Hi Philip!

Yes, you are right, the texts have been fertile for it. Now I hope there can be some progress made on understanding them.

Mithra6 wrote:

HOWARD B SAYER wrote:I imagine Bonatti didn't discuss same sex marriage?

Not marriage, but he did mention homosexuality. It's not a huge leap in logic.

Does he have anything valuable to contribute towards the astrological thinkings in these and other areas which circulate around us in 2010?

Mithra summarised his focus on marriage earlier, on the face of it I can't see how this could be ascertained by an astrological chart, or why anyone (sensible) would bother to attempt to do so in 2010. Mithra seems to suggest otherwise.

''Basically this deals with , will I be married, how many times, what will my spouse be like, will they be good in bed, and how will people see my marriage. Nothing terribly culture specific. Perhaps the most archaic looking section is about sex. However, all you need to do is ignore how Bonatti feels about certain sexual acts and pay attention to the indications themselves. No biggie. ''

I have removed a couple of remarks that make unsubstantiated critical suggestions regarding some astrologers' academic qualifications. With everyone admitting not to know if those allegations are well founded or not, its probably best not to make them so publicly here.

Thanks for your understanding
Deb

HOWARD B SAYER wrote:

Mithra6 wrote:

HOWARD B SAYER wrote:I imagine Bonatti didn't discuss same sex marriage?

Not marriage, but he did mention homosexuality. It's not a huge leap in logic.

Does he have anything valuable to contribute towards the astrological thinkings in these and other areas which circulate around us in 2010?

Mithra summarised his focus on marriage earlier, on the face of it I can't see how this could be ascertained by an astrological chart, or why anyone (sensible) would bother to attempt to do so in 2010. Mithra seems to suggest otherwise.

''Basically this deals with , will I be married, how many times, what will my spouse be like, will they be good in bed, and how will people see my marriage. Nothing terribly culture specific. Perhaps the most archaic looking section is about sex. However, all you need to do is ignore how Bonatti feels about certain sexual acts and pay attention to the indications themselves. No biggie. ''

I'm actually surprised that someone would think those kinds of questions AREN'T important questions in 2010. The vast majority of questions I get are about love and career. It seems to me that if you are doing someone's natal chart, and they ask if they are going to meet someone this year, you have to first look at what is happening overall with relationships. Only then can you answer that question. Really I think almost every natal chart I've done deals with that in some way.

As to whether these can be ascertained by a natal chart, I think that's a difference in how many modern astrologers see the capabilities of astrology. However in traditional, all we ever do is predict. Horary does something that many astrologers tell me can't be done in astrology, yet Deb, Lee Lehman, Chris Warnock, and many others are regularly doing it.

Natal is a bit tougher since unlike horary, we don't have the large number of contemporary astrologers regularly doing natal. There aren't nearly as many traditional natal astrologers as horary. This means we're still figuring this stuff out to a big degree.

However, I've been impressed with most of the results so far. To say this can't be done isn't correct, whether it's natal or horary.

Mithra6 has already replied to Howard Sayer's last post. All I can say is that he is well ahead of me. I am still struggling to understand what it was about.

Perhaps my limited wit is at fault but it is probably because some people's conception of a subject is very different from others. This is after all what this discussion is about.

Are "sensible" people unconcerned about marriage in 2010? Can a natal chart not at least indicate the potential for marriage, whether you are using modern techniques or old?

I do find it very odd.

A puzzled Matt

matt23z wrote:
A puzzled Matt

Allow me to unpuzzle you.

What is marriage?, I would argue across time and space quite a strange phenomena. In one culture you have old men marrying young women, in others marrying many women at the same or different times, in others it is unknown, or to summarise this custom in the western hemisphere today it's an arrangement which has all sorts of social, financial, religous, romantic, forced, familial, etc, or not as the case may be, variables. If it has a function then the care of, and legitimisation, of children might be its primary raison d'etre.

I would be surprised if an astrologer could provide an accurate time, or period, when an enquirer into this possibility would be hitched, ignoring the why would they and how should they, or shouldn't they, issues.

Do you want me to put up ten times and ask you, or anyone else, which one married on a certain date ? If somebody could do this a few times in a row, or even once or twice in a compelling enough way, then I would have to re-evaluate my thinking on the imagined relationship between astrology and predictions of this type.!

Hi Howard,

HOWARD B SAYER wrote:What is marriage?

A contract.

Does anyone else recognise these kinds of attitudes? Do we accept these kinds of assumptions are built on myths? If they are what are the implications for how we view other approaches to astrology? Ultimately is this an issue of subjective taste and temperament rather than any objective criteria?

Hi, people

The topic is "golden age" vs "progress" ideas. But Mark was not asking for a real example of conflict, but of a discussion on the epistemological level.

The last emails stopped discussing the topic and started to be confrontational. Please, stay on topic. Please, try to confront people?s opinions with opinion, and not turning the discussion personal. Otherwise your posts will only be erased or the thread locked. Nobody ever won an internet discussion.

We don?t accept aggressive posts here, and we also don?t accept passive-aggressive posting either. Rhetorical questions made just for the sake of attacking other people?s opinions are not ok either. If you really do have a question keep it honest and real, and not sarcastic. Let?s avoid not only ad hominem, but also straw man.

Thank you Howard for unpuzzling me there. As to your suggestion of asking people to predict marriage dates I am not so sure.

We recently had a debate about the book that blind-tested natal astrologers and I think I can best summarise it (the book) as inconclusive. If such a test was seen as part of a trad v. mod competition then we risk more of the arguments that Yuzuru mentions. It is difficult to prove astrology, even to a sympathetic audience as far as I can make out

He also reminds us all that this is the philosophy and science forum rather than a forum about technique.

I look forward to reading more of your contributions in future.

Regards

Matt

Whether it does it well or poorly, modern astrology certainly can deal with the issue of whether or not people are marriage material, and what kind of marriage they want or are likely to have. Living together arrangements get a little tricky, 40 years after their initiation by the baby boomers, because in many jurisdictions, a co-habiting couple are considered to be in a legally defined common-law marriage after as few as 3 years. A marriage assessment would entail at a minimum getting a grasp of the overall individual, the particular situations of Venus and Mars, as well as what is happening with the ruler of the 7th house cusp.

Of course, pop astrology isn't going to address the question with any subtlety, but then that is not the kind of astrology a serious modern astrologer would practice.

As to the same-sex question, there is a debate as to whether same-sex orientation can be seen in a natal chart. Some of the earlier modern astrologers thought Mars square Uranus was diagnostic in a man's chart, but this doesn't seem to hold water. I have seen Venus square Uranus in some lesbian and polyamorous natal charts, but I cannot say how common it is. So far as I know, the best modern astrology view now is that same-sex orientation cannot be seen in a horoscope, but that you can say something about the kind of relationships the person is likely to have. On modern astrology forums you will sometimes find posters who claim that you can see it with such-and-such a chart placement, but then a gay man will oftentimes claim that he does not have said diagnostic.

Ptolemy does talk about same-sex preferences, but I don't know whether anyone has researched his statements.

Matt,

Mark asks if astrologers various attitudes are based on objective criteria. In the current zeitgeist a test like this imagined marriage one would be what is required, the Under One Sky challenge had to many confounding variables.

My view on this schism is that if someone insists on labelling themselves a traditional or modern astrologer than what they have to say may not prove to be all that interesting and, borrowing from Philip, it might be time to leave the room.

waybread wrote:
I could quote some real idiocy from modern astrologers. But then again, I read in Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos III.13.159 of my Mars opposite Saturn:

"In the opposite positions he makes his subjects robbers, pirates, adulterators, submissive to disgraceful treatment, takers of base profits, godless, without affection, insulting, crafty, thieves, perjurers, murderers, eaters of forbidden foods, evildoers, homicides, poisoners, impious, robbers of temples and of tombs, and utterly depraved."

Actually this is a slightly, or grossly, misleading translation. The passage is actually III.14, 15, 111-115 (159) (ed. Boll et Boer, 1957).

"In the opposite positions" purports to translate epi de tOn enantiOn, which refers back to the beginning of the passage in line 100:

tOi de tou ApeOs sunoikeiOtheis epi men endoksOn diatheseOn

'Connected(joined) to Mars, (Saturn) in a dignified position...'

Hence "In the opposite positions" would have been better rendered

"In undignified position"

For this definition see Tetrab. I.24.

This chapter served as the basis of Franz Cumont's study of the social conditions as exemplified in astrological texts in post-Classical Hellenistic societies, "Astrology and religion among Greeks and Romans", New York, 1912.

The most reliable modern study of the place of astrological writers in Hellenistic society and their historical contextualization in the rhetorical conflicts of the Second Sophistic is Tamsyn S. Barton, "Power and Knowledge Astrology, Physiognomics and Medicine under the Roman Empire" Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press, 1994. A book which I can not recommend too highly for its placement of astrological writers firmly within their context. Of course Bouche`-Leclercq, "L'Astrologie grecque" Paris 1899 is still of great authority.

Other astrological writers have similar lists of characteristics as formed by astral configurations, viz.,
Dorotheus II 14-9, ed. Pingree, 1976
Vettius Valens 1 21-1; II 16, ed. Kroll, 1908
Anubios (in Dorothei, ed Pingree, Teubner, 1976, p 345-57)
Manethon II(I) 141-396; III(II)227-362, ed. Koechly, 1858.

feliciter.

LORENZO SMERILLO