About Astrology (History)

Astrology, type of divination that involves the forecasting of earthly and human events through the observation and interpretation of the fixed stars, the Sun, the Moon, and the planets. Devotees believe that an understanding of the influence of the planets and stars on earthly affairs allows them to both predict and affect the destinies of individuals, groups, and nations. Though often regarded as a science throughout its history, astrology is widely considered today to be diametrically opposed to the findings and theories of modern Western science.

Astrology is a method of predicting mundane events based on the belief that the celestial bodies—particularly the planets and stars, considered in their arbitrary combinations or configurations (called constellations)—in some manner either determine or signify changes in the sublunary world. The theoretical foundation for this belief lies historically in Hellenistic philosophy, which fundamentally differentiates astrology from the celestial omens that were initially categorized and cataloged in ancient Mesopotamia.

Originally, astrologers assumed a geocentric universe in which the “planets” (including the Sun and Moon) revolve in orbits with centers at or near the center of the Earth, and the stars are fixed upon a sphere with a finite radius, whose center is also the center of the Earth. Subsequently, the principles of Aristotelian physics were adopted, according to which there is an absolute distinction between the eternal, circular motions of the heavenly element and the limited, linear motions of the four sublunar elements: fire, air, water, and earth.

Special relations were believed to exist between particular celestial bodies and their varied motions, configurations with each other, and the processes of generation and decay apparent in the world of fire, air, water, and earth. These relations were sometimes regarded as so complex that no human mind could completely grasp them; thus, the astrologer might be readily excused for any errors. A similar set of special relations was also assumed by those whose physics was more akin to that of the Greek philosopher Plato. Further Platonic astrologers, the element of fire was believed to extend throughout the celestial spheres, and they were more likely than the Aristotelians to believe in the possibility of divine intervention in the natural processes through celestial influences upon the Earth, since they believed in the deity’s creation of the celestial bodies themselves.

The role of the divine in astrological theory varies considerably. In its most rigorous aspect, astrology postulates a totally mechanistic universe, denying to the deity the possibility of intervention and to man that of free will; as such, it was vigorously attacked by orthodox Christianity and Islam. For some, however, astrology is not an exact science like astronomy but merely indicates trends and directions that can be altered either by divine or by human will. In the interpretation of Bardessono’s, a Syrian Christian scholar (154–c. 222)—who has often been identified as a Gnostic (a believer in esoteric saltatory knowledge and the view that matter is evil and spirit good)—the motions of the stars govern only the elemental world, leaving the soul free to choose between the good and the evil. Man’s ultimate goal is to attain emancipation from an astrologically dominated material world. Some astrologers, such as the Harranians (from the ancient Mesopotamian city of Harran) and the Hindus, regard the planets themselves as potent deities whose decrees can be changed

through supplication and liturgy or through theurgy, the science of persuading the gods or other supernatural powers. In still other interpretations—e.g., that of the Christian Priscillianists (followers of Priscillian, a Spanish ascetic of the 4th century who apparently held dualistic views)—the stars merely make manifest the will of God to those trained in astrological symbolism.

The view that the stars make manifest the
divine will is closest to the concept that lies behind the ancient Mesopotamian collections of celestial omens. Their primary purpose was to inform the royal court of impending disaster or success. These might take the forms of meteorological or epidemic phenomena affecting entire human, animal, or plant populations. Frequently, however, they involved the military affairs of the state or the personal lives of the ruler and his family. Since the celestial omina were regarded not asdeter ministic but rather as indicative—as a kind of symbolic language in which the gods communicated with men about the future and as only a part of a vast array of ominous events—it was believed that their unpleasant forebodings might be mitigated or nullified by ritual means or by contrary omens. The bāru (the official prognosticator), who observed and interpreted the celestial omina, was thus in a position to advise hisroyal employer on the means of avoiding misfortunes; the omens provided a basis for intelligent action rather than an indication of an inexorable fate.

The original purpose of astrology, on the other hand, was to inform the individual of the course of his life on the basis of the positions of the planets and of the
zodiacal signs (the 12 astrological constellations) at the moment of his birth or conception. From this science, called genethlialogy (casting nativities), were developed the fundamental techniques of astrology. The main subdivisions of astrology that developed after genethlialogy are general, catarchic, and interrogatory. General astrology studies the relationship of the significant celestial moments (e.g., the times of vernal equinoxes, eclipses, or planetary conjunctions) to social groups, nations, or all of humanity. It answers, by astrological means, questions formerly posed in Mesopotamia to the bāru Catarchic (pertaining to beginnings or sources) astrology determines whether or not a chosen moment is astrologically conducive to the success of a course of action begun in it. Basically in conflict with a rigorous interpretation of genethlialogy, it allows the individual (or corporate body) to act at astrologically favourable times and, thereby, to escape any failures predictable from his (or its) nativity. Interrogatory astrology provides answers to a client’s queries based on the situation of the heavens at the moment of his posing the questions. This astrological consulting service is even more remote from determinism than is catarchic astrology; it is thereby closer to divination by omens and insists upon the ritual purification and preparation of the astrologer. Other forms of astrology, such as
iatromathematics (application of astrology to medicine) and military astrology, are variants on one or another of the above.

Astral omens in the ancient Middle East

The astral omens employed in Mesopotamian divination were later commingled with what came to be knownas astrology in the strict sense of the term and constituted within astrology a branch described as naturalastrology. Though lunar eclipses apparently were regarded as ominous at a somewhat earlier period, theperiod of the 1st dynasty of Babylon (18th to 16th centuries BC) was the time when the cuneiform text EnūmaAnu Enlil, devoted to celestial omina, was initiated. The final collection and codification of this series, however, was not accomplished before the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. But the tablets that havesurvived—mainly from the Assyrian library of King Ashurbanipal (7th century BC)—indicate that a standard version never existed. Each copy had its own characteristic contents and organization designed to facilitate itsowner’s consultation of the omens.

The common categories into which the omens of Enūma Anu Enlil were considered to fall were four, named after the chief gods involved in the ominous communication: Sin, Shamash, Adad, and Ishtar. Sin (the Moon)contains omens involving such lunar phenomena as first crescents, eclipses, halos, and conjunctions withvarious fixed stars; Shamash (the Sun) deals with omens involving such solar phenomena as eclipses,simultaneous observations of two suns, and perihelia (additional suns); Adad (the weather god) is concernedwith omens involving meteorological phenomena, such as thunder, lightning, and cloud formations, as well asearthquakes; and Ishtar (Venus) contains omens involving planetary phenomena such as first and lastvisibilities, stations (the points at which the planets appear to stand still), acronychal risings (rising of theplanet in the east when the Sun sets in the west), and conjunctions with the fixed stars.

Though these omens are often cited in the reports of a network of observers established throughout theAssyrian empire in the 7th century BC, they seem to have lost their popularity late in the period of the Persiandomination of Mesopotamia (ending in the 4th century BC). During the later period new efforts were made, ina large number of works called Diaries, to find the correct correlations between celestial phenomena andterrestrial events. Before this development, however, portions of the older omen series were transmitted toEgypt, Greece, and India as a direct result of Achaemenid domination (the Achaemenian dynasty ruled inPersia from 559 to 330 BC) of these cultural areas or of their border regions.

Astral omens in Egypt, Greece, India, and China

The evidence for a transmission of lunar omens to Egypt in the Achaemenian period lies primarily in ademotic papyrus based on an original of about 500 BC. A more extensive use of Mesopotamian celestialomens is attested by the fragments of a book written in Greek in the 2nd century BC and claimed as a workaddressed to a King Nechepso by the priest Petosiris. From this source, among others, the contents of EnūmaAnu Enlil were included in the second book of the Apotelesmatika, or “Work on Astrology” (commonly calledthe Tetrabiblos, or “Four Books”), by Ptolemy, a Greek astronomer of the 2nd century AD; the first book of anastrological compendium, by Hephaestion of Thebes, a Greco-Egyptian astrologer of the 5th century AD; andthe On Signs of John Lydus, a Byzantine bureaucrat of the 6th century. Yet another channel of transmission tothe Greeks was through the Magusaeans of Asia Minor, a group of Iranian settlers influenced by Babylonianideas. Their teachings are preserved in several Classical works on natural history, primarily that of Pliny theElder (c. AD 23–79), and the Geoponica (a late collection of agricultural lore).

In various Middle Eastern languages there also exist many texts dealing with celestial omens, though theirsources and the question as to whether they are directly descended from a Mesopotamian tradition or arederived from Greek or Indian intermediaries is yet to be investigated. Of these texts the most important arethose ascribed to Hermes Trismegistos by the Harranians and now preserved in Arabic, the Book of the Zodiacof the Mandaeans (a Gnostic sect still existing in Iraq and Khuzistan), the Apocalypse, attributed to thebiblical prophet Daniel (extant in Greek, Syriac, and Arabic versions), and The Book of the Bee in Syriac.

The transmission of Mesopotamian omen literature to India, including the material in Enūma Anu Enlil,apparently took place in the 5th century BC during the Achaemenid occupation of the Indus valley. The firsttraces are found in Buddhist texts of this period, and Buddhist missionaries were instrumental in carrying thismaterial to Central Asia, China, Tibet, Japan, and Southeast Asia. But the most important of the works of thisIndian tradition and the oldest extant one in Sanskrit is the earliest version of the as-yet-unpublishedGargasamhita (“Compositions of Garga”) of about the 1st century AD. The original Mesopotamian materialwas modified so as to fit into the Indian conception of society, including the system of the four castes and theduty of the upper castes to perform the samskaras (sanctifying ceremonies).

There are numerous later compilations of omens in Sanskrit—of which the most notable are the Brhatsamhita,or “Great Composition,” of Varahamihira (c. 550), the Jain Bhadrabahu-samhita, or “Composition ofBhadrabahu” (c. 10th century), and the Parishishtas (“Supplements”) of the Atharvaveda (perhaps 10th or11th century)—though these add little to the tradition. But in the works of the 13th century and later, entitledTājika, there is a massive infusion of the Arabic adaptations of the originally Mesopotamian celestial omensas transmitted through Persian (Tājika) translations. In Tājika the omens are closely connected with generalastrology; in the earlier Sanskrit texts their connections with astrology had been primarily in the fields ofmilitary and catarchic astrology.

Astrology in the Hellenistic period (3rd century BC to 3rd centuryAD)

In the 3rd century BC and perhaps somewhat earlier, Babylonian diviners began—for the purpose ofpredicting the course of an individual’s life—to utilize some planetary omens: positions relative to thehorizon, latitudes, retrogressions, and other positions at the moment of birth or of computed conception. Thismethod was still far from astrology, but its evolution was more or less contemporary and parallel with thedevelopment of the science of genethlialogy in Hellenistic Egypt.

Equally obscure are those individuals who, living in Egypt under the Ptolemies (a Greek dynasty ruling 305–30 BC), mathematicized the concept of a correspondence between the macrocosm (“larger order,” or universe)and the microcosm (“smaller order,” or man) as interpreted in terms of Platonic or Aristotelian theoriesconcerning the Earth as the centre of the planetary system. They conceived of the ecliptic (the apparent orbitalcircle of the Sun) as being divided into 12 equal parts, or zodiacal signs, each of which consists of 30°; in thisthey followed the Babylonians. They further regarded each of these 12 signs as the domicile (or house) of aplanet and subdivided each into various parts—decans of 10° each, fines (“bounds”) of varying lengths, anddōdecatēmoria of 2°30′ each—each of which is also dominated by a planet. Scattered at various pointsthroughout the ecliptic are the planets’ degrees of exaltation (high influence), opposite to which are their

degrees of dejection (low influence). Various arcs of the zodiac, then, are either primarily or secondarilysubject to each planet, whose strength and influence in a geniture (nativity) depend partially on its positionrelative to these arcs and to those of its friends and enemies.

Furthermore, each zodiacal sign has a special relation with a part of the human body. The 12 signs are furtherdivided into four triplicities, each of which governs one of the four elements. Numerous pairs of opposites(male-female, diurnal-nocturnal, hot-cold, and others), based on the speculations of the followers ofPythagoras, a Greek mystical philosopher of the 6th century BC, are connected with consecutive pairs of signs.Finally, a wide variety of substances in the elemental world and attributes of human character are more or lessarbitrarily associated with the different signs. These lists of interrelationships provide the rationale for manyof the astrologer’s predictions.

An individual planet’s influences are related both to its general indications when regarded as ominous inMesopotamian texts and to the traits of its presiding deity in Greek mythology. But on them are alsosuperimposed the system of the four elements and their four qualities, the Pythagorean opposites, and lists ofsublunar substances. Furthermore, as in the omens, the modes of the planetary motions are carefullyconsidered, since their strengths are partially determined by their phases with respect to the Sun. Also, theyexert a mutual influence both by occupying each other’s houses and by means of conjunction and aspects—opposition (to the 7th) and quartile (to the 4th or 10th) generally being considered bad, trine (to the 5th or 9th)and sextile (to the 3rd or 11th) good.

Moreover, as the planetary orbits revolve from west to east, the zodiac rotates daily about the Earth in theopposite sense. From a given spot on the Earth’s surface this latter motion—if the ecliptic were a visible circle—would appear as a succession of signs rising one after the other above the eastern horizon. Astrologersregard the one that is momentarily in the ascendant as the first place, the one to follow it as the second, and soon, with the one that rose immediately prior to the ascendant being the 12th. In genethlialogy each place inthis dōdecatropos determines an aspect of the life of the native (one born under a particular sign); in otherforms of astrology the place determines some appropriate aspect of the sublunar world.

Astrologers, then, cast a horoscope by first determining for the given moment and locality the boundaries ofthe 12 places and the longitudes and latitudes of the seven planets. They read this horoscope by examining theintricate geometric interrelationships of the signs and their parts and of the planets of varying computedstrengths with the places and each other and by associating with each element in the horoscope its list ofsublunary correspondences. Any horoscopic diagram, of course, will yield a vast number of predictions,including many that are contradictory or extravagant. Astrologers thus must rely on their knowledge of theclient’s social, ethnic, and economic background and on their own experience to guide them in avoiding errorand attaining credibility.

Since about 100 BC the above method has been the essential procedure of astrology, though variousrefinements and additional devices occasionally have been introduced, including those associated with theHermetic tradition of Hermes Trismegistos and with Dorotheus of Sidon, an influential astrological poet ofthe third quarter of the 1st century AD. One is the system of lots, which are influential points as distant fromsome specified points in the horoscopic diagram as two planets are from each other. A second is the

prorogator, a point on the ecliptic that, traveling at the rate of one degree of oblique ascension a year towardeither the descendant or ascendant, determines a person’s length of life. Another is the method of continuoushoroscopy, under which anniversary diagrams are compared with the base nativity to provide annual readings.And, finally, certain periods of life are apportioned to their governing planets in a fixed sequence; these periodgovernors in turn share their authority with the other planets by granting them subperiods.

Astrology after the Hellenistic period

In India

Greek astrology was transmitted to India in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD by means of several Sanskrittranslations, of which the one best known is that made in AD 149/150 by Yavaneshvara and versified as theYavanajataka by Sphujidhvaja in AD 269/270. The techniques of Indian astrology are thus not surprisinglysimilar to those of its Hellenistic counterpart. But the techniques were transmitted without their philosophicalunderpinnings (for which the Indians substituted divine revelation), and the Indians modified the predictions,originally intended to be applied to Greek and Roman society, so that they would be meaningful to them. Inparticular, they took into account the caste system, the doctrine of metempsychosis (transmigration of souls),the Indian theory of five elements (earth, water, air, fire, and space), and the Indian systems of values.

The Indians also found it useful to make more elaborate the already complex methodology of Hellenisticastrology. They added as significant elements the nakshatras (or lunar mansions), an elaborate system of threecategories of yogas (or planetary combinations), dozens of different varieties of dashas (periods of theplanets) and antardashas (subperiods), and a complex theory of ashtakavarga based on continuous horoscopy.The number of subdivisions of the zodiacal signs was increased by the addition of the horas (15° each), thesaptamshas (4 2/7° each), and the navamshas (3°20′ each); the number of planets was increased by theaddition of the nodes of the Moon (the points of intersection of the lunar orbit with the ecliptic) and of a seriesof upagrahas, or imaginary planets. Several elements of Hellenistic astrology and its Sāsānian offshoot (seebelow), however—including the lots, the prorogator, the Lord of the Year, the triplicities, and astrologicalhistory—were introduced into India only in the 13th century through the Tājika texts. Besides genethlialogy,the Indians particularly cultivated military astrology and a form of catarchic astrology termed muhurta-shastra and, to a lesser extent, iatromathematics and interrogatory astrology.

In Sāsānian Iran

Shortly after Ardashīr I founded the Sāsānian empire in AD 226, a substantial transmission of both Greek andIndian astrology to Iran took place. There were Pahlavi (Iranian language) translations of Dorotheus of Sidon,Vettius Valens, Hermes, and an Indian called (in the Arabic sources) Farmasp. Since the Pahlavi originals areall lost, these translations provided the only knowledge of the Sāsānian science. Genethlialogy in Iran wasessentially an imitation of the Hellenistic (though without any philosophy), onto which were grafted someIndian features, such as the navamshas and a Shaivite interpretation of illustrations of the Greco-Egyptiandeities of the decans. The most influential and characteristic innovation of the Sāsānian astrologers was thedevelopment of the theory of astrological history—that is, the writing of history, both past and future, on thebasis of extensions of the techniques of the prorogator, the Lord of the Year, the planetary periods, and the

continuous horoscopy employed in Hellenistic genethlialogy. This was done in conjunction with Zoroastrianmillenarianism (the division of the finite duration of the material creation into 12 millennia).

In Islam

Astrology entered Islamic civilization in the 8th and 9th centuries in three simultaneous streams—Hellenistic,Indian, and Sāsānian. Arabic translations from the Greek and Syriac represented the Hellenistic science, fromSanskrit the Indian version, and from Pahlavi the Sāsānian combination of the two. Through the work of AbūMaʿshar in the 9th century, Islamic astrology added to these influences the Harranian adaptation of theNeoplatonic definition of the mode of astral influences in terms of Aristotelian physics. Abū Maʿshar furtherelaborated Sāsānian astrological history and greatly expanded the number of lots that an astrologer had to takeinto consideration. Much attention was paid by the Muslims to catarchic and interrogatory astrology, but,under attack by the theologians for denying divine intervention in the world and man’s free will, astrologyrapidly declined in its appeal to Muslim intellectuals after the Mongol invasions of the 13th century, thoughnot before its influence had spread in India, the Latin West, and Byzantium.

In Byzantium

During the last upsurge of paganism in the 5th and 6th centuries AD, Byzantium (the Eastern Roman Empire)boasted a host of astrologers: Hephaestion, Julian of Laodicea, “Proclus,” Rhetorius, and John Lydus. Thoughtheir works are singularly unoriginal compilations, they remain the major sources for an understanding ofearlier Hellenistic astrology. By the end of the 6th century, however, the general decline of the ByzantineEmpire’s intellectual life and the strong opposition of the church had combined to virtually obliterateastrology, though some practice of reading celestial omens survived in Byzantium as it did in western Europe.The science was revived only in the late 8th century and the 9th century under the impact of translations fromSyriac and Arabic. The period from about 800 to 1200 was the most propitious for Byzantine astrology,though nothing was essentially added to astrological theories or techniques. This period was rivaled only by alast flowering of astrology in the late 14th century, when John Abramius and his students revised the olderastrological treatises in Greek to provide the Renaissance with vulgate texts.

In western Europe

The astrological texts of the Roman Empire were written almost universally in Greek rather than in Latin; theonly surviving exceptions are the poem Astronomica of Manilius (c. AD 15–20), the Matheseos libri (“Bookson Astrology”) of Firmicus Maternus (c. 335), and the anonymous Liber Hermetis (“Book of Hermes”) fromthe 6th century. In the absence of astronomical tables in Latin, however, none of these was works of any use,and astrology for all practical purposes disappeared with the knowledge of Greek in western Europe. It wasrevived only with the numerous translations of Arabic astrological and astronomical treatises executed inSpain and Sicily in the 12th and 13th centuries, supplemented by a few translations directly from the Greek.But the new astrology in the Latin-reading world remained essentially an offshoot of Islamic astrology,gaining an adequate representation of its Hellenistic originals only in the 15th and 16th centuries. These twocenturies also witnessed the fullest flowering of astrology in western Europe, frequently in conjunction withNeoplatonism and Hermetism. By the 17th century, however—with the displacement of the Earth from the

centre of the universe in the new astronomy of Copernicus (1473–1543), Galileo (1564–1642), and JohannesKepler (1571–1630) and with the rise of the new mechanistic physics of Descartes (1596–1650) and Newton(1643–1727)—astrology lost its intellectual viability and became increasingly recognized as scientificallyuntenable. Though Kepler attempted to devise a new method of computing astrological influences in theheliocentric (Sun-centred) universe, he did not succeed.

Astrology in modern times

In countries such as India, astrology manages to retain here and there its position among the sciences. Itscontinued legitimacy is demonstrated by the fact that some Indian universities offer advanced degrees inastrology.CancerAstronomical chart showing a crabforming the constellation Cancer;hand-colored etching by Sidney Hallfrom Urania’s Mirror, 1825.SagittariusAstronomical chart showing a centaurwith bow and arrow forming theconstellation Sagittarius; hand-coloredetching by Sidney Hall from Urania’sMirror, 1825.Capricornus

In the West, however, Newtonian physics and Enlightenmentrationalism largely eradicated the widespread belief in astrology,yet Western astrology is far from dead, as demonstrated by thestrong popular following it gained in the 1960s. There were evenattempts to reestablish a firm theoretical basis for it, notably bythe French psychologist Michel Gauquelin in his The ScientificBasis of Astrology (1964), though with results that are at bestinconclusive. The divisions of the year governed by the 12zodiacal signs (which are derived from Hellenistic astrology) asdepicted in newspapers, manuals, and almanacs are as follows:

Aries, the Ram, March 21–April 19

Taurus, the Bull, April 20–May 20

Gemini, the Twins, May 21–June 21

Cancer, the Crab, June 22–July 22

Leo, the Lion, July 23–August 22

Virgo, the Virgin, August 23–September 22

Libra, the Balance, September 23–October 23

Scorpio, the Scorpion, October 24–November 21

Sagittarius, the Archer, November 22–December 21

Capricorn, the Goat, December 22–January 19

Aquarius, the Water Carrier, January 20–February 18

Pisces, the Fish, February 19–March 20

Astrologers have tried to incorporate the planets discovered sincethe Renaissance into the general astrological scheme and to findsome sort of statistical relation between planetary positions andhuman lives. None of these attempts appears to be at allconvincing to skeptics and other critics of astrology, however,and no serious explanation seems to exist regarding the allegedspheres of influence of the planets, the alleged nature of their

Astronomical chart showing a goatforming the constellation Capricornus;hand-colored etching by Sidney Hallfrom Urania’s Mirror, 1825. influences, or the manner in which they operate. Despite thesecriticisms and others like them, astrology continues to attractpeople from all walks of life—from the casual followers whoread their horoscopes in the daily newspaper to those who havetheir star charts drafted by professional astrologers. In short, even though it is regarded by many as devoid ofintellectual value, astrology in its modern and historical forms remains of great interest to scholars and a widespectrum of the general public.David E. Pingree Robert Andrew Gilbert

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica