It
is very difficult actually to know how archaic man - say before 1000 B.C.
- thought about many things. The few records we have of such ancient cultures
can easily be wrongly interpreted by projecting our own intellectual thinking
upon them and seeing the statements recorded on stone or clay in a rationalistic
light. Why, for instance, do we divide a circle into 360 degrees? There are
presumably scholarly answers to such a question. They may or may not be
"authoritative." One important aspect of the problem rests, I
believe, on the relationship between space-measures and time-measures; why,
for instance, while there are 365 days in the year, do we speak of 360 degrees
in a circle - the circle having been considered by all ancient people as the
"perfect form," that is, the form of the ideal whole?
In
this chapter we are dealing with time-values. Time is almost certainly the
primordial frame of
The
soli-lunar month, from New Moon to New Moon - or probably from the first
appearance
of the Moon's crescent in the West after sunset to the next time this occurred
- must also have been recognized as being most important, related as it is with
the female rhythm of menstruation. As there are approximately 30 days within a
lunation cycle and 12 lunation cycles within a year, this may well have been the
first reason why man thought of dividing the year into twelve months of 30 days
each. It is because the year
The
point which I wish to make here is that the numbers 30 and 12 were obvious ones
to choose in order to orient one's conscious activities in terms of a whole
seasonal cycle. And it seems evident that the solar year was sooner or
later recognized as the fundamental whole of time, at least as soon as man
became cultivator of the land, and agricultural societies were born.
Nevertheless,
the lunar (or soli-lunar) month may have been the dominant time-measure
earlier, especially among matriarchal, cattle-raising and nomadic tribes; and
there are records, particularly in India, of a long struggle between Lunar and
Solar Dynasties. There must have been an even more general struggle attending
the change from matriarchy to patriarchy.
The
type of astrology which we have inherited from Chaldea, Greece and Alexandria is
evidently the product of a patriarchal system of organization. It is basically
solar; yet it is also soli-lunar because it speaks of the Sun and the Moon as
"the two Lights," and these Lights are related to the day and the
night periods. Our astrological tradition is therefore based on the fact that,
within the great time-whole determined by the solar year, there are
approximately twelve soli-lunar periods of about 30 days each. From this the
In
other words the perfect whole of the year contains twelve successive
"steps," each constituted by 30 days. Each step is then seen related
to the beginning of the cycle; it forms an aspect to it. As each step
covers 30 degrees, the primary aspect is the 30-degree aspect, which we now call
semi-sextile, for reasons soon to be elucidated.
We
have thus a series of aspects, or rather of "steps," which encompass
30, 60, 90, 120, 150,
Astrology
and music were closely related in ancient cultures, especially perhaps in China,
and later on in the doctrines of Pythagoras which owed probably a great deal to
the more ancient Orphic Mysteries. The first instruments which man used were
presumably the taut string of a bow, the flute (originally a tube of bamboo) and
resonant material (wood, stone, stretched skins) for rhythmic percussive
effects. When one uses a taut string or a pipe (the "pipes of Pan" are
a good example), it is evident that, if one
Now,
a most important fact - to which musicologists strangely enough give so little
importance, if they mention it at all - is that what we call today musical
scales were long ago considered to be
descending series
of tones. For
many centuries now man has been thinking of scales as starting with the low
note (tonic) and rising to the octave-sound above; but it is very clear that
Music
in these archaic times seems to have expressed the "descent" of spirit
into matter, the progressive conquest and involvement of man into the physical
realities of the earth. Since the sixth century B.C. and the days of Pythagoras
and Buddha - which marked an epochal turning point in human evolution - an
inverse sense of direction slowly developed after a period of confusion and
uncertainty. It became definite some five centuries later, at the time which I
consider to be the starting point of a Great Year (precessional cycle) of some
25,868 solar years - thus the beginning of what we call today the Piscean Age. (cf.
Birth Patterns of a New Humanity) Since then, and particularly since
With
Pythagoras, geometry became a most important object of study, and was used as a symbolical
key to the understanding of universal processes. Space, more than time,
occupied the attention of the leading thinkers. Man being
Likewise
during the first half of a cycle - any
If
we think of the life-span of a human being,
The
first half of a human life ends at 42; and it normally is a period of waxing
vitality and strength of purpose. As the second half begins the "dangerous
forties" are reached - the symbolical Full Moon. Then the vital processes
begin to be reversed. The opportunity to "change gears"
If
we examine the involutionary series of aspects - i.e., of steps in the
unfoldment of vital and personal energies, and of will and purpose - we see that
three aspects stand out: the sextile, the square and the trine. Each one has a
definite character, and the sextile cannot be considered at all as a
"weaker trine" - as is often stated in astrological textbooks. In a
human life the sextile aspect corresponds to puberty (around 14). When, two
planets form a waxing sextile something happens to their relationship which
brings out its potentially creative significance, but also which - at least in
terms of progressions and transits - can be the cause for a subsequent crisis in
reorientation. This crisis is implied in the square aspect. It should become
resolved into constructive harmony and productivity in the trine aspect.
The
30 degree aspect is, in a sense, a preparation for the sextile, and the 150
degree aspect for the opposition. The conjuction is a release of energy, but
everything toward which this release is directed exists only in a state of potentiality.
This means pure subjectivity, and, often in terms of external circumstances,
some confusion. It is for this reason that I cannot accept systems of
symbolization of each degree of the zodiac in
which
the symbol for the first degree of Aries describes some very positive and
forceful male figure. Neither do I believe in the cosmological "Big
Bang" theory as an explanation of the beginning of the universe. Nothing
begins in a spectacular show of power - at least as far as human experience
goes. This must be so because
In
terms of the relationship between two planets, a conjunction represents the
initial release of the possibility of bringing such a relationship to a
new level of value, or of expressing it in a new field of activity. For
instance, in most cases every New Moon occurs in a new sign of the zodiac: and
this means that every new "fecundation" of the receptive Moon by the
active Sun operates according to a new mode of existence, or a new quality of
vital response to the everaltered challenge of life.
If
Venus and Mars form a conjunction, some new form of emotional-personal
self-expression is starting to operate. Because it is only starting to
operate, the person born with such a conjunction is usually over-concerned with
emotional self expression; and this may mean an over-focusing of attention upon
the problem of "transmuting"
Quite
a few "occultists" were born with such a conjunction, because the
development of occult powers normally requires a basic repolarization of the
instinctual emotional drives.
A
conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn likewise refers to the reorientation of the
social and/or religious faculties, i.e., to the potentiality of a transformation
of one's relationship to society and traditions. Men and women born at the time
of, or just after the three conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn in 1940-41 have
been, during the last few years, at the forefront of the
social-religious-ethical
revolt of youth - often a rather confused and instinctive revolt lacking a
clear consciousness of means as well as purpose. Persons born in 1951-52 when
Jupiter and Saturn were in opposition will no doubt take, generally speaking a
more objective attitude - or else will emphasize their eagerness to
"divorce" the society and the traditions within which they were born.
People
born at the time of the Uranus-Neptune conjunction of 1821 became the ardent
followers of the Romantic and Revolutionary Movement which made history in the
fields of human activity some 23 to 28 years later. The Industrial Revolution
began then to affect large numbers of human beings; and when these two planets
of reformation, rebirth and transcendence came to their long lasting
opposition from 1906 to 1910 the potentiality of a total transformation of
mankind became very much clearer and more objective, with the spread of
depth-psychology, the Einsteinian and electronic promise of new powers, and also
with
The
semi-sex tile theoretically implies the "descent" of the focal point
of the new relationship into the actual physical or personal realm of
experience. In a human life, this corresponds to age 7 - the formation of
permanent teeth. The child is potentially able to "chew" his
experiences as a more individualized center of activity. Rudolf Steiner followed
an old religious tradition when stating that what he called the "ego"
becomes really embodied at that age - the "age of reason," or of
spiritual responsibility in the Roman Catholic sense. This focalization of an
actional ego-center leads to the next step: puberty. The focus now is in the
field of interpersonal relationship as a result of the exteriorization of the
sex-force through specific glandular activity.
The
sextile
therefore sets the stage upon which the "crucial" (i.e., cross-like)
phase of the square aspect will operate. Thus we have this sequence: semi-sextile
- self-focusing; sextile - focus in relationship; square - the
working out of a relationship between individual selfhood and interpersonal
relationship on the basis of a social tradition and a set type of -
"Establishment" first at school, then in the whole of society. Then comes the trine which
provides the means as well as the opportunities needed to integrate self,
relationship and social traditions into a
workable and productive way of life.
The
quincunx (150 degree aspect) brings
Before
I undertake to discuss the geometrical principles of formation of astrological
aspects, I should make it clear that the meaning I have attributed to the
involutionary series of aspects represent only one of two sets of meanings. They
are meanings which refer mainly to the time factor, and which are particular
value when one studies transits and progressions, that is, the successive phases
of unfoldment of a process begun with the conjunction of two (or more) planets.
They are the products of a dynamic approach to existence; they refer
mainly to self-exteriorizing outward activity - activity focused at the
vital-emotional and largely instinctual level. This does not mean that other
factors do not enter into the picture of the first-hemicycle-type of
development. These other factors surround this development, because no
cycle begins in a vacuum. Every whole is "born" within a larger
whole which completely envelops it.
Every
child is born in a community with a specific system of social behavior, which is
rooted in an ideological, religious and cultural tradition
Thus,
two types of forces operate through childhood and the teen-age period, and still
later on: the dynamic force of self-exteriorization which operates in "spontaeity"(literally: "of its own"), and the moulding
pressures of the collective mentality and the basic way-of-life of the
community. It is to the second type of force that the geometrically produced
and objectified evolutionary aspects refer. And it is these
aspects which I shall now consider.
