|
Astrology
by Hand Week 20
Astrology
and Magic: Differences
Last week
I began to show the ways in which astrology and magic are linked. But
there is no question that the various subjects classified as magic and
the various subjects classified as astrology have different thrusts. Astrology
seems more diagnostic (i.e., divinatory) and magic more proactive, but
this, I suggest, is a difference more apparent than real.
The most
casual perusal of the literature of the Golden Dawn, or the writings of
Cornelius Agrippa, will disclose that at least these people thought that
divination, including astrology, was part of magic. And those who are
familiar with modern Hindu astrology must be aware that there are a number
of practices prescribing gems, rituals, etc. to mitigate astrological
effects that are clearly magical. And this is not confined to Eastern
astrology. Marsilio Ficino’s Three Books on Life involves
a great deal of much the same thing under the heading of natural magic.
And then we have the passages in Cornelius Agrippa that we referred to
a couple of weeks ago in which astrology may be used to time a blatantly
magical operation.
Astrology
and Ritual
Another apparent
difference between astrology and magic is in the use of ritual.
Of course, not all magic is based on ritual. Some of it is simply the
use of raw psychic ability with a clear and strong intention, but not
a lot of magical ritual. But there does appear to be more ritual involved
in magic than in astrology.
This I think
is true if you use a narrow definition of “ritual.” But if you expand
the notion of ritual to include all forms of repeated behavior the purpose
of which is to focus the will or consciousness of the practitioner, then
astrology contains ritual. It may vary from one astrologer to another,
but it is there nonetheless. Just about every astrological practitioner
has a procedure for “getting in touch with a chart.” I know that I am
often very poor at just jumping into a chart and “reading” it. Sometimes
I am very good at it. But then something else has heightened my awareness
about the issues involved, and the focusing of my attention that I would
normally bring about through my getting-in-touch-with-the-chart process
has already happened.
Then there
is electional astrology, the art of choosing times. Many people think
that horary is the most magic-like form of astrology. I think electional
astrology is, precisely because when we choose a time for action, we are
speaking or transmitting the nature of our intentions in astrological
language, and then we take an action at a specific time to declare that
the election of the time has taken place. We open for business; we send
a letter; we make a phone call; we have a meeting, etc. These are not
rituals in the usual sense one might say, but sometimes they are quite
ritualistic in that the actions are not fully actions in the real world.
(It has been my experience, however, that the more the actions at an election
are actions in the “real world,” the better the results are likely to
be.)
And of course
we have the Agrippa type of magical elections. I would like to suggest
that the essence of ritual is not that everyone dress up in costumes and
do things that are a bit different, but that the essence of ritual is
that it consists of a series of actions designed to focus one’s intention
or will. This definitely happens in electional astrology.
Is
It Okay for Astrology to be Magical?
This is not
a question that I can answer for anyone but myself. From every point of
view I can take, the answer is yes. As long as one has not declared that
magic is bogus by definition as Lawrence
Jerome did, it is okay for astrology to be connected to magic
from the point of view of intellectual respectability. Is magic okay morally?
I think that any action must be justified or condemned entirely according
to what it seeks to accomplish and by what in fact it accomplishes. If
we apply these criteria to technology and science, we might find them
actually quite problematical. The benefits of these are obvious, but so
also are the dangers and the actual costs we have experienced.
Again, which
is more dangerous, astrology and magic on one hand, or nuclear physics
on the other? The spiritual awareness, the wisdom of the practitioner,
these are key features of both astrology-magic and science-technology.
Without these, both are dangerous to the practitioners, to their souls
and to the lives of those around them.
But where
is the language of nature coming from? We begin with
this next week.
|
