I am curious why many traditional astrologers who use outer planets in horary work state they can only look at the conjunction as these are invisible points that 'cast no rays'.

Surely the point is that the traditional planets do cast rays? Don't we have examples of astrologers like Lilly looking at all the Ptolemaic aspects to the Part of Fortune or fixed stars? Equally, the angles are obviously invisible points which most people look at the traditional planets making Ptolemaic aspects to.

Isn't the issue more about whether we permit them an orb or not and if so how much?

Mark

Hi Mark,

You say that "many traditional astrologers" state that they work like this - but I'm not aware of anyone I know working like this, so I'm curious where you got that notion from.

Ok perhaps the use of the word 'many' was too strong. How about 'some'?

Perhaps I am mistaken but I thought two moderators here on skyscript ( Tom and Sue) have stated something like that.

I think the position was described as a 'fixed star' approach to outer planets in the sense of only focusing on conjunctions to key planets/angles. However, perhaps they were just expressing a pragmatic technique rather than a philosophical objection to other Ptolemaic aspects.

I also thought John Frawley and Sue Ward were were more restricted in their use of outer planets. Although I see Sue Ward has written an 80 odd page article on this subject which to be honest I have never paid to download.

As I understand it there seem to be three traditional responses to the outer planets:
1 Ignore them
2 Use them as indicated above
3 Use them like any other planet ( include all Ptolemaic aspects)

However, if noone is proposing point 2 ,as you suggest, then this is obviously a non-issue.

Mark

Mark, I might be the one that is mistaken. I?ve also used that ?powerful fixed star? analogy but that doesn?t mean I limit the relevance to conjunction only. Tom and Sue can speak for themselves. I don?t know enough about Sue Ward?s views at the moment to be sure, but I think she tends to ignore them altogether.

I did just check John Frawley?s textbook ? he says ?Treat them much like fixed stars: ignore them unless they are right on a relevant house cusp or in immediate aspect with the main significators? (p.38 )

He says aspect, and from the rest of the text it?s clear he is not limiting this to conjunction only. He thinks that they are more important when close to the actual ascendant and midheaven than say ?floating around in the middle of the first house?. So do I, every planet is more important the closer it is to the angle or cusp, but I might be a little more relaxed than John because whereas I see a planet meaning less in this position, he suggests it means nothing. But overall I think his point is that we don?t need to go looking for them or trying to chase a meaning down if they are not strongly placed in the chart, and I agree with that.

Deb, do traditional people use Arabic Parts other than the very common ones like POF, divorce,etc.?

'traditional people' ? Sounds like they live in a cave or something

The parts have a very long history, at least as far back as the classical period. There is a full list of Albiruni's parts on this page, and the link on the top right hand corner leads to more articles on the use of parts.

http://www.skyscript.co.uk/alparts.html

I have mixed feelings on them myself - generally I think that the best they do is repeat what you can find through the planets anyway.