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10 Tips For Learning Astrology
October 19, 2007 – 3:23 am | 62 Comments

So you want to learn about astrology? Not the generalized Sun-sign stuff that you find in newspapers and magazines, but serious astrology. The advanced type where you can actually determine specific information about a person’s life through the observation of the planets and other celestial phenomena. Here are some tips to help you get started.

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Home » astrological techniques and concepts

The Definition of Astrology

Posted by on August 7, 2011 at 1:40 pm16 Comments

What is the definition of astrology? If you search around the internet for a few minutes you will find a number of different definitions. Unfortunately most of them are wrong.

They are wrong in the sense that they do not accurately reflect the way in which many astrologers conceptualize and subsequently define their own subject. This is often because definitions of astrology are written by people who have little or no familiarity with the subject, and thus they are written from an outsider’s perspective.

The purpose of this article, then, is to outline a definition of astrology that is broad enough to encompass all or most views of the subject by actual practitioners. I will then contrast this definition with some of the more common ones that exist today.

Astrology: A Definition

This is the definition of astrology that I would like to propose:

Astrology is the study of the correlation between celestial objects and earthly events.

That’s it. Now, one could argue that the definition is overly broad, but I would say that what it lacks in specificity it makes up for in accuracy. Here is why:

Most contemporary definitions of astrology assume that astrologers posit some sort of celestial force which exerts an influence over earthly events, in order to account for the things that certain astrological alignments are said to correlate with. The problem with this is that such definitions of astrology ignore a longstanding debate within the astrological community about whether the celestial objects used in astrology act as signs or causes of the things that they correlate with here on Earth.

In point of fact, I would say that the majority of modern western astrologers today hold the view that the movements of celestial objects such as planets and stars do in fact correlate with terrestrial events, but they do not cause those events to take place. Or in other words, celestial objects act as signs of events that they correlate with, but not causes.

This is usually conceptualized in terms of a modified version of Carl Jung’s theory of “synchronicity,” where there can be an acausal connection between objects or events in time that consists entirely of an equivalence in meaning or symbolism. So, for example, while an astrologer might say that having Mars in the 10th house of a natal chart could “indicate” or  “signify” someone who has a career as an athlete or perhaps someone who is in the military, that does not necessarily mean that they think that Mars causes the person to have that career path. Rather, the planetary placements at the moment of a person’s birth simply reflect or symbolize different facets of their life and future.

Signs Versus Causes in the Astrological Tradition

Western astrology originated in Mesopotamia as a form of divination, and as a form of divination astrology was conceptualized as the attempt by the gods to communicate their intentions to humankind through celestial signs and omens. Even though celestial omens were thought to convey messages about the future, this does not necessarily mean that they were conceptualized as causing those future events to take place. Francesca Rochberg, one of the leading scholars in the field of Mesopotamian astrology today, explains

The relationship between x the phenomenon and y the predicted event has given rise to much discussion, the consensus being that the relationship is not causal, but more of the order of simple association or correlation. The omen statement would be interpreted therefore, not as x causes y, but rather, if x, (expect also) y. (Francesca Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pg. 58)

Later on in the astrological tradition, sometime during the late Hellenistic period, a new conceptualization of astrology which viewed the planets as efficient causes of earthly events was introduced. However the older sign-based conceptualization of astrology still persisted as an alternate or competing viewpoint, and this appears to have given rise to a debate within the astrological community.  For example, in the 1st century CE Seneca acknowledged both positions during the course of making some brief remarks where he criticized the usefulness of astrology:

They [the stars] either actuate or signalize all that comes about in the universe. If every event is brought about by them, how is mere familiarity with a process which is unchangeable going to be of any help? If they are pointers to events, what difference does it make to be aware in advance of things you cannot escape? They are going to happen whether you know about them or not. (Seneca, Letters From a Stoic: Epistulae morales ad Lucilium, trans. Robin Campbell, Penguin Classics, 1969 (repr. 2004), letter LXXXVIII, pg.155.)

In the 2nd century CE Claudius Ptolemy tried to re-conceptualize astrology as an Aristotelian natural science, explaining the “effects” of the planets and stars on humanity as a resulting from the effluence of varying levels of heat and moisture. Ptolemy was essentially trying to reject the earlier sign-based conceptualization of astrology in order to bring the subject more into line with some of the prevailing scientific trends of his day. And he was largely successful. To a certain extent Ptolemy’s causal conceptualization of astrology became the dominant paradigm during the Middle Ages. This did not end all debate over the subject though. For example, in the 5th century Hephaistio of Thebes opened his astrological textbook with an allusion to the different conceptualizations, perhaps acknowledging that the debate was still ongoing:

Our aim here, O most excellent of friends Athanasios, is, God willing, to set forth this handbook as something that can be quite easily followed; it contains some commentary and an essay that has come to us about what was said by the ancients concerning the stars, whether signifying or causing or even in some other fashion encircling and turning everything here under the Moon with their figures relative to each other and to the earth… (Hephaistio of Thebes, Apotelesmatics, Book I, Preface: 1, trans. Robert Schmidt, The Golden Hind Press, Berkeley Springs, WV, 1994, pg. 1)

While Ptolemy’s causal conceptualization of astrology came to be the dominant one in the Medieval period, some tensions between the different viewpoints persisted in the astrological tradition all the way into the modern period, when the debate was fully revived again.

Modern Views on the Astrological Mechanism

Astrology was reconstituted in the 20th century within the context of psychology and character analysis, rather than the concrete prediction of external events. Carl Jung was one of the main influences on the psychological models that were incorporated into astrology during this period, and one of the things that came along with this was his theory of synchronicity.

Jung called synchronicity an “acausal connecting principle,” and many psychological astrologers adopted a modified version of his theory in order to explain how the planets in a person’s birth chart could represent the native’s psyche or their character without necessarily being the cause of the native developing those traits. In his seminal 1936 work The Astrology of Personality the astrologer Dane Rudhyar explicitly rejected the notion that “the planets or stars actually influence individual beings by the fact of their sending to earth radio-like waves, or rays…” He goes on to say that even if some sort of rays were discovered which did have an effect on biological processes

…this would in no way prove the usual findings of astrology … but this would solve only a fragment of the problems involved in the sum total of astrological ideas. (Dane Rudhyar, The Astrology of Personality, Lucis Publishing Co., 1936, pgs. 43-44)

Rudhyar’s argument was essentially that even if some sort of celestial force is discovered which influences terrestrial life in a way that accounts for some astrological assumptions, this still probably wouldn’t account for the vast majority of what astrologers claim that astrology is capable of, as many of these assertions only make sense within the context of a sign-based conceptualization. A more elaborate version of this argument was put forward more recently by Geoffrey Cornelius in his influential 1994 book The Moment of Astrology.

While it is certainly true that not all modern astrologers adopted acausal views of astrology, many of the major astrological authors of the 20th and early 21st century did, to the extent that it once again became a major viewpoint amongst practitioners. An example of this conceptualization can be seen in remarks made in 1978 by the influential psychological astrologer Liz Greene:

The positions of the heavens at a particular moment in time, by reflecting the qualities of that moment, also reflect the qualities of anything born at that moment, whether it be an individual, a city, an idea, a company or a marriage. One does not cause the other; they are synchronous, and mirror each other. (Liz Greene, Relating: An Astrological Guide to Living with Others on a Small Planet, Weiser, 1978, pg. 24)

More recently, Richard Tarnas outlined the following position in his notable 2006 book Cosmos and Psyche:

In the perspective I am suggesting here, reflecting the dominant trend in contemporary astrological theory, the planets do not “cause” specific events any more than the hands on a clock “cause” a specific time. Rather, the planetary positions are indicative of the cosmic state or archetypal dynamics at that time. (Richard Tarnas, Cosmos and Psyche: Intimations of a New World View, Viking Press, 2006, pg. 77)

Notice that Tarnas not only explicitly rejects the notion of a causal mechanism underlying astrology, but he presents this as the dominant conceptualization of the subject in the astrological community at this point in time. Surely any contemporary definition of astrology would have to take this into account. But do they? Let’s take a look.

Contemporary Definitions of Astrology

What follows are some contemporary definitions of astrology by sources outside of the astrological community. I have emphasized certain words in the definitions with bold lettering in order to demonstrate the prevalence of the causal conceptualization of astrology in virtually all of these definitions.

Here is Dictionary.com’s definition of astrology:

The study that assumes and attempts to interpret the influence of the heavenly bodies on human affairs.

Merriam-Webster definition of astrology:

The divination of the supposed influences of the stars and planets on human affairs and terrestrial events by their positions and aspects.

The Oxford Dictionary definition of astrology:

The study of the movements and relative positions of celestial bodies interpreted as having an influence on human affairs and the natural world.

Skeptical Literature

One of the interesting side effects of the prevalence of the causal conceptualization of astrology in the typical definitions of the subject is that this definition also becomes widely used in skeptical literature on astrology. This is problematic since it results in a number of straw man arguments on the part of skeptics, where virtually all of their arguments are based on disputing the notion that the planets can have any causal effect on human life, even though this isn’t necessarily what most astrologers claim, as demonstrated above.

This makes some of their arguments rather weak and easy to dismiss, since it basically becomes the case where they are setting up and knocking down their own definition of astrology, without checking to see if it actually matches with what the astrologers are saying. This is part of a broader issue I’ve noticed with the modern skeptical movement and mentioned in previous articles, where a typical skeptic will seldom take the time to develop more than a passing familiarity with astrology, and so they are usually forced to rely on questionable arguments that have been repeated by other skeptics for decades. At some point I expect the skeptical community to pick up on this discrepancy between the definition that they usually give for astrology and the one that astrologers tend to use for themselves, but until then, here are some typical definitions of astrology from skeptics:

Definition of astrology from the Skeptic’s Dictionary:

Astrology, in its traditional form, is a type of divination based on the theory that the positions and movements of celestial bodies (stars, planets [except the one you are born on or those in other solar systems], Sun, and Moon) at the time of birth profoundly influence a person’s life. … Correlation does not prove causality, but it is good enough for most astrologers. … According to some astrologers, the data support the hypothesis that there is a causal connection between heavenly bodies and human events.

Phil Plait’s definition of astrology (he is the former president of the James Randi Educational Foundation):

What is astrology? That question is tough, actually. There are lots of flavors of astrology. Sun sign, Vedic, archetypal, natal, Horary… the different kinds of astrology seem to outnumber the stars in the sky. Some of the claims they make are inherently contradictory (some say the moment of birth is important, others say it’s the month, etc.), but they all operate under a very broad working assumption: there is some sort of force from the heavens that influences us here on Earth. There are lots of different attributions for this force (some say gravity, some say electromagnetism, some say a force that cannot be measured), but it all boils down to the planets and stars having an effect on people.

Notice the discrepancy here between Plait’s definition of astrology and the definitions given by the astrologers mentioned above, Tarnas and Greene. He actually goes on for a while on this topic, explaining at great length why astrology cannot operate through any known force. Now, to a certain extent this is actually necessary, since there are a number of astrologers who believe that astrology works through some known or unknown force. But in all of his extensive criticisms of astrology the other widespread conceptualization of it is never mentioned. As far as I can tell, most skeptics aren’t aware of it.

From a certain perspective one might argue that since even most mainstream dictionaries only mention the causal conceptualization of astrology in their definitions of the subject, the skeptics can’t really be faulted for doing the same. I’m not sure that this is necessarily true though, because the dictionaries can only be faulted for having an incomplete definition, whereas the skeptics tend to portray themselves as authorities on the subject who are knowledgeable enough about it to be able to say definitely that there is nothing to it. Now, I actually know that most skeptics are good people who have good intentions in their skeptical endeavors, but there is something deeply disturbing about what I’ve just pointed out. How can a group of people set themselves up as authorities on a subject when they haven’t even studied it enough to write an accurate definition of it?

Towards a More Accurate Definition of Astrology

Some of the public misconceptions about astrology stem from poor definitions of the subject. In order for any definition of astrology to be correct, it needs to be properly inclusive of the spectrum of different viewpoints that exist about the subject within the field.

What I hope to have demonstrated in this article is that one of the persistent definitions of astrology by astrologers themselves is the belief that celestial phenomena can act as signs or omens for terrestrial events without necessarily acting as causes. The correlation itself is what is significant, and no underlying cause is necessarily implied or required. When defining and discussing the subject of astrology in the future, this viewpoint needs to be recognized and taken into account.

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About Chris Brennan

Chris is a practicing astrologer from Denver, Colorado, USA. He is the former President of the Association for Young Astrologers, as well as the former Research Director of the National Council for Geocosmic Research. He offers personal consultations and teaches online classes through his website at www.ChrisBrennanAstrologer.com.




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16 Comments »

  • Austin says:

    It is difficult for me to dismiss either the causal or divinatory explanations.

    Divinations may be conducted utilizing virtually any type of material- intestines, cards, birds, yarrow sticks, etc. It is therefore impossible to exempt the planets from being valid objects of divination.

    Although the causal angle on astrology has grown less popular in the last century, there is a certain level of undeniable truth to a causal relationship between celestial events and earthly ones. Day and night are a good place to begin building this case. Then we can move on to the lunar cycle, and go from there.

    The question is not whether there is or is not a causal relationship between celestial and terrestrial events, but whether the full range of claims made by most astrologers can be attributed to that causal interaction. It may be that some are, and some aren’t.

    I’d like to end with pointing out that scientists have still not confirmed by what agency gravity operates. Gravitons, anyone? But they are pretty goddamn sure it operates, and have some excellent models for predicting how it will work. So it is with astrology.

  • Eve Dembowski says:

    What I find interesting about your article is the fact that the astrology has for the most part been defined by those who are not astrologers. I am often asked questions like; “What is astrology?” and “How does it work?”. I think that Chris suggested definition may be a good option for now.

    I agree with Austin that there is some valid evidence for casual influences. Interestingly those influences are most evidently “caused” by the Luminairies (Sun and Moon). The biggest and physically most obvious (to us) celestial bodies.

    Philosophically this could seen as the influence on the lowest aspect of the Soul: the physical, material body/life. The issue is that we can not separate the different aspect of the soul (life) and make finite conclusions from what we observe. The body may respond to the cycle of the Sun creating day and night, but there is also some thing deeper going on which many choose to ignore. Astrologers choose not to ignore this…

    But what is it, this deeper thing? This is a good question and one that astrologers should try to define even if that definition is a work in progress. After all how do we define life? how do we define a human? How do we define the soul? God? Astrology at its best is trying to define and observe the interconnection between all these things.

    The more I work with and study astrology the more I come to conclude that we can not practice our Art without becoming philosophers.

  • Kristina says:

    I agree that Astrology is misrepresented in today’s society and therefore disregarded by the mainstream culture. I think the problem lies in the fact that we’re living in a highly materialistic society. The idea of synchronicity just doesn’t make sense to people like the idea of causalty does. I think the possibility of astrology being acausal needs it’s fair share of representation, for sure, but I think we as students and practitioners of Astrology also need to admit that as long as we’re here on earth we may never know for sure how this all works. We definately need better definitions and this article is a big step in the right direction. Thank you Chris for your work 🙂

  • Jim says:

    While I agree that a good working definition of astrology is important, I disagree that the lack of a shared definition of the term is at the root of most people’s skepticism of astrology. Having interacted constructively with several astrology-skeptics myself, I see skepticism of astrology as being generally based in the fact that many astrologers claim to know things that they clearly don’t, and in the the fact that astrologers are often unwilling to admit their ignorance or mistakes when confronted with them. These two phenomena make astrologers look like buffoons to the general public, and makes it easy for those with a truly scientific turn of mind to hang astrology–and astrologers–up for ridicule.

    I’m a professional astrologer myself, and over the last three years I’ve been able to convince a couple of skeptics of the validity of astrology. One former skeptic even became a semi-regular client of mine. I haven’t convinced every skeptic I’ve come across that astrology is valid, but here is what helped effect the changes of mind that did occur.

    Number one, I freely admit the limits of our understanding of astrology. I don’t insist that I know things that I don’t, or that astrology is something it is not. For instance, although astrology is a valid field of study, it is not subject to the scientific method. Therefore astrology is not a science, and should not be called a science. Calling astrology a science in the presence of someone who actually practices science (like the skeptic who became a client of mine, who is a physicist by profession) is a great way to alienate him or her. Also, there are fundamental things about astrology that we don’t–and probably will never–know. While there is highly convincing “circumstantial” evidence that astrology works, we have no way of definitively answering the questions of why or how it works. Beliefs about the “how” and “why” of astrology abound, of course, but there is no way of answering these questions in a way that would “prove” one belief is more valid than another. I comfortably admit these facts to people, and this helps skeptics to know that I approach both the subject of astrology, and their skepticism, with an open and inquiring mind. I have yet to find a skeptic that is not willing to at least hear what I have to say, when I take this approach.

    The second reason I can sometimes convince skeptical minds to open up a bit to astrology, is that I can often provide a good dose of that “convincing circumstantial evidence” I mentioned earlier. When I do readings, I avoid generalizations and platitudes. I make individualized, falsifiable, and sometimes counter-intuitive predictions (or analyses). Just as importantly, these predictions and analyses consistently (though not always) turn out to be true. In other words, I show people that I can obtain real data through astrology that is not available to me through any mundane means. The proof is in the pudding, as they say, and if astrology is to be taken seriously, those who practice it have to develop a good track record of making accurate predictions–or otherwise learning objectively true things–through astrology, which would not have otherwise been possible. Experience shows that different astrological techniques work differently for different people, so I don’t think trying to enforce a “standard” way to do astrology is going to help the astrological community establish this good track record. Instead, each of us as astrologers need to make our analyses as individualized and specific as possible, and not be afraid to hear “I don’t want to hear that” or “that can’t happen” or even “you were wrong” from a client…or a skeptic. If as astrologers we are practicing an astrological technique that doesn’t consistently work for us, for everyone’s sake we need to identify and accept this fact as soon as possible. We then need to either refine our technique, find a different technique that works better, or else leave the readings to someone else. Rationalizing our failures to predict or analyze accurately in readings, and sticking to platitudes or generalizations in order to avoid mistakes and bad feelings, is a big part of why so many people are skeptical of astrology. That skepticism won’t change until the behavior of astrologers changes.

    It’s my experience that practicing an astrological technique that works, sticking to my guns when the charts tell me something a client thinks is scary or unlikely, and admitting and learning from my mistakes when I make them, all help me give better readings. The fact that this behavior also seems to make me more credible to skeptics is icing on the cake.

  • Chris Brennan says:

    There are a variety of different reasons for someone to be skeptical about astrology. In the article I only went so far as to say that some of the public misconceptions about the subject stem from inaccurate definitions of it. This doesn’t strike me as a very controversial assertion.

  • Jim says:

    Chris–I submit that it is both controversial and unwise, to state that anyone has a more accurate understanding of why astrology works than anyone else. I briefly mentioned why I hold this view in my previous post, but I’ll expand on it here.

    I agree with you that the correlative explanation of why astrology works that you put forth in your article is both more popular among modern astrologers, and seems more plausible, than a causative explanation. However, popularity and plausibility are not proof, and the proof needed to conclusively support one explanation of why astrology works over another doesn’t currently exist. Without proof, any assertion (no matter how popular or plausible) becomes merely one of personal belief or of subjective experience. No matter how sincere and well-intentioned an assertion of belief may be, or how common it may be in an important community at a given time, it will always be open to re-interpretation and dispute.

    Your attempt to address the question of why astrology works (and so provide an optimal definition of astrology) is an admirable one. But, it seems to me that in the process of making this admirable attempt you have made an error very common in the astrological community, that of confusing belief with proof. I have observed that this confusion–distressingly common in the astrological community, and less so in the wider academic and scientific communities–is a primary source of ammunition for hardened skeptics of astrology. My hope is that by pointing this confusion out, we can all avoid it, and thereby begin to reduce the widespread confusion and controversy regarding astrology by recognizing beliefs as beliefs, and facts as facts.

    It is my opinion that as long as the astrological community confuses subjective beliefs with objective facts, it will remain outside mainstream society (and especially outside of mainstream academia). I suggest that a good use of the astrological community’s time and resources toward ending this exclusion would be to admit the things we don’t know (like why astrology works), and get on with the business of using astrology to meaningfully improve all our lives.

  • Hieronimuss says:

    Personally I’d like to see the definition lean more towards self-empowerment. This one works for me: “Astrology is a form of imagination emerging from nature and having direct relevance for everyday life. It is an applied poetics, a vision of life on earth stimulated by movements in the heavens, which can take us into areas of self-reflection as no other system of symbols and images can.” Thomas Moore, The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life

  • […] The best definition I found was, of course, written by an astrologer, found here: […]

  • Dave Smith says:

    For many years now I have been defining astrology as “The study of the correlation between celestial facts and human affairs.” … exactly what is proposed here. I also espouse an “acausal” astrology. The planets don’t do anything to us. They simply reflect the present condition of the universe as seen from our earthly vantage point. They define a Moment, and each of us IS that moment brought to manifestation: we are the Spirit made flesh. A horoscope DESCRIBES a unique moment in spacetime, and each moment is both creative and purposeful. In this view of things causality is not required: we simply must recognize the underlying Unity of the universe.

  • Bob Carroll says:

    Thanks for quoting my Skeptic’s Dictionary definition of astrology. You might be guilty of the very straw man you say skeptic commit since you don’t point out that I also say:

    In its psychological form, astrology is a type of New Age therapy used for self-understanding and personality analysis (astrotherapy). In all forms, astrology is a manifestation of magical thinking.

  • Chris Brennan says:

    Which part of this paragraph do you think clarifies your stance on the purported mechanism underlying astrology? The reference to magical thinking?

  • […] Just a quickie!  I found this awesome article by Chris Brennan, one of the foremost experts on Hellenistic astrology, on the…. […]

  • Caleb Kent says:

    ah! Astrology is the integration of Magical, Mythic, Archaic, and Mental Consciousness!

    it is a mathematic(Mental) of symbolism(Mythic) with (a)causation(Magical) between actual occasions(Archaic).

    (to mix in a little Gebser and Whitehead)

  • Chris,

    The second axiom of the Kyballion — the mystical teachings of Hermes Trismegistus — explains why astrology “works” as it were.

    The Principle of Correspondence: As above, so below.

    In my very first astrology class with Terry Lamb, she provided what I consider to be the most elegant explanation. The same force that moves the planets also moves us.

    What astrology gives us is perspective. The cycles and movements of the planets help us to see the big picture, and understand the flow of the patterns. Once we recognize the big patterns, we can see how that big pattern is repeated in our lives and events in myriad ways.

    It’s exactly like fractals. Except the same patterns repeat and express on far more than just two dimensions. Just consider how many different ways (and in how many different contexts) a single chart can be interpreted. The chart is the snapshot of the pattern, and like a fractal, it is repeated in everything.

    We can’t see the shape of the pattern, however, unless we pull back far enough, and that’s the value of astrology.

  • […] Just a quickie!  I found this awesome article by Chris Brennan on the definition of astrology. […]

  • […] The Definition of Astrology, di Chris Brennan Traduzione: Alessandra […]