Nixx wrote: You say so but if you look at comments here and elsewhere you do wonder. Young Paul is a notorious amoralist and one would assume if you entered his Horary space for a good time to go on a mission to kill a hundred 3yr old children in a 13 hr time period he would regard it as his duty to provide you the ''optimal' moment. He may not if reality appeared in his conceptual consciousness, or you would hope his senses appeared.

Please do not consider yourself wise enough or knowledgeable enough to assume to know what I would or would not do.

'One would assume' nothing of the sort.

For the record, my name is just 'Paul', not 'Young Paul'. Perhaps, based on your later statement regarding your own age, you feel that by prefixing my name with 'Young' you hope to degrade my points. Who knows.

Good afternoon,

On a positive note one might recommend reading Julius Firmicus Maternus' delineations in his Mathesis, a complete, annotated translation of which by James H. Holden was recently published. Maternus' style and contents are amongst my favourites. They stand in stark contrast to the exclusively pastel-coloured ones found in many 20th century astrological textbooks and are not for the faint of heart. On nearly all occasions i find combinations of Maternus' delineations very reliable, even 'shockingly' so, including matters of moral and sexual behaviour.

Maternus explicitly states that the delineations are NOT to be used in an isolated way but combined and applied according to the structures of the chart.

Best regards,

lihin

Ile wrote:
Lot of the Unchastity of Women (Asc + Mars - Moon) is also not to be neglected. This formula given by Al-Biruni is also given to other similar lots:
- Misconduct by women
- Intercourse of women with men.

Lot of Sexual Unions (ASC + DC - Venus) is also informative.

Trickery and deception of men and women (Asc + Venus - Sun).
This one was exactly on Solar Return DSC in the year when my friend's wife cheated on him.

These are all sexist and biased in favor of men. Also it would be informative to find out whether your friend has cheated on his wife and which Solar Return placements fell with that.

These formulas by their very title "misconduct by women, intercourse of women with men" are misogynistic. Why shouldn't they be neglected, because male infidelity is accepted, expected, and promulgated by just about every culture?

zoomaster wrote:Lihin, I see your point regarding the latent patriarchal underpinnings of many medieval and classical works. I agree that much of what is written in these texts, you cite Lilly in particular, sounds somewhat 'sex-negative.'

However, I don't think a matriarchal 'reinterpretation' is necessary. The aphorisms apply to men and women equally.

Really, you don't think matriarchal reinterpretation is necessary? Just out of curiosity, are you male?

Secondly, where did you get the idea that the aphorisms apply to men and women equally? Do they sound as if they were applied equally? Because from what I've been reading it looks like they have not only been biased but they are even titled in such a way, as to pass down only that, which is biased, instead of bringing in the idea that infidelity is inherently sex-blind. Throughout the course of this discussion have you wondered why there are so many of these Lots and/or "aphorisms" geared specifically towards the "unscrupulous behavior" of women, and we have little to show for the same principle in the unscrupulous behavior of men? Of course it was discriminatory! And no, unless you can find a legitimate translation of an ancient work that specifically explains of the equality you are mentioning, don't assume there was any equality in these works.

Good morning,

In my humble opinion, Ms Stella Tiggy's points are mostly valid. In other threads, e. g. on the Third House of the Goddess, i have mentioned the increased pervasive, patriarchal, Abrahamic-monotheistic influence in Mediaeval compared to Hellenistic astrologies. One might, however, recall that both the Brahmin Indian and the ancient Greek tribes were patriarchal. Thus, it could only be expected that these values and attitudes are reflected in the corresponding astrologies.

Other similar items are ex. gr. preference for the right to the left, for the light to the dark, for the 'masculine' to the 'feminine'. The ancient texts seldom use 'active' and 'passive' that would be applicable in matriarchies as well as patriarchies with reversed gender roles. Many stringent rules of patriarchy concern patrilineal inheritance of property that precludes female promiscuity because, until quite recently, it was quite difficult or impossible to clearly establish fatherhood in cases of polyandrous mothers. So indeed, in practice patriarchal societies have often de jure and almost always de facto accorded liberties of sexual conduct to men but denied them to most women, at least to 'virtuous' ones.

Since most observation of real conduct leads to the conclusion that homo sapiens, like other primates, is more likely polygamous-polyandrous than monoandrous-monogamous, why should one object to widening the delineations of some of the astrological lots to apply equally to both sexes, if such widening respects the underlying astrological symbols?

On the other hand, equivalence of 'matriarchy' to a kind of 'paradise' and 'partriarchy' to a kind of 'inferno' is in my humble opinion illusory, often part of a political ambition to (re)establish matriarchy in the particular interest of some females. Are female tyrants by nature milder than their male counterparts? Given the balances between Benefics and Malefics, generation and corruption, etc., human society, matriarchal or patriarchal, might best be compared to a 'purgatorio', mitigated when its members of both sexes seek to behave towards each other with respect, understanding and - occasionally - even love.

Best regards,

lihin

lihin wrote:Since most observation of real conduct leads to the conclusion that homo sapiens, like other primates, is more likely polygamous-polyandrous than monoandrous-monogamous, why should one object to widening the delineations of some of the astrological lots to apply equally to both sexes, if such widening respects the underlying astrological symbols? lihin

Hi Lihin,

I appreciate your support. The reason I am opposed to widening it is because it isn't clear at this time whether they really do apply equally. There should be a panel of astrologers who sits down and does the due diligence, and collects the charts of cheating men to see whether the Lots created for women also apply to the cheating men. Then, assuming the Lots do apply equally (which I highly doubt they will) they should be renamed to account for both sexes.

This is the point: there is an understanding of why these sexist scripts have survived and the fact that they were passed along from one sexist society to the next (let us call it what it is), but where will this stop? Where can we stop and say "let the discrimination stop" and take action to see whether these actually hold up for both sexes in practice? And if they don't, how can we, as astrologers, take an ethical stance on such a one-sided deal?

Good evening,

Why 'cheating'? Why not just fulfilment and expression of human nature? Enjoyment, pleasure, lust, love, beauty - all Venusian, Benefic! It looks to me (new highest-level, illustrative examples from the USofA have just become public) that human monoandry and monogamy are mostly illusory, maintained if at all for appearances' sake and perhaps to underscore the adage, "forbidden fruits taste better".

Genders and sexual relations are (fortunately) realities. To me the word 'sexism' means little to nothing. 'Gender discrimination' is a more familiar expression.

May one doubt if the Mediaeval astrology authors were purposefully engaged in gender discrimination? To me it seems more likely they applied astrological symbols to their social environments that were Abrahamic monotheistic and patriarchal, defining social gender roles in set ways.

Several of the lots can differ (depending on the author) from males to females. Personally, i have yet to see any consensus on anything astrological past or present, so i doubt that a panel might achieve the desired results. Another underlying issue might be that 'usual' social gender roles may strongly oscillate between matriarchies and patriarchies.

In my own practice, not seeking to condemn anyone who is polyandrous or polygamous, bisexual or abstinent, if the client expresses particular interest in this domain, i delineate the basic sexual behaviour as it is indicated by the natal chart, ex. gr. configurations of Malefics with Venus, 5th and 7th places. The lots are at best a complement. However, one thing many apparently forget is that the most frequent delineation of anything is 'middling'.

Another item is that reality often seems not to accord itself to current or other notions of 'morals' and 'ethics'. One can cite the examples of Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix and of Joseph Stalin. The famous German playwright Bertold Brecht wrote, "Erst kommt das Fressen und dann kommt die Moral." (First comes the eat and then come the morals.) If we like to wear rose-coloured moralistic spectacles, we might read charts better by removing them. Many people seem reluctant to consider that the sums of good and benefic may be about the same as those of evil and malefic.

Might one observe that, to the best of my feeble current knowledge, there is still no reliable way to ascertain the gender of the native from a natal chart?

Best regards,

lihin

You can call it gender discrimination, but in actuality is discrimination based on sex and not gender.

Why 'cheating'? Why not just fulfilment and expression of human nature? Enjoyment, pleasure, lust, love, beauty - all Venusian, Benefic! It looks to me (new highest-level, illustrative examples from the USofA have just become public) that human monoandry and monogamy are mostly illusory, maintained if at all for appearances' sake and perhaps to underscore the adage, "forbidden fruits taste better".

Why cheating? because that is what it came down in those societies. During those times, for a woman, just being out in public was considered unscrupulous behavior. Enjoyment, pleasure, lust, love, and beauty are all fantastic EXCEPT at the expense of another person OR with the use of deception and trickery to attain a means. Those are the domains of Saturn and Neptune. Are you saying doing something that would hurt another person (usually a woman) is enjoyable? Is this really what you're arguing?

What it sounds like to me, is that you're trying to fit what is happening in our everyday lives to the mold of ancient scripts. Either that, or trying to fit what the ancients have said to fit what is happening in society. But what you are acknowledging is that infidelity in and of itself is a normalized behavior. I am willing to bet, that if society normalized murder (an eye for an eye, for example) you'd probably be fitting a few astrological aphorisms to try and justify why it is occurring! You'd say, "OH! It's that Lot! The one from Saturn to Mars and equally from the Ascendant!"

To me, it sounds like you're confusing things. You're making the waters muddy. Eh, again, call it what you will! It's a shame you feel that normalized behavior should be used to justify some kind of moralistic (or that which is amoral) reality. Why would you even use such notable public figures? Men in those positions are hardly representative of the population. Presidents, governors, generals, and other notable figures are often feel differently about themselves than the average person. They feel they are "special" and should be allowed to indulge regardless of who it hurts.

As for the Lots being able to tell sex, no, but why do you feel that is a justification for NOT doing the work? You'd still need to sit down with the charts of "unchaste" men and figure out if the Lots work identically in their charts. I keep seeing you try to make excuses for avoiding this most significant point.

And again, from an ethical standpoint this hasn't even been addressed! I keep seeing excuse after excuse as to why these issues should not be addressed. I don't know if the Lots discriminate against sex, but I know people do! And so, if a husband has cheated on his wife dozens of times but suspects his wife of cheating on him once, an astrologer may see the husband as justified in his suspicion while the husband's indiscretions have been completely ignored.

Good morning,

Organisation of human, be it matriarchal, patriarchal or mixed (despite occasional contrary outward appearances, the last form seems to be by far prevalent), is methinks somewhat more complex than 'gender discrimination' alone might suggest. In matriarchies, males are 'victims' of gender discrimination, as we can observe today in societies and subcultures where de facto matriarchy reigns.

Whoever says 'woman and man' can consequentially pass from the duad to the triad to include 'child'. Until quite recently using gene tests of paternity, it was, i must repeat, impossible to establish fatherhood required for patrilineal inheritance without severely restricting the sexual liberties of females. Not love but property was the primary consideration.

If anyone would like, we could examine some of the Hellenistic and / or Mediaeval basic delineations concerning sexual behaviour individually, attempt to determine if and why they are appropriate for both sexes and, depending on findings, try to edit the delineations according to the adage,

"What is good for the gander is good for the goose."

May i might i suggest we take for example Book VII, Sections 12 to 25 of Mathesis by Senator Julius Firmicus Maternus as a base?

Best regards,

lihin

Tiggy, have you recently reread Schoener, Maternus, Al-Kindi, and Al-Khayyat? In each of these texts the authors make almost no distinction between the sexual preferences and activities of women and men re: Mars/Venus configurations.

In fact, I'm highly surprised that you would take such an antagonistic view to works that are overly analytical at worst, and benign but insightful at best. Perhaps you are angered by terms such as 'lecherous', etc, despite the fact that the authors clearly attribute such qualities to women AND men. Also remember that no translation is perfect...often, translators have to the best they can with what they have to work with.

Then again, this is an internet forum, so I suppose it's not such a big deal. Who cares what people do with their gonads? One of the things I like most about a lot of ancient texts is that they share this non-interfering, non-patriarchal sort of neutrality.

To get back to the original topic it's clear that Mars in Venus's signs, Venus in Mars's signs, and configurations involving those planets point to natives with powerful sexual appetites. Notice I am avoiding the use of the hot-button term unfaithfulness.

i agree with twiggy as well on the idea of some of the older astrology being negative towards women. i think she used a few example with the arabic/greek lots.. women haven't had equal rights with men historically and i think it is reflected in some of the older historical astro texts we see when reading it too. that is my 2c .

james_m wrote:i agree with twiggy

Who is "twiggy"?