As for the Dispositors, a planet has a disposition or a positive inclination towards any planet in its domicile/exaltation. The Dispositor is the host to its "guest".

In other words, a planet is not indisposed towards its "guests" in terms of attitude. But if something bad happens to the "host", it affects the "guests", sometimes very significantly.

Personally I feel Lilly can be a bit vague with his descriptions if I'm honest. I don't think he's a great source for learning these things - he's very useful in that he's compiled, in english, a book on varying branches of astrology and offers loads of examples. He's confusing though in that he seems to have a 'free and easy' use of technical terms.
I mean anyone in isolation reading Lilly might be forgiven for coming away thinking that reception meant mutual reception, or that the almuten was actually the lord of geniture etc.

I think this is just another example of a 'loose' usage of technical terms tbh.

Baring in mind that Lilly himself would have learned from the other classical authors I see no reason why, if we wish to discuss the terminology as it pertains not just to Lilly's usage of it, that we shouldn't examine other authors. The good thing about those other authors are they they clearly and succintly describe what each thing means. We're left instead to infer from Lilly's writings and usage what he means.

But if we're just looking at what Lilly thought these things meant then it seems that it's a very vague and abstract concept. This is why I don't like reading CA. I just don't think Lilly is very clear on certain technical terms, and when he is, he seems to contradict (even if only slightly) older authors.

Paul wrote:
Baring in mind that Lilly himself would have learned from the other classical authors I see no reason why, if we wish to discuss the terminology as it pertains not just to Lilly's usage of it, that we shouldn't examine other authors. The good thing about those other authors are they they clearly and succintly describe what each thing means. We're left instead to infer from Lilly's writings and usage what he means.

But if we're just looking at what Lilly thought these things meant then it seems that it's a very vague and abstract concept. This is why I don't like reading CA. I just don't think Lilly is very clear on certain technical terms, and when he is, he seems to contradict (even if only slightly) older authors.

Lilly's approach is hands on that's what I like about him and he's not all that confusing imho. He makes you learn while others mostly give you tons of information on Almuten Figuris and the Moon's bendings.

Seiko wrote:

Paul wrote:
Baring in mind that Lilly himself would have learned from the other classical authors I see no reason why, if we wish to discuss the terminology as it pertains not just to Lilly's usage of it, that we shouldn't examine other authors. The good thing about those other authors are they they clearly and succintly describe what each thing means. We're left instead to infer from Lilly's writings and usage what he means.

But if we're just looking at what Lilly thought these things meant then it seems that it's a very vague and abstract concept. This is why I don't like reading CA. I just don't think Lilly is very clear on certain technical terms, and when he is, he seems to contradict (even if only slightly) older authors.

Lilly's approach is hands on that's what I like about him and he's not all that confusing imho. He makes you learn while others mostly give you tons of information on Almuten Figuris and the Moon's bendings.

Yeah he's got lots of examples which makes him useful, but when it comes to defining technical terminology I think other authors are better imo. I do think he can be a bit vague at times. I would almost say that really his importance is in compiling several traditional techniques in one volume whose popularity survives to the present day ensuring that those techniques have not been lost to us. However we now have access to translations of some of the authors that Lilly himself was using as base of reference so I don't see any reason why we shouldn't look to those other authors to get a better grasp of some of the technical terms.

I mean you yourself seem to have changed your mind on what Lilly meant between your earlier post and your later one. I don't think the fault lies with you for this, but with how vauge and loose LIlly can be with his definitions instead. My quote from abu-mashar above quite succintly describes what the definition is in a clear and easy to understand way, that's what's really missing from Lilly at times. We're left to kind of interpret it ourselves based on his examples.

The persian astrologers seem to have recognised 3 main types of pushing - pushing nature, pushing virtue and pushing management (and then combinations of the above) and are pretty clear on what each one is. Pushing management is simply an aspect with any applying planet pushing management to a slower planet. Pushing nature is where a slower moving planet receives a swifter one, that swifter one pushes his nature to the slower one. Pushing virtue is the other way around almost, so rather than being in the dignities of another planet, the swifter planet is in his own dignities and applies to another planet.

We have very clear concise definitions of what each thing means. We lose that when it comes to Lilly who seems to use several technical terms interchangeably.

I was being too simplistic in the initial posts of this topic. When I was challenged (in a good way) I had to look more in-depth.

All in all, to give virtue/disposition (acc. to Lilly) is to make an application. We can argue to death about whether there has to be some dignity or not but it looks like Lilly uses those terms as synonyms for the planet's relative strength so IMHO it is not limited to domicile/exaltation -- and apparently 'disposing of' is not the same as 'disposition'.

Anyways, it is not so important. The truth is if someone truly wants to learn something, he or she has to look at the charts and draw his/her own conclusions. In this manner that knowledge becomes yours for keeps. Lilly, a genius that he was, called himself 'a student of astrology'. And so should we.

Hi Paul, was hoping you could clear this up for me. I'm unsure of your definition of pushing managment (something I've been heretofore unaware of).

Pushing management is simply an aspect with any applying planet pushing management to a slower planet.

Are you saying that pushing managment is simply whenever planets are in aspect? The swifter just manages the slower.

Thanks.

Hi Regulus - There have been quite a few posts on pushing types in the traditional forum. Pushing management is the same thing as pushing counsel. The ever-generous Astrojin went to great lengths at explaining all of this here:
http://www.skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewt ... e9aa468b82


A slow Mercury in Sagittarius is having us run circles around word usage...

Regulus wrote:Hi Paul, was hoping you could clear this up for me. I'm unsure of your definition of pushing managment (something I've been heretofore unaware of).

Pushing management is simply an aspect with any applying planet pushing management to a slower planet.

Are you saying that pushing managment is simply whenever planets are in aspect? The swifter just manages the slower.

Thanks.

Yeah pushing management occurs whenever one planet applies to the other.

So to recap:
Pushing management: any applying aspect, the applying planet pushes management to the other.
Pushing virtue/power: when a well dignified planet applies to another planet, the applying (dignified) planet pushes power/virtue to the other.
Pushing nature (committing disposition): When a slower moving planet receives a swifter one (ie. the swift one is in the dignities of the slower one), the applying planet pushes nature to the slower one (commits his disposition).

(edit: this is how abu'mashar etc. use it, I cannot comment on Lilly who is a little more idiosyncratic and 'loose' with his definitions)

Hi All,

This is a good discussion to have, because there are certain technical terms here that get jumbled across languages, and there seems to be some sloppiness of language in the later tradition--at least from the perspective of Abu Ma'shar's definitions, which you can read in my Introductions to Traditional Astrology (ITA).

Paul is right about those definitions in his earlier post. There are several kinds of "pushing" or "committing" in the texts. (Some of the Latin translators even talk about "gifting.")

1. "Pushing nature" is what we would normally understand as classical reception: when a planet applies to the domicile or exalted lord of the place in which it currently is. Example: the Moon in Aries, applying to the domicile lord Mars. Some astrologers allowed pushing nature to involve two of the lesser dignities, too, so that if a planet were in the (say) bound and face/decan of the same planet (who was not already the domicile or exalted lord), that would work, too. An example would be the Moon in Gemini in a day chart, in the bound of Saturn, applying to Saturn: since she is in the bound of Saturn and he is the diurnal triplicity lord of airy signs. See ITA III.15.

2. "Pushing power," which is the same as "committing virtue." ("Virtue" in Latin also means "manliness, strength, power"). Here, a planet which is already in its own domicile or exaltation, applies to some other planet. An example would be Mercury in Gemini, applying to Mars. See ITA III.16.

3. "Pushing management," which is the same as "committing disposition" ("Disposition" in Latin has to do with arranging and managing something). The definition of this in al-Qabisi and Abu Ma'shar seems simply to refer to some significator applying to some other planet--in other words, no special dignity is involved. It seems to have a wholly generic meaning. (Deb Houlding has suggested an alternative and to my mind plausible meaning, but I don't want to get into it here, because I'm trying to stick to the strictly-defined meanings, and I don't see her solution borne out in the horary texts I've translated for the Book of the Nine Judges.) See ITA III.18.

There are two confusing features of the history of these definitions:

a. Not every author uses the same titles for these scenarios. In his Introduction (5.13), Sahl calls pushing power "pushing management," so that he uses one term to describe another. My sense is that some of these titles were a little bit up for grabs. But you can see why he'd call pushing power pushing management: if a planet is already in its own domicile or exaltation, then it is not only in a place of its own "power/virtue," but it is also actively "managing" something, namely its dignity.

b. In the later tradition (Bonatti, Lilly), some of these terms were used loosely and were combined with the word "light." So people might talk about committing or pushing "virtue and light." Since all aspects involve planetary light, it's hard to know what the addition of the word "light" was supposed to accomplish. Normally, astrologers only talked about the transfer, collection, or reflection of light, not "pushing/committing" it.

In my own writing and thought, I am trying to stick to the definitions here. But my sense is that, with some of the later authors especially, you need to focus less on the title given to the configuration, and pay attention to what is actually happening to a planet.

Ben