Exegesis Volume 2 Issue #40

Exegesis Digest Thu, 18 Sep 1997

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Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 16:46:36 -0400 (EDT)
From: John Reder
Subject: Re: Exegesis Digest V2 #38

At 06:43 PM 9/16/97 BST, you wrote:

>Exegesis Digest         Tue, 16 Sep 1997         Volume 2 Issue 38
>
>From: Janet Hartley
>
>Hi John,
>
>I agree completely with your assessment of DI and have been very
>frustrated on the other astrology lists waiting for them to get
>over the DI worship and get back to astrology, but they haven't
>yet.  I would love to see a discussion on houses (I use Koch, but
>forgot why) and also Event Charts.  I am always asked to do them
>but have not done so because I am not sure how they should be
>interpreted.  Are there any good books on Event Charts or would
>someone on this list please give me some tips?
>

Janet:

You have to realize that most people "into" astrology, are into it on the level of the supermarket tabloid level. (Big surprise that they are hooked on Di then.) TO them it is all romance and celebrity horoscopes, with the lotto key thrown in. It is very rare to get a discussion beyond Linda Goodman/Jeanne Dixon level.

When you talk about what books are good for discussion of event astrology, you really have to look at books that deal with the traditional non-saccharine, non humanistic approach to divination. You want to look at the traditional meat and potatoes interpretation that has been put on the siding for the last century.

The best book I ever read was "Simplified Horary Astrology" by Ivy Goldstein-Jacobson. That was out of print for the last decade, but is now being reprinted again and is available through a number of the astrology book sellers on the web. Barbara Waters is another good author and so is Anthony Louis, though they tend to be a bit chatty. (Louis more than Waters. You have to skip though a lot of talk to get down to the point.

For theory of interpretation Marc Edmund Jones was really good. I found his emphasis on using "Occam's Razor", in interpretation to be very enlightening. (Disregard that which is minor and not relevant in interpretation). I finds most people who get into minutia of detail often get lost from the central point they are examining. William Lilly was a big promoter of minutia and I find most people who follow him to the letter missing the obvious because they are searching for the trivial.

So, if you can, get Ivy to start, use that as the base and go on from there.

John Reder

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Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 20:35:51 GMT
From: Bosse Omhav
Subject: Houses` systems

Hello Carla, fellow Exegesians,

On Fri, 12 Sep 1997, you wrote:

>I`d be very much interested in discussing houses`s systems, but as
>I`ve tried to do so in another forum and was almost banished from
>there, I would appreciate to know whether it is possible to do it
>here, and whether is there someone interested in the matter.

To begin with, what method of reference to use, what value has the different frame of references? Three - dimensional facts are somehow to be projected upon a two - dimensional sheet of paper, or computer screen. The space around us is filled with indicators of all kinds. Is this what the houses are for? Well, they are at least one way to divide the space around an event, i.e. the birth of a child.

How do we divide this space? What point of view do we take into consideration?

In the name of Sokar, the god of orientation, one may say that the different references (i.e. the great circles) correspond, symbolically to various levels of consciousness. Each of the great circles represents a different view. "As above, so below: yet after another manner".

The predictive system called Primary Directions are based on the different house systems. If it turns out to be a "correct" way of computing Primary Directions, they may help us choose what house to use in different situations. The mathematics are rigorous, but with the aid of computers it would indeed be easier to explore if there is any new insights to gain here . . .

I.e. it may be important to keep in mind also the prime vertical in the interpretation of a chart.

The Prime Vertical (the east-west great circle) goes through the zenith and nadir (over our heads and under our feet), and the east-west points of the horizon. According to Michael Munkasey, the Prime Vertical (and the meridian) define a concept of time and time passage in the Earthly plane. They represents here and now to us.

'Medice, cura te ipsum!

As the final words in Planets in Houses, by R. Pelletier, Michael Munkasey writes:

"The prime vertical and the meridian divide the space in our immediate environment and give us an immediate and conscious framework for perception and classification. The meridian serves as our celestial timekeeper, tying us to a fixed reference point in the heavens, which relates our progress not only in the world but in life. The prime vertical separates our awakening functions from our doing functions and serves as the symbolic division between our beginnings and our endings, awakening and sleeping, that which is us and that which is other in our lives".

As said, the prime vertical is the great circle that touches the East point of the horizon and the Zenith.

It offers the most natural way of dividing the locally visible sky, from the ground to the top, and was used in the first system of 'rational' house division, namely Campanus system. Campanus divided the visible part of this great circle (from the horizon to the Zenith) in three parts, drew a great circle through each of the intermediate divisions to the North and South points of the horizon, and defined the cusps of the 11th and 12th houses as the cross points of these two circles with the ecliptic.

The same thing was done for the houses below the horizon (dividing the prime vertical arc from the horizon to the Nadir). The opposite points on the ecliptic gave the western cusps.

Campanus cusps can be very different from Placidus and Regiomontanus (who divide the equator) even in temperate latitudes, but I think they are not to be neglected.

The division of the prime vertical may offer some insight about the hidden influence of Spirit in the deeds and destiny of the subject.

The prime vertical, as the word says, connects us with what is directly, vertically, above us, our Zenith. The Zenith (computed on a circle perpendicular to the horizon) is a sort of individual pole, while the North pole (computed on a circle perpendicular to the equator) is probably more connected with our earthly environment and the circumstances, and the ecliptic pole (computed on a circle perpendicular to the ecliptic) with the great cycles of mankind, or even of all life on the earth, through the precession of the equinoxes.

Bosse Omhav

"So it is possible that the prime vertical is the best and most direct carrier of the influences of the sky (or Heaven, Tien for the classical Chinese, which can also be called 'Spirit', correctly, provided one knows what he means by this too abused word) on the individual subject.

Still, this symbolism is difficult to prove, if one wants 'scientific' evidence. One line of research should be to study the transits on the house cusps computed on the prime vertical and on the equator. Another the primary directions to the same cusps".

    Alessandro

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