Traditional Astrology For Today

Ben Dykes, who is one of the leading experts on medieval Astrology, Has just published an Introductory book called Traditional Astrology For Today. It's quite short, 130 pages all in, and is aimed at the 'curious modern astrology student or practising professional'

It's designed to :

Provide an introduction to the area before there's any major outlay on books or courses

Enable current practises to be supplemented by traditional techniques

Provide a quick guide to terms, vocabulary and names and works of the old Astrologers

Provide an up to date reference guide to the best current works available in English

Provide some answers to objections against Traditional techniques.


I've only just received my copy but I'll be posting a review on the book in the near future.
The obvious immediate conclusion is that this is not a rival to Avelar and Ribeiro's book -

http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=152043

- it's a brief introduction, not an extensive treatise, but given the standing of the author, one that should prove enlightening

Edited to add:

Having now read it -

It isn't a rival to Avelar and Ribeiro, and isn't meant to be - it's very much a complement to it. It's an excellent slim guide to the theory and practice of an approach which is as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago and equally relevant to the practise of Astrology today.

Review

Well, as you can see by the time difference between this post and the previous, this is not a long book or a particularly demanding book (if you already know a little about Astrology). It is however, a very good read.

I've listed Dykes' objectives in the previous post and it is the last one - answering objections to TA that gets the main focus, either directly or indirectly. The book consists of 106 pages of 'text' plus 24 pages of and epilogue,appendicies and a bibliography. It is divided into two parts, though these are not of equal length.

Part I takes up the first third of the book and covers history, ideas and values. The history is quite brief and is intended to give an idea of the main periods and their relevant Astrologers. At the outset Dykes makes it clear that he is only dealing with horoscopic Astrology, that is where a chart is cast and used, rather than the earlier omen Astrology of the Babylonians or the Astrology of the Egyptians. He divides Traditional Astrology into four periods, the Hellenistic from around 100 BC to 200AD, The Sassanian Persians (226 AD - 651 AD) plus the Arabic Astrologers (750 AD - 950 AD; the Medieval Latin West about 1100 AD to 1400 Ad and finally Renaissance and Early Modern 1400 - 1700. Most of his examples and methods come from the second of these four, with some reference to the others. It's no coincidence that his special area is medieval Astrology and especially Persian and Arabic Astrology, followed by hise earlier work on Guido Bonatti who falls into the third period.

Nevertheless, the narrowing gives him a clearer focus than would otherwise be the case, and stops him rambling between periods. Part I also looks at the philosophical underpinnings, showing that there was no common philosophical basis for the tradition. He makes reference to the philosophies of Aristotle, Plato, the Stoics, Magical tradition and Christianity and uses the Aristotelian and Stoic views to discuss the issues of human happiness and astrological counseling in order to show that these approaches can be useful in the present day. He does this very well, as he should being a former teacher of philosopy. The exposition is brief but gets over the main points and perhaps also stimulating a reconsideration of the reader's outlook on life.

The remainder of Part I brings him to the two most contentious things about TA. The first is the use of 'good' and 'bad' as values and the second is the issue of what the chart shows. The 'good' and 'bad' theme surfaces several times during the book but essentially Dykes says that 'good' and 'bad' are value judgements that we all make all the time. People come to Astrologers because they feel something is wrong (has gone bad) and need help. The job of the counsellor is to recognise this and help them devise strategies for dealing with it. In other words we are not talking about 'Good' and 'Evil' when we use terms such as 'benefic' and 'malefic' (at least not in a moral sense) we are talking about functionality and how well something is performing it's proper function.

On the issue of the chart, he contrasts modern views that the entire chart is a 'map' of who we are and our 'mind' against the traditional view that the chart not only shows who we are (Body, Mind and Spirit) but also something about the external world of relationships, friends, work, etc. He claims it's a more objective approach.

Now whilst I agree with most of his points here, I have a sneeking suspicion that he's setting up something of a straw man to knock down. Yes, I've come across modern views that don't recognise external constraints, either from the physical world or from others but most of the modern astrologers I've met are actually quite in line with Dykes perception of the role of counselling and the role of the chart. To be honest I find it reassuring that the traditional and modern can actually agree, even if coming from different starting points.

Part I may be brief but it's purpose is important, it says that you must address the issue of how you see Astrology in the world and how you work with a subject to help them address the problems that they see in a meaningful way and one which leads to real strategies to deal with reality.

I'll deal with Part II in the next post.

My astrological library is top-heavy with books on psychological and "humanistic" astrology, with very little coverage of more traditional aspects except for brief mention in the primers I started with. If I were to start building a traditional sub-division, where would be the best place to start? I have enough knowledge of the history and the fundamentals of the traditional astrologers to not have to start at absolute zero, so the Dykes book is probably not meaty enough from a practical usage standpoint. I see the Avelar and Ribeiro book is available, and I already have Christian Astrology, Tetrabiblos and a few public-domain fragments. What's next? Bonatti? (There appears to be a large number of discrete volumes by topic.) Morin? Christopher Warnock gives a recommended reading list on this site:

http://www.renaissanceastrology.com/traditionalastrology.html

What do you think? (I'm mainly interested in the natal, electional and perhaps talismanic aspects since I've been using astro-geomancy for the sort of questions normally handled by horary, although I've done horary charts when I was working with Alphee Lavoie in the distant past.)

Review - Part II

In this part, Dykes looks at techniques. Whilst it is two thirds of the text, it's perhaps the easiest to review

He goes through the obvious consideration of Planets, Signs and Houses. He doesn't rule out the use of the outer planets, though he explicitly states that he doesn't use them and that those current astrologers who both follow a traditional approach and who use them, tend to do so only if there are very close aspects (a degree or less). He does talk about essential dignity of the planets but concentrates on Rulership and Exaltation (and their opposites, Detriment and Fall) and the nature of Peregrine. Triplicity, Terms and Face get only very passing mention in this book, though clearly Dykes regards them as having some importance.

He acknowledges the different use of signs - and it's worth remembering that not all modern Astrologers use the sun sign approach, as evidenced by Dave. He actually puts most interpretive emphasis on the modes - cardinal (which he calls moveable, following tradition), fixed and mutable (traditionally called common). On Houses he comments on the 'alphabet' approach stressing that traditional astrologers saw no correlation between the First House and Aries, etc. Again though, probably most modern Astrologers would agree with Dykes, though they may occasional talk as though there was a correlation. He looks briefly at House systems but his main focus is to identify places where a planet is advantageous to the native and also has dynamic capability (these don't entirely overlap).

He looks at how to interpret a chart using two rules, firstly that a planet in a house has more immediate affect on the affairs of the house and that what is indicated from a house emanates from the ruler of the house. He shows how a lot of information can be derived from these two rules, even before we add in aspects. This short section gives an excellent guide for any student of Astrology whether they are going to use a traditional approach or not.

The remainder of Part II looks at predictive methods. He contrasts modern use of transits with traditional use, the former being stand alone, the latter being in conjunction with other methods and usually the lowest level in the process. He does refer to other methods such as solar returns, distributors and primary directions but really only in a couple of sentences. Most of his exposition is saved for Profections, together with very good examples and a short case study of their use in predictive work.

The book ends with a set of appendices which cover a slap bang up to date reading list, including Avalar and Ribeiro's 'On the Heavenly Spheres' reviewed elsewhere. Unsurprisingly there's a lot of his own books in the reading list but they are of a high standard. There's also a glossary of terms.

This book can't cover everything and does not attempt to, thus the Lots (Arabic Parts) get a very brief chapter, which really only deals with the Part of Fortune in any detail. Despite the fact that I would count myself reasonably familiar with traditional approaches, there were several occasions when I found that he sharpened my understanding by looking at the 'wood' rather than the 'trees'.

Overall this is an excellent addition to Astrology bookshelves, Even if you're a dyed in the wool 'modern' like Dave, you'll still find it useful, for taking a second look at what you're doing and why - even if you end up disagreeing. It's a thought provoking book as well as a slim guide to practise.

You can learn more about Ben Dykes at:

http://www.bendykes.com/

Barleywine said:

My astrological library is top-heavy with books on psychological and "humanistic" astrology, with very little coverage of more traditional aspects except for brief mention in the primers I started with. If I were to start building a traditional sub-division, where would be the best place to start? I have enough knowledge of the history and the fundamentals of the traditional astrologers to not have to start at absolute zero, so the Dykes book is probably not meaty enough from a practical usage standpoint. I see the Avelar and Ribeiro book is available, and I already have Christian Astrology, Tetrabiblos and a few public-domain fragments. What's next? Bonatti? (There appears to be a large number of discrete volumes by topic.) Morin? Christopher Warnock gives a recommended reading list on this site:

http://www.renaissanceastrology.com/traditionalastrology.html

What do you think? (I'm mainly interested in the natal, electional and perhaps talismanic aspects since I've been using astro-geomancy for the sort of questions normally handled by horary, although I've done horary charts when I was working with Alphee Lavoie in the distant past.)

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The available literature is growing very fast

On nativities:

Avelar and Ribeiro is a good introductory text - I've reviewed it elsewhere on this forum, so if you're not particularly sure, it's a good starting point.

If you want to go into it through the original texts, the Ben Dykes translations 'The Persian Nativities' is highly detailed but also highly expensive as there are 3 Volumes. I've got Volume III which is Abu Mashar on solar returns and other predictive methods.

Dykes also has several translations of Bonatti so his site is well worth the visit - I've put the link in the previous post. You'll also find he has a translation of Bonatti on Elections. plus a couple of other relevant works.

Dykes is establishing himself as the most prolific writer on medieval astrology and he deploys a high level of scholarship.

One of the advantages of TAFT is that it has a bang up to date and comprehensive reading list divided by category. There's also an excellent list of websites. As I said above, I actually found it a good read and a couple of times I got a sharp and clear statement of what I should be doing with a chart but am only muddling towards.

I think you're main first decision is about what period to look at. The amount of material now available means that it's very difficult to look at all of Traditional Astrology and read all the texts, which was not the case even 10 years ago. Like you, at the moment I want to develop my natal techniques and I've decided to go with Dykes Persian Nativities trilogy, which gives both comment and the original texts. Thereafter, it will be horary and possibly elections.

Incidentally, Dykes has quite a few excerpts for download, they're not long but enough to give you the flavour and help you make the choice of whether his area is for you or not.

Dispositors in Traditional Astrology

I've been having a discussion on another forum about searching for sole dispositors in"modern" (with Uranus, Neptune and Pluto) charts. Someone pointed out that following the "chains" of dispositors doesn't work with "traditional" charts. On the face of it, I had to agree with him, and said that it seems traditional astrologers stick with angularity and essential and accidental dignities and debilities like sign rulerships, mutual receptions, exaltation, detriment, fall, diurnal and nocturnal triplicity rulers, sects, terms and faces, certain mundane house placements, familiarities, etc and apply a "scoring system" of the type William Lilly used to determine planetary strength and weakness. I've seen no mention of "sole dispositor" determination as I learned it in the '70s, although the "Lord" of a "House" (meaning the sign it rules) and therefore domination of any planet therein seems to be part of the traditional toolbox.

Can you shed any light on this subject?

Sounds like a fascinating read for the beginner and novice alike!
Thank you so much Minderwiz for reviewing it and drawing my attention to it!

Barleywine said:

I've been having a discussion on another forum about searching for sole dispositors in"modern" (with Uranus, Neptune and Pluto) charts. Someone pointed out that following the "chains" of dispositors doesn't work with "traditional" charts. On the face of it, I had to agree with him, and said that it seems traditional astrologers stick with angularity and essential and accidental dignities and debilities

Can you shed any light on this subject?

Click to expand...

Oddly I would have said that following the chains of dispositors doesn't work with modern Astrology but does work with Traditional, though whether you would ever use it in a traditional context is the real question.

Why doesn't it work with Modern? Suppose Venus is in Aquarius. Who is her dispositor? Is it Uranus or Saturn or both? Leaving aside the fact that the integration of the outers into sign rulerships is totally flawed, most moderns talk about co-rulers for Aquarius, Scorpio and Pisces and if there are co-rulers how do you decide on which if either is a dispositor? The only practical answer seems to be whatever the particular Astrologer says it is, there's no theoretical underpinning, only opinion.

Now using traditional rulerships a dispositor tree is quite easy and straightforward, but whether it has significance seems to be the crux of the matter. If we are talking about planetary strength lets consider two possible situations.

Saturn in Libra, Venus in Virgo in a day chart. A Traditional Astrologer would certainly agree that Venus disposits Saturn (Venus rules the sign that Saturn is in). But which is the stronger? Well Venus is in Fall, though she is the Earth triplicity ruler, so score = -1 on essential dignity. Saturn is in Exaltation and is also the Air triplicity ruler and the Face ruler, so score = 8 on essential dignity. Is Venus able to control or exercise power over Saturn? Of course not. She's rather like the cash strapped motel owner dealing with a very rich guest - nothing is too much trouble and don't worry about the noise or the mess

Move Venus into Libra (coming soon) and she has +5 for rulership but still not enough to rival Saturn. She might exercise a bit more influence because, using the motel owner example, she's not desperated for the cash and might well get by without it. But this is a very high paying guest bringing a lot of cash, it will still take a lot for Venus to go head to head, and she'll lose on essential dignity (though accidental dignities might well sway it back her way).

I've never, ever seen a reference in the Traditional literature to dispositor trees or sole dispositors, so in that sense you are spot on. It seems that these are an attempt to give some greater focus on relative strength but without having to deal with the complexities of dignity.

Interestingly, I saw an article in The Tradition (the now seemingly deceased Journal of Tranditional Astrology) by Martin Hermes, entitled The Role of Dispositors of Planets in Signs - which of course confirms my first point.

In it he argues that the original Greek term for what we now call ruler actually meant something more akin to steward, that is the role of the 'ruler' was to facilitate the expression of the planet(s) in it's sign(s). So the idea of Dominus, Lord or Master, was a later mistranslation. So that would also suggest that the dispositor tree and sole dispositor concept is unsound - though obviously a highly debatable conclusion.

Minderwiz said:

Oddly I would have said that following the chains of dispositors doesn't work with modern Astrology but does work with Traditional, though whether you would ever use it in a traditional context is the real question.

Why doesn't it work with Modern? Suppose Venus is in Aquarius. Who is her dispositor? Is it Uranus or Saturn or both? Leaving aside the fact that the integration of the outers into sign rulerships is totally flawed, most moderns talk about co-rulers for Aquarius, Scorpio and Pisces and if there are co-rulers how do you decide on which if either is a dispositor? The only practical answer seems to be whatever the particular Astrologer says it is, there's no theoretical underpinning, only opinion.

Now using traditional rulerships a dispositor tree is quite easy and straightforward, but whether it has significance seems to be the crux of the matter. If we are talking about planetary strength lets consider two possible situations.

Saturn in Libra, Venus in Virgo in a day chart. A Traditional Astrologer would certainly agree that Venus disposits Saturn (Venus rules the sign that Saturn is in). But which is the stronger? Well Venus is in Fall, though she is the Earth triplicity ruler, so score = -1 on essential dignity. Saturn is in Exaltation and is also the Air triplicity ruler and the Face ruler, so score = 8 on essential dignity. Is Venus able to control or exercise power over Saturn? Of course not. She's rather like the cash strapped motel owner dealing with a very rich guest - nothing is too much trouble and don't worry about the noise or the mess

Move Venus into Libra (coming soon) and she has +5 for rulership but still not enough to rival Saturn. She might exercise a bit more influence because, using the motel owner example, she's not desperated for the cash and might well get by without it. But this is a very high paying guest bringing a lot of cash, it will still take a lot for Venus to go head to head, and she'll lose on essential dignity (though accidental dignities might well sway it back her way).

I've never, ever seen a reference in the Traditional literature to dispositor trees or sole dispositors, so in that sense you are spot on. It seems that these are an attempt to give some greater focus on relative strength but without having to deal with the complexities of dignity.

Interestingly, I saw an article in The Tradition (the now seemingly deceased Journal of Tranditional Astrology) by Martin Hermes, entitled The Role of Dispositors of Planets in Signs - which of course confirms my first point.

In it he argues that the original Greek term for what we now call ruler actually meant something more akin to steward, that is the role of the 'ruler' was to facilitate the expression of the planet(s) in it's sign(s). So the idea of Dominus, Lord or Master, was a later mistranslation. So that would also suggest that the dispositor tree and sole dispositor concept is unsound - though obviously a highly debatable conclusion.

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I remember seeing the idea of "stewardship" somewhere long ago. I noticed that Lilly sometimes used the word "domination" but "stewardship" has a likelier import. Personally I would like to see some aspect between the ruler of the sign and the planet(s) ruled before I would place too much value on the rulership relationship. I seem to recall Rob Hand saying he doesn't use rulerships, and that a planet has nothing to do with a house unless it's physically THERE, or is in aspect to a planet that's physically THERE. That was in the '80s though, so I don't know where he stands today.

The individual who made the comment about dispositor chains was a knowledgeable traditional astrologer (or at least speaks the language convincingly), and I gathered that he doesn't use co-rulerships, so it seems the chain would break down somewhere along the line. I haven't tried to run one with my "traditional" chart. Maybe he's wrong, but it's probably moot as you say, with so many other tools available. The whole "sole dispositor" thing seems like the "almuten of the horoscope" determination without all the work.

Oh, and on a parallel note, why does Morinus give so many points to some planets when I can only come up with half as many (or sometimes much less) using the tables? I understand the concept but my allotments are nowhere near as generous. The author does say that planetary strength is on his "TO DO" list, so maybe he will be tweaking the almuten calculations.

Barleywine said:

I remember seeing the idea of "stewardship" somewhere long ago. I noticed that Lilly sometimes used the word "domination" but "stewardship" has a likelier import. Personally I would like to see some aspect between the ruler of the sign and the planet(s) ruled before I would place too much value on the rulership relationship. I seem to recall Rob Hand saying he doesn't use rulerships, and that a planet has nothing to do with a house unless it's physically THERE, or is in aspect to a planet that's physically THERE. That was in the '80s though, so I don't know where he stands today.

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Well Hand has some material on his ARHAT site on calculations of essential and accidental dignities, so I presume he now uses at least some of them,

Barleywine said:

The individual who made the comment about dispositor chains was a knowledgeable traditional astrologer (or at least speaks the language convincingly), and I gathered that he doesn't use co-rulerships, so it seems the chain would break down somewhere along the line. I haven't tried to run one with my "traditional" chart. Maybe he's wrong, but it's probably moot as you say, with so many other tools available. The whole "sole dispositor" thing seems like the "almuten of the horoscope" determination without all the work.

Click to expand...

Well if we had Sun, Mercury and Venus in Virgo, Saturn and Jupiter in Leo, Mars in Sagittarius and Moon in Aries, that should give a sole dispositor of Mercury using traditional rulerships. The outers would not be used, therefore they are not relevant to the dispositor tree. Using the outers as rulers would reduce the chances of sole dispositors for considerable periods - just think about Neptune entering Pisces, and then Saturn entering Capricorn, followed by Jupiter entering Sagittarius.

The analogy with the Almuten of the chart is a good one in this instance, I'll try and remember that!

Barleywine said:

Oh, and on a parallel note, why does Morinus give so many points to some planets when I can only come up with half as many (or sometimes much less) using the tables? I understand the concept but my allotments are nowhere near as generous. The author does say that planetary strength is on his "TO DO" list, so maybe he will be tweaking the almuten calculations.

Click to expand...

The calculation of the Almuten of the Chart (and there are several methods for this) is not straightforward. You seem to be taking Lilly's approach which is to total essential and accidental dignities.

However Ibn Ezra uses a very convoluted system, which looks at the degrees of the Sun, Moon, Ascendant, Part of Fortune and pre-natal szygy. For each one of these five degrees we award points for rulership, exaltation, triplicity, terms and face - so planets who rule these degrees or who have them as a dignity begin to accumulate points. The planetary hour ruler and the planetary day ruler get scores as well, then each planet gets a score for its house placement,etc. At the end of the point scoring we tot up the points for each planet and the winner (Almuten) is the Almuten of the Chart. This process is not identical to the essential and accidental dignities and includes additional considerations and ignores others.

Morinus does not use Ibn Ezra's method, though this is by far the most common method quoted.