhood as facts, not ideals. So we see that an Age has vices and virtues. We speak of the Piscean Age as that of idealism and fanaticism, due to the 6th ray, and we tend to not see its bright side so much anymore but just its radical and narrow ways. The same with the Aquarian Age, we tend to see it now as wonderful opportunity, but the possibilities for materialism and regimentation are very great and need to be worked against.

So, back to the horoscope. The natural placement has Aries at the east point – sunrise, at the left of the chart. South is at the top, because that is where (in the northern hemisphere) the Sun reaches its culmination. On this cardinal cross, are Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn. These are the signs that start seasons, so these signs are considered initiatory and mark the beginning of cycles.

In viewing the world as a whole, we see that the 12 signs can easily be considered 6 dual signs: Aries Libra, and Cancer Capricorn, for instance, because the Spring Equinox – marked in the north by Aries, is Libra in the southern hemisphere. Same with Cancer and Capricorn, the winter and summer solstices are each represented by these signs. Again, we can view this in a way as positive and negative in the sense of outgoing and receptive, or male and female, soul and body. Duality is the name of the manifestation game.

The next cross is the fixed cross: Taurus, Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius. These signs are in the middle of the seasons and demonstrate, positively or negatively, the quality of fixity. The last cross is the mutable, with Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces. These are signs of completion.

The signs can also be viewed in terms of their elements, in triplicities, the fire signs, the earth signs, the water signs, and the air signs.

And we see the divisions of space (and there are many ways of calculating these), explain areas of experience in which the energies play out in an entities life. Each sign is ‘naturally’ associated with a house: Aries for the first house, for example, Taurus for the second, and so on. These correlate the same type of qualities to these areas of life.

In a chart, the ‘moment of birth’ however fixes a different sign on the horizon, due to the turning of the earth and therefore the apparent placement of the planets around the different houses. And so the planets by their energies, ‘in’ a sign and ‘house’ bring in different qualities.

The first thing to do when looking at a chart is see the pattern – (page 22 in Leoni’s exoteric). This gives an idea, and then we look at  

There are different kinds of charts other than birth charts, and there are ways of arriving at current state of affairs through such charts as progressed and solar returns (birthday charts) and transits. And we can compare one chart to another by seeing where one persons planets fall in another’s chart, etc.

 

These energies all combine, as said, to produce upon the form a particular set of qualities and expressions. Physiogonomy … can be interpreted astrologically because, all forms are distinguished by the qualities present at the moment of time they were made. As the soul chose the material out of which to create the form, a body, it ‘out pictures’ into what you look like. …