Martin wrote:

I would like to add my perspective as a professional academic: some of us would love to do this sort of work, but it is constantly getting more difficult to find funding for it. It is not fashionable, and the academic world is ruled by fads and fashions in a way most non-academics would scarcely believe. Studying old texts simply to find out what the authors thought is hardly done anymore -- you have to analyse power structures or deconstruct gender roles for your work to be considered worthwhile. Speaking for myself, I would be happy to turn out astrological translations for the rest of my life, as long as my bills were being paid!

The trouble with ?professional academics? is that they think and act as professional academics. They want money and acceptance from their peers. If the love of the subject is really there one just does it. No demands for remuneration, no need for support from peers. It's possible to do what you love and and still find ways to pay the bills. But it's much harder if one falls into the trap of identifying oneself as a ?professional academic?. Maybe those are the people astrology doesn't need now. It could be that the ones who are most needed (and helpful) are those who give their time and talents ? without demanding to be able to take something in return. Without sentimentalizing or getting carried away with romantic notions: Doesn't it seem that the thinkers and philosophers who wrote the original ancient astrological works were probably more of the do-what-you-love-and-are-called-to-do type rather than our safely salaried and institutionally ensconced professional academics? And do we really need or want those who merely follow academic fashions? Of what use are such people?

This thread is growing faster than I can find time to read it!

It could be that the ones who are most needed (and helpful) are those who give their time and talents ? without demanding to be able to take something in return. Without sentimentalizing or getting carried away with romantic notions

Hi Kirk,

Don't you think it is sentamentalizing to make comments like this? I used to know a woman who held a very ?responsible? position in astrology, who would make a big deal out of the fact that she wasn?t get paid for what she did. But she wasn?t doing that role for nothing, or out of the goodness of her heart. Her payment was power and prestige, and the ability to manipulate people. She wouldn?t have traded that for a fat salary and no influence! On the other hand, I don?t see anything corruptible in the desire to pay the bills. People who do things from the heart will find their satisfaction, and it?s never directly tied up with money. However, astrologers live in the real world and need to keep their feet on the ground. I respect those who have managed to make astrological projects work whilst being fair and open about that they can and can?t do - especially when they manage to do it on a succesful commercial basis, pleasing their customers and not pulling on people?s heart sleeves for donations and charitable gifts. Its nice to think that astrologers are giving people, but I don't think that should depend upon them giving their professional service away with an unprofessional expectation. Balance is found in give and take. In any case, I don't believe it is good for the soul to take something without the ability to show appreciation for its worth.

Deb

I think part of the problem is that we have at least three threads in one thread.

Thread I - Making available the information we have.

Thread II - Translating, or at least copying the material we don't have translated yet.

Thread III - Who needs money to live? Or the whole 'if you want to be a diviner, you shouldn't take money for working in the field'. This may hark back to how the people with the biggest astrology book (and tarot card, for some reason) collections are bored housewives, as Dave noted. And as I've noticed! Those of us without that luxury, well, we don't have that luxury.

All important topics, I grant, but conflating them isn't helping untangle anything.

I think you put your finger on it Olivia (bored housewife comment excluded - not so sure about that). I'm going to resist adding more to this debate because it could turn into a moderators nightmare (and I've already compromised myself! )
But I would like to point out a relevant comment regarding the reprinting of Bonatti, by way of snipping from Ben's opening post:

there are currently NO PLANS TO REPRINT IT in its current form.

We should be careful when we use CAPS in forums - they have a way of starting panics. I'll take the liberty of adding some emphasis that I think Ben would approve of:

there are currently NO PLANS TO REPRINT IT in its current form.

So even though, as Gabe said, Ben could eat his own translation if he so chose, I don't think he actually wants to eat it, or is the kind of person that would. I imagine he'll let us know here, when he has more to say than that.

Deb

Kirk wrote:Martin wrote:

I would like to add my perspective as a professional academic: some of us would love to do this sort of work, but it is constantly getting more difficult to find funding for it. It is not fashionable, and the academic world is ruled by fads and fashions in a way most non-academics would scarcely believe. Studying old texts simply to find out what the authors thought is hardly done anymore -- you have to analyse power structures or deconstruct gender roles for your work to be considered worthwhile. Speaking for myself, I would be happy to turn out astrological translations for the rest of my life, as long as my bills were being paid!

The trouble with ?professional academics? is that they think and act as professional academics. They want money and acceptance from their peers. If the love of the subject is really there one just does it. No demands for remuneration, no need for support from peers. It's possible to do what you love and and still find ways to pay the bills.

Love of the subject cannot substitute knowledge of the subject.
Which utility can have a wrong translation or a comment without any foundation?
Nothing.
At least for me, I was taught to check as first thing when I read a book, before starting to read it, who is the author. It avoids many awful surprises.

And on the other hand I guess that even Professors of University have bills to pay..

margherita

Gjiada wrote:Love of the subject cannot substitute knowledge of the subject.
Which utility can have a wrong translation or a comment without any foundation?
Nothing.
At least for me, I was taught to check as first thing when I read a book, before starting to read it, who is the author. It avoids many awful surprises.

And on the other hand I guess that even Professors of University have bills to pay..

margherita

I totally agree with this. A rational basis of a translation is necessary. The problem is not the universities but rather the fact that governments invest less in (universitary)education. To get money for research either the student fees must dramatically rise or companies will have to sponsor them (or a combination of both). For support from companies there must be done something in exchange. An oil company would rather invest in a university that teaches geophysics than archaeology or assyriology.

Kirk wrote:The trouble with ?professional academics? is that they think and act as professional academics. They want money and acceptance from their peers.

I actually had to laugh when I read this, insult though it is. The notion of anyone getting into the academic study of astrology for the sake of money and peer acceptance is hilarious. Recalling some comments Patrick Curry made at last year's Sophia conference, I am sure it would have him rolling on the floor.

There is a Swedish saying: 'It is easy to cut broad stripes out of another man's leather.' Easy to say that those who have already spent many years assembling the necessary skills to translate and teach should serve the astrological community for free (which, incidentally, ancient authors were very far from doing); considerably harder to master an ancient language or two for oneself and start turning out texts -- in one's spare time, of course.

Olivia wrote:Estebon, I really don't think you're implying that only wealthy Americans and Europeans practise astrology - or are you?

I am implying that anyone without the means to support a basic life shouldn't be concerned (yet) with the Occult Mysteries of Life. Food, Shelter, Warmth, then Conscious thought. its a natural progression.

steven wrote: So I'm very happy that Ben is releasing a book with a new translation Al-Khayyat as well as Omar. And while it is double the price of Holden's the quality of the book will last far longer than those published by the AA. I've already had to replace twice the copy of Al-Khayyat. I detest these cheap paperback editions.

indeed-

Hi folks,

I hope I will not stir up this messy thread very much.

steven wrote:In case you didn't know David Pingree is deceased! He passed away in November of 2005! He was one of the last living masters in dead languages so it was a major loss.

Sadly, I was struck by the news those days as I knew what a loss he would be. Sadly again, I was not mistaken.

steven wrote:In another post you mentioned Omar not being acquainted with the lots preserved in Paulus for example. I'm not so sure that is correct simply because there are many manuscripts in the Istanbul library which are Pahlavi translations of most of the early Greek authors. Omar could read and translate Pahlavi! I know specifically that both Valens and Dorotheus are in Pahlavi manuscripts - complete! Yet as you mentioned there is no one to translate these.

Well, as far as I know, all the Pahlav? material perished with the Arabic conquest of Iran. Of course, not few traces remained in Arabic translations but most of these translations are fragmentary. In fact, I know nothing else that survived fairly intact, only the ?Um?r translation of the Pahlav? Dorotheus, and a Book of Nativities attributed tp Zar?dusht whose original might be a genethliacal work of a 3rd century CE ?arr?nian named Aelius. Thus, all the other treatises are either fragmentary in their form, like the M?sh??all?h translation of the Pahlav? Dorotheus, or survived only as testimonies in other works, like the Pahlav? Valens which, usually indistinguishably from its commented version made by Buzurjmihr, partially reappears here and there, for example, in the so-called Book of Aristotle by M?sh??all?h.

steven wrote:Also it is also a fact that 4 of the treatises in Abu Ma'shar's On Solar Revolutions are not in either the Latin or Greek translations - they are only in the Arabic manuscript. This is the reason that 6 months ago I began a course in Arabic literature and am studying it right now. Maybe I'm too old and its too late, but I'm gonna give it a shot.

Nice plan, Steven! I am afraid I will also be old when I can afford picking up Arabic studies.

Martin Gansten wrote:I agree whole-heartedly with your concern (and would emphatically add Sanskrit to your list of languages).

The only reason I left it from my list is that jyoti?a seems to have its separate audience. Even then, Indian astrology was more or less bounded to Western astrology until the Middle Ages, so the research on it has its own merits. However, knowing how vast this material is, I think even my great-grandchildren cannot hope most of them may become available in English.

Concerning your stance as a "professional academic", I think it can be completely understood, and when I wrote about the connection of astrologers and academics, I did not intend to flame the latter because of their attitude. We all must accept that one phenomenon may be studied from various points of view, and astrological texts are not exceptions. These points of views may radically differ: a researcher can say he pursues some astrological studies because it is an important chapter of cultural history; an astrologer can say the same because he is hunting for proofs why he should use this or that technique, and he thinks the first step is digging, not just making case studies. Although a classical philologist, I count myself in the second branch, and I do not really care if a comprehensive translation of a newly discovered astrological text comes from a critical edition, or even if it is not a translation but a summary fit for astrological work, since also a preliminary report is much more valuable than big nothing. That is what cannot be expected from scholars since if they work on an edition, it takes them years because of the detailed philological tasks that cannot be quickened. Thus, I see reason neither for complaint nor self-justification.

Levente

Hello all,

This has been an interesting thread, and I have some opinions that I'll probably keep to myself at the moment.

To put it back on track, I got my copy of Persian Nativities vol. 1 on Saturday and have been going through it. Dr. Dykes' intros are usually almost as valuable as the work itself, as he delivers quite a bit of info about the texts: their histories, previous translation/transmission problems, theories about the development of the texts, and more. I'm currently in Bk 2 of the Book of Aristotle, trying to keep myself from just jumping into the 3rd book already.

Has anyone else picked it up, and if not, why haven't you sold a pint or 2 to a shady blood bank to get it yet?

GR wrote:Has anyone else picked it up, and if not, why haven't you sold a pint or 2 to a shady blood bank to get it yet?

Hi! I received mine on Saturday, too, and am enjoying the introduction to the Book of Aristotle immensely - savoring it, in fact. I so agree with you that Dr. Dykes' intros are nearly as valuable as the texts.