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Transits must refer to something in order to be transits.

We can and we do make such references, but we don't make them exclusively that way. For example "Transiting Venus is currently at 7 Scorpio" is a valid and correct statement and it doesn't require a reference to another chart to be understood.

The solar return without the natal is a natal chart

A natal chart requires a birth. An electional chart requires an event and so on.

Solar returns are cast for a particular time and place and for a particular reason. With reference to a nativity it is not a transit chart. It's a solar return. Without reference to a natal chart it's just a map of the sky that could apply to anyone born the same day in that location.

Astronomers have a different definition of transits than astrologers do, and that definition requires a reference but it a reference to another planet's position at the time of the "transit.".


Tom

Hi Tom

In 2006 I posted details of a solar chart concerning my 6th house (Scorpio) of natal coming to the ascendant of solar return and in that year I fell of a step ladder and broke my left arm. In the solar chart Jupiter was in the ascendant which rules my 7th and 10th houses and you said I would make a good recovery - which I did.

This year we have the 6th again arriving at the ascendant of solar return but this time the planet ruling ascendant (Mars) is in 10th in Leo - its dispositor the Sun is in the 8th in Gemini and Mercury its ruler is in 7th in Taurus. Venus the dispositor is in 9th in Cancer.

My 6th house in solar is Aries ruled by Mars - so it rules ascendant and 6th and is in 10th its opposite Neptune and trine Pluto and makes minor aspects to Jupiter,Saturn and Uranus and is sextile to ascendant - to me it does not seem as traumatic as 2006 but am still a bit concerned can anyone shed light for me.

Mars is also at an Anarertic degree 29 degrees 11 minutes Leo - I have read this as mulling over things and then taking a contrary route - but how this equates to illness I am not sure. Jupiter also is at 29 degrees 55 minutes but I can't find any literature on it in all my books. My birth details are 6th June 1950, 5:10 am, Oxford UK - sorry if this seems a bit muddled but am trying to learn solar returns.


Dolly

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Julie:

Some astrologers read solar returns alone, as a natal. Of course it is not literally a natal chart.

This is true but I don't believe many do this. If we believe that the nativity contains the potential of the life, it makes no sense to me to ignore it.

Dolly:

Something occurred to me last night about delineating solar returns. Ibn Ezra, Morin, I think Abu Mashar, I haven't taken the plunge into Ben Dykes latest translation just yet to confirm, and probably others, stress the importance of establishing the ruler of the year from the solar return. Unfortunately each astrologer above does it a bit differently. Ibn Ezra's method is the most unambiguous and maybe the easiest, if you have the software or the inclination to work out the primary direction of the ASC.

He says to direct the ASC to the relevant year and see if any planet in the solar return aspects that point. If a planet aspects it, that planet is the ruler of the year along with the bound ruler of that point. If there is no aspect, then just use the bound ruler. I'm pretty sure when he says "aspect," he means "perfection" during the year in question. Although I haven't tried it, we might be able to do the same thing with the progressed ASC. Then you look at what the ruler(s) of the year promise in the nativity and apply that to the SR and look for the same sort of thing.

I did try this with my son's chart. I directed his ASC (Naibod key) to this year and no planet in aspect to it. It is in the bounds of Venus. It had been in the bounds of Venus for a few years by 2010. And I noticed when the ASC changed bounds to Venus, he married. I'm going to do some more with this and see where it leads.

Tom

In Abu Mashar and Bonatti (and Morin???) say the ruler of the year is the profected sign ruler.

Abu Mashar's yearly considerations are:

Profected sign and ruler
Solar Return
Firdaria
For PD, he directed the ascendant through the terms.

There is more finesse to this, but there ya go.

Tony Louis' book on Solar Returns is a good overview of various techniques, traditional and modern, including, but not limited to Morin.

I have to disagree with Tom in this point. My review of this book is that it is poorly writen and mostly focused on modern astrology. The parts that are focused on Morin show that he has a poor grasp on the subject of morinian analysis: yes, he talks a little bit, but he reads a chart using modern astrology only. Besides Morin, he doesn?t show real grasp on any other traditional authority. To me it was a waste of money.

For instance, Solar returns: formulas and analyses by Nance McCullough was a much better buy, and she is a completely modern astrologer, but with more insights into real practice. I have the feeling that Tony Louis never used SR until he decided to write a book about them! The lack of examples of real clients and predictions is usually a red flag.

JuliYvonne:

Some astrologers read solar returns alone, as a natal. Of course it is not literally a natal chart.

well, we can always found astrologers who will do something, of course :-)

If you want to take SR strictly from the modern perspective, yes, most of them only take the SR chart as a stand alone technique, or they will say to compare with the natal chart, without clarifying how to do it, with a quick example at the end of the book (with few exceptions like the book of McCullough quoted above).

But if one want to take the modern perspective, one should at least be aware that solar returns are one the most old techniques on the book, and they were never used as stand alone charts. And most modern writers, have never in contact with the ancient ideas on the topic, and never tested them, and pretty much re-invented the wheel from scratch.

In fact, even the way that Morin uses it (the ruler of SR 10th on the first) seems to be pretty much a renaissance technique. The more you go into the past, the more the SR seems to be used agains techniques of progressing the nativity, usually acting as a modificator of the natal promise.

and I can't think of a reason why it couldn't be done with the progressed ASC as well as the directed ASC

.

David McCann makes the point that progressed angles are not really progressed http://www.skyscript.co.uk/pran.html

Best regards to all

Hello Mithra, Tom, Yuzuru and all,

Mithra6 wrote:In Abu Mashar and Bonatti (and Morin???) say the ruler of the year is the profected sign ruler.

Abu Mashar's yearly considerations are:

Profected sign and ruler
Solar Return
Firdaria
For PD, he directed the ascendant through the terms.

There is more finesse to this, but there ya go.

I was waiting someone who could talk from a traditional point of view

For me too profection should be seen before solar return and gives the lord of the year.

Ptolemy gives a precise order, which was repeated in all the authors with some variant, but as usually they are just variants of the same method.

I don't know if Morin mentions them- Tom??? - but many late authors like Placido did not consider them anymore.

margherita

margherita wrote: For me too profection should be seen before solar return and gives the lord of the year.

I agree. It's so easy to find the profected sign anyway, and it gives you an initial foundation for prediction immediately.