It strikes me as probable that Jung, Greene and Zondag would have researched Phlegmatic

It strikes me that none of these authors ever did any anything like this since the resources to do this sort of thing were not available to them. This is what I see as a serious deficiency in modern astrologers: the lack of knowledge and understanding of their own past. Let's take a quick look at a chronology that will put this in perspective:

The opening salvos from traditional astrology in the late 20th century were fired in 1974 with the publication of two translations of Morin's volume 21 of Astrologia Gallica and Clara Darr's publication of Gadbury's Nativity of King Charls (sic). This is roughly the same time that what has come to be called "modern psychological astrology" began to emerge (although its roots can be traced back farther). "Psychological" astrology took off and there was very little traditional astrology in English to speak of until Robert Zoller published The Arabic Parts in Astrology in 1980. This is an original work so the only contemporary publications of traditional works were there the three mentioned above, and two of them were translations of the same book..

In the mid 1980s the traditional movement finally got moving when Olivia Barclay and others published and taught Christian Astrology. Our own Deborah Houlding was one of Barclay's students. At about this time Project Hindsight was formed and more and more original traditional texts were discovered and published, and more people started studying them and began to understand how different astrology was when it was part and parcel of everyday life.

Notice this this the time the more prominent moderns were studying, developing their own methods, and teaching them. They did not, despite some of their claims, spend a lot of time, if they spent any, studying traditional astrology or researching it. They couldn't; they didn't have the resources available to them. I have a text somewhere around here by Stephen Arroyo where he claims he studied all forms of astrology and didn't like any of them so he developed his own system. To call this hubris is an understatement, particularly since Arroyo's idea of a traditional astrologer was Marc Edmund Jones.

Modern astrologers grab a couple of stereotypes and persuade themselves of their knowledge of the tradition. They call it "deterministic" and dump it. In propaganda analysis this is called setting up a straw man. It has no value.

Jung doesn't enter into this at all as far as I'm concerned. I wish I had hung on to the quote I once saw where he made fun of astrologers. Greene, Zondag, Arroyo, and others like them are a terrible source for knowledge of traditional astrology.

As for phlegmatic:

That you found a near 19th century definition of phlegmatic that does not coincide with the definitions given in 17th century astrology might beg the question, if I was sure what the question was. The definitions and examples I gave are what astrologers meant when they used the expression ?phlegmatic temperament? regardless of what anyone in any field said afterward. I know you?re not arguing that the older astrologers are somehow using the word incorrectly.

For the record, the practice of what is now called ?traditional astrology,? and there are several varieties, but that?s another story, ended roughly 1700 or with the Enlightenment. This, obviously is not a firm date, but an arbitrary one, and it depends on how one defines ?traditional astrology.?

Nicholas Culpeper (1616 ? 1654) defined ?Signs of a Phlegmatick (sic) Man? this way:

Phlegmatic men are shorter of stature for although much vapours and superficiality is ingendered in their bodies, yet by means of coldness the substance is bound and staid from stretching in length; nevertheless moisture, dealith itself in breadth and maketh them grosse and fat. Their veins and aeteries are small, their bodies without hair; they have little beards, and their hair is flaxen; their colour whitish with smooth skin and cold in touching; as concerning their conditions, they are very dull heavy slothful, sleepy, cowardish, fearful, covetous, self-lovers, slow of motion, shamefaced, and sober. In them the virtue of digestion and appetite is feeble (through defect of natural heat) their pulses are little and slow, and their urine pale and thick with dreaming of water etc.? (Astrological Judgement of Diseases from the Decumbiture of the Sick, Ascella page 162 originally published 1655)

Notice a few things. First temperament has an effect on body type and diseases as well as the psychological make-up. Even today we make those connections between psychological types and disease, e.g. hot tempered (choleric) people tend towards heart attacks. Nervous types (sanguines) towards some kinds of cancers. Notice the references to their being overweight (although I don?t? know how that squares with feeble appetites; perhaps the poor digestion is associated with being ?grosse and fat?). This is the way a traditional astrologer views the phlegmatic temperament. Kant is irrelevant.

As for the definitions from my modern texts, yes they are superficial. I think almost all modern texts are superficial. That?s why many of us switched. I don?t find Liz Greene particularly enlightening either, just verbose and meandering, a style of astrological writing pioneered by Dane Rudhyar. I?m predominantly choleric. I take the straight approach. Fire is hot and dry: enough said and I expect that of my non-fiction authors. Make your point and move on. Furthermore I didn?t see any examples of profound definitions from any moderns in your post that support your definition of the fire signs.

Finally, when I refer to signs I am not referring to Sun signs. Just the signs themselves and the types they represent. George Washington had his Sun in Pisces and was anything but phlegmatic. In fact he was probably closer to an Aries type. If I had to bet, I?d say his temperament came out choleric melancholic or vice versa (warrior ? farmer).

Hunting around old dictionaries is not a bad way to get a grasp on how the older astrologers used words, but reading the texts for understanding is better.

Tom

It strikes me that none of these authors ever did any anything like this since the resources to do this sort of thing were not available to them. This is what I see as a serious deficiency in modern astrologers: the lack of knowledge and understanding of their own past.

Hello Tom,

I believe you are very gentle with Liz Greene or others
If they could not read ancient astrological texts, they could read Hippocrates, and Galen, and Regimen Sanitatis, and Della Porta and so on.

Moreover Jung knew hermetic literature, so maybe they were not interested in using the old temperaments but they tried to associate them with the modern meaning of elements, or as you wrote they were just superficial. It's difficult to say, at least I have no idea.
Margherita

Sorry Steven. My remarks were, to me anyway, obvious hyperbole, but the basis for the hyperbole is experience. You haven't lived until you've been told, straight faced, that the spec says "all steel" shall be abrasive blasted" and our engineer will not sign off on the job (which, as you know, means no one gets paid), and that includes the back to back steel plates, which, in order to be blasted, and thereby fulfill the letter of the specification, will require dismantling of the bridge.

I've spent, literally, full days writing letters explaining the obvious to engineers. My most recent experience has to do with a paint spec. The specification requires a total dry film thickness of x, i.e. the total thickness of all three coats of paint is a defined amount. Fine. Then they approve a repair procedure for damaged areas (all steel gets damaged during shipping and erection) that requires, requires mind you, sanding and applying another full coat of paint on the affected area, and this is fine, too. In fact, it is standard. Then they rejected the work and their own repair procedure, on the grounds that the additional coat of paint makes the total thickness of the paint thicker than the maximum thickness of the original three coats. Duh Four is more than three. No one can apply more paint and without adding more thickness. I am going to spend two days at a fab shop this week to try, for the third time, to get them to understand this and stop saying "You'll just have to do it," as though I can make 3 + 1 = 3.

Think I"m making this up? Off site I'll give you the name of the State and agency. Hell I"ll send you my report of my upcoming trip. Here's the logic. As more and more coats of paint are added the total system becomes more brittle and if enough material is added, the system will eventually crack and peel. By adding an extra coat they are shortening the life cycle of the coating system and therefore they will have to strip and paint the bridge sooner than they would if they didn't add the coat of paint. Of course at some ethereal level the theory is true. But there is no definitive evidence that this will happen prematurely on the repaired areas by the addition of one repair coat on small sections of the steel, much less any studies on the topic. It is all theoretical and we're talking about adding an additional 3 thousandths of an inch of paint. This agency has three people on this self made problem full time this week. My company has two and the fab shop has four or five working on it, which costs he will have to recover somehow in order to stay in business. Mind you the specified procedure from their specification is being performed all over the USA without so much as an eyebrow being raised. Your tax dollars at work solving a non-problem. Maybe engineers in the private sector have more common sense.

I can go on and on.

True they're not all like this, but enough of them are to give me an occasional ulcer. I could be helping people who genuinely need help, and by so doing get the job done properly, on time, and everyone will get paid. Instead I'm doing this.

No offense meant. I've had a few really positive experiences with engineers (like when one told another to get off his job and stay off - thereby permitting the contractor and me to get the job done in a correct and timely manner), but the many of my experiences are less than sensible.

Enjoy your day and your children Steven. They are a blessing.

Tom


PS Hey Steven. How many of your engineer buddies are astrologers?

Tom wrote:Although this is a traditional technique, we?ve been discussing it in this Forum in a thread that started out as pertaining to the US Presidential candidates. A couple of things came up regarding temperament, so I thought I?d put some information about it here. Sadly, space and time to not permit a full explanation of even one technique used to determine temperament. I refer interested readers to John Frawley?s book The Real Astrology Applied and from there to the chapter on temperament. I also highly recommend Dorian Greenbaum?s work Temperament Astrology?s Forgotten Key. Greenbaum and Frawley use different methods but usually end up at the same place or close enough to it.

?Temperament? is actually the contemporary English word for the most basic part of our psychological make-up. The earlier astrological writers used the words ?temperature? or ?complexion? (see Christian Astrology page 532) to describe this facet of the native. In addition to any psychological components, it was used to determine physical appearance and the kinds of illnesses a person would be subject to during his or her life (Astrological Judgment of Diseases from the Decumbiture of the Sick, by Nicholas Culpeper).

Frawley compares the natal reading to that of a pyramid. The astrologer builds on the broad base and gradually narrows things down to a fine point. That broad base is the temperament. Everything, therefore, about the native is ultimately based on the temperament. If we put temperament at the foundation, and aspects closer to the top, the choleric native will react differently to a Mars ? Jupiter aspect than the melancholic native. This is why it is considered so important in a natal reading and also why one person will experience placements differently than another.

There are four basic temperaments, but most people are a combination of two or more.

Choleric is the fire temperament and it is related to Mars. It is hot and dry. Think of the warrior, or in contemporary society, the athlete. It is the temperament of action and of bringing about a change. Keep in mind we are not simply talking about temperature and humidity. All the descriptive words may be used as metaphors such as ?hot head? or ?cold shoulder? or ?dry sense of humor.?

Melancholic is the earth temperament and is associated with farmers. Its ruling planet is Saturn. It is cold and dry. It is not necessarily depressed in the modern sense of that word, although it can be. Melancholics are persistent once motivated. They are also capable of great feats of memory. Find someone with a great memory and you?ll probably find he or she has a strong melancholic streak.

Sanguine is the air temperament and is associated with scholars. It is hot and moist. Sanguine types are known for their social skills and easy movement among people. People may flock to and gawk at the famous athlete, but they will like the sanguine type.

Phlegmatic is the water temperament and is ruled by the Moon. This is the most difficult temperament to work with. More on that below. If you have an acquaintance that is relatively unmotivated until he or she ?feels like it,? they are probably strongly phlegmatic. They are often voted the most likely to end up alcoholic or drug addicted and if they don?t go to that extreme, they won?t be far from it. This represents the desire nature, i.e. a person motivated usually be desire and not by self improvement or responsibility.

As stated above two or more temperaments usually dominate. This is because we determine temperament by looking at several factors and combining them one way or the other to reach a broad composite. This is not precision work. Close is usually good enough. So one can be Choleric/melancholic or sanguine/phlegmatic. This usually means they exhibit the qualities of one or the other at different times or it can be blended.

The biggest problem is divorcing temperament from personality. By ?personality? I mean those characteristics of the individual that are readily seen by others. The ?class clown? is what we see. The terrible depression or low self esteem is hidden by it. It is possible to be jocular and melancholic if Mercury dominates Saturn for example. It is also true that some people wear their temperament on their sleeve, say, a choleric with Mars rising. The point is to determine the temperament without regard to what we know of the native. We need to force ourselves to be objective. John McEnroe?s sanguine temperament is ideally suited for the announcer?s booth, but what we saw and remember is his hyper-active Mars on the tennis court.

Temperament can be used quite effectively to determine a suitable profession. I?m thinking of a friend of my son?s who graduated from a prestigious university with a degree in engineering. He is an outgoing, assertive, athletic individual with a great sense of humor. I remember saying to my son that I couldn?t see him as an engineer at all. The engineers I work with are prissy, introverted, and think their wives should come with a manual that they could memorize and implement in order to get them to function better (they are said to have one of the highest divorce rates). Engineers don?t understand the difference between an erogenous zone and a check valve. They are melancholic types. True to form this young man, although he graduated near the top of his class has yet to practice engineering and went into sales and is quite successful to boot.

The main purpose of determining temperament is learning the best way to direct the life in profession as well as in other areas. Fire temperaments will usually end up well as fire rises naturally. Melancholics need a push, but like a boulder going downhill, once it starts it is difficult to stop. Phlegmatics are a problem. And here the moderns, once they have risen from their swoon, realize traditional astrology is not politically correct. Some people just have a harder time with life than others regardless of circumstances. I can?t help but think of young men who become instantly wealthy and famous by dint of their athletic prowess who then waste no time in throwing it all away. We all make mistakes, but some people never tire of it.

John Frawley explains the problems with the phlegmatic temperament in an old Astrologer?s Apprentice article on Janice Joplin. (No. 15). Janice is strongly phlegmatic, he tells us she needs the presence of a strong malefic in her chart or else she ends up just another anonymous dead junkie. Drop the anonymity and the result was the same. Janice did have a strong angular Saturn ruling her ASC. After all she did sing the blues. The most striking feature in her chart was the negative mutual reception between Saturn in Gemini (detriment of Jupiter) and Jupiter in Cancer (detriment of Saturn). Saturn as ASC ruler represented the depression in her life. Jupiter in his exaltation in the 5th house represented the excess. The mutual reception represented one feeding the other. The depression fed the excess and the excess fed the depression and the cycle continued until her death. A strong sanguine would not have reacted to the configuration that way or a strong choleric. She was phlegmatic. She gave into her desires.


Temperament can be used to help with interpersonal relationships. The strong sanguine is not going to remotely understand the strong melancholic and vice versa. But one who has sanguine as slightly dominating might be attracted to an individual who has melancholy in slight predominance. They will compliment each other rather than oppose each other. This astrological match making is far more likely to produce positive results than ?synastry? alone. It will work with professional relationships as well as sexual relationships and friendships.

I?ve only skimmed the subject and much more remains to be said. Again I recommend Greenbaum and Frawley as they are the two astrologers who seem to be doing more with this than anyone else. It is worth the study and effort. Moderns will be further shocked to discover that neither Frawley nor Greenbaum use the outer planets for the assessment of temperament: traditional rulerships only. Once the shock passes, it isn?t too difficult to handle.

If there are questions or comments, please feel free to post them here.


Tom

Ive always struggled to find my type. There seems to be some sanguine in my clown-joker persona but it doesnt last very long cause i have a strong Melancholic or Phlegmatic side. I need a strong push to get motivated, and even then i have to be motivated over and over again.
But i have strong desires and find it difficult do to anything if i dont feel like doing it,thus the doubt about phlegmatic-melanchoic.
Physically things are aso blurred. I have a lot of body hair for my type of face- soft, pale, somewhat feminine, full lips, that i even thought of removing them with laser.
Im a capricorn Sun,Venus ,Mars with Gemini rising and Moon in Pisces.
Mercury,saturn and Jupiter are in Aquarius close to MC in house 9 and 10 in lacidus
Do you know a link with a good temperament test?

thanks

woodwater,

according to the Greenbaum method you're predominantly phlegmatic/sanguine.

thanks a lot folks

Hi again TOM

It?s a brave man who says Kant is irrelevant, thankfully we aren?t on a Philosophy forum.
Eysenck says that Kant?s chapter on Temperament ?was widely read and accepted in Europe?.

I don?t see any point in debating with you what sources Kant, Jung, Greene and Zondag are relying on because neither of us knows. Jung was quite fond of reading esoteric hermetic, alchemical and perhaps astrological (?) tomes. Did he speak Latin, Greek and Arabic sufficiently to read some of the earlier astrological texts? Greene has a reputation for being methodical and meticulous so I?d be reluctant to dismiss her research out of hand. Although this was one of her early books so it may have been a bit more impulsive.

Anyway my objective here is to try and trace this linear relationship, or lack of, between specifically phlegmatic to this modern feeling/water type. We now have Culpepper in the mix. I?ll ignore the biological/physical stuff for now, as this would require some medical studies to confirm. Looks like a long shot to me.

dull heavy slothful, sleepy, cowardish, fearful, covetous, self-lovers, slow of motion, shamefaced, and sober.

So again we have some word issues, for example what did ?sober? mean in the 17th century.?

Sleepy (a bit like lazy), plus cowardish, fearful again a bit Piscean. Shame is a solar emotion so I?m told. Slow of motion makes me think of Taurus. Covetous maybe Scorpio? Self-lovers, is this narcissism ?

I thought of Joni Mitchell as a good example of the modern water-feeling- type.

born November 7, 1943 at 10:00 PM in Fort Macleod (Canada)
Sun in 14?53 Scorpio, AS in 19?52 Cancer,
Moon in 24?36 Pisces, MC in 22?27 Pisces

Putting her through the Greenbaum Temperament system she comes out as :
5-choleric
4-phlegmatic
2-melancholic



I agree you come over as a bit choleric. Touch of Leo maybe?

Billy wrote: Jung was quite fond of reading esoteric hermetic, alchemical and perhaps astrological (?) tomes. Did he speak Latin, Greek and Arabic sufficiently to read some of the earlier astrological texts? Greene has a reputation for being methodical and meticulous so I?d be reluctant to dismiss her research out of hand.

Hello,
well Jung surely knew hermetic tradition. And I'm quite sure he knew Kant and Nietzche.
I believe they had enough sources even without reading Lilly, but I'm not sure they were true to them.
I have Greene's Relating and it seems very different from Galen, it's just a book about sun signs to me.

Sleepy (a bit like lazy), plus cowardish, fearful again a bit Piscean. Shame is a solar emotion so I?m told. Slow of motion makes me think of Taurus. Covetous maybe Scorpio? Self-lovers, is this narcissism ?

But what about the modern Pisces' compassion and empathy with the world? Phlegmatic temperament, at least as I know it's the most detached one, if there is empathy it's just for himself

And what about Sanguine temperament? I think it's very different from modern Air temperament.
And the modern Fire one? I think it's a mix btween Sanguine and Choleric.

I can't see many similarities, I'm sorry.

I have Greene's Relating and it seems very different from Galen, it's just a book about sun signs to me.

Book about sun signs?

This issue camed up earlier that the modern types appear to have been generated from the modern understanding of the signs.

So the Water/Feeling type is a blend of Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces.

I imagine a modern system would go something like this (very roughly):
SUN-8 POINTS
MOON - 5 POINTS
ASCENDENT- 5 POINTS
MERCURY, VENUS AND MARS- 2 POINTS
MIDHEAVEN - 3-4? POINTS
IC/DESC - 1-3? POINTS
ANGULAR PLANETS - 2 POINTS (WITH THE MODERN RULERSHIPS)
RULING PLANET (OF ASCENDENT)-2-4? POINTS

PLUS LOOKING AT ASPECTS CONFIGURATIONS AND SIGNIFICANT HOUSE PLACEMENTS - A FEW POINTS HERE AND THERE, DEPENDENT ON THESE.

Although I'm not suggesting Greene, or a similar type of Astrologer, would find much value in any temperament/type system these days.

So far on this thread there appear to be some similarities between temperament and type but none of this 'hand in glove' as Greene suggests. But I think we are only skimming the surface so far.

I'm hoping my copy of Psychological Types shows up so I can look at it again in more detail.

Hi Billy,

It?s a brave man who says Kant is irrelevant, thankfully we aren?t on a Philosophy forum.

Context, Billy context. I did not mean or even imply that absolutely everything Kant ever said was irrelevant. It was Kant's opinion of the meanings of particular words when he was alive that is irrelevant to what others thought of those words who lived a couple of hundred years before he did. What is important is that we realize that words change meanings over time, and that in order to understand an author we must understand what he meant when he used particular words. Robert Hand has made an astrological career understanding astrology by understanding language. It is important in places other than astrology, too.

I'll give you a simple example. Almost everyone, traditional and modern uses the word "jovial" when describing Jupiter. It may surprise you to know that when Lilly used the word jovial, for example, it did not mean what you and I try to convey when we use that word. Santa Claus is jovial and his generosity fits that meaning, too. Jovial to Lilly and back through the middle ages meant noble, reserved, magnanimous. It was a word used to describe the best characteristics of the nobility. Jupiter rules nobles. A nice etymological study could trace the development of this word, but it is more important that we understand how Lilly meant it than it is to try to somehow discredit Lilly for using it "incorrectly."

Anyway my objective here is to try and trace this linear relationship, or lack of, between specifically phlegmatic to this modern feeling/water type.

Culpeper meant what he meant. Whether that can be traced to a modern concept or not isn't that important when trying to understand Culpeper. This is my point in a nutshell. There is no point is trying to understand the pre Enlightenment thinking with post Enlightenment sensibilities. What possible difference could it make if Culpeper's definitions are the same as Jung's?

?the greatest lie of all in the sciences and metaphysics: that we are the product of a process of maturation, in which all our knowledge is superior to that of all other cultures; and that we have refined ourselves out of and beyond most of the nonsense that held back previous cultures.? -- Historian John Morrill

Tom