Conventional Astrology: Uses & Misuses
A Simple Method of Casting a Chart
I use dots or periods in an unusual way … Most of us read too fast, I feel — the dots are an attempt to encourage you to slow down … Every time you come to three dots, pause … take a breath … let the words sink in…
Take your time … you’re in no hurry … This is not intended to be a book for practicing your speed reading.
Relax, and enjoy!
In the tradition which has now come to us from the mystical land of Tibet, it is told that Manjushri, the embodiment of wisdom, gave the science and artform of astrology to the people of ancient times as a tool to aid their understanding.
But the people misused astrology — it became a limiting game, a pastime in itself, rather than a tool for dharma, for ‘words of truth’, for growth and understanding, going beyond all limitations. So, Manjushri took the astrology books away from the people, and hid them in a cave, until such time that the people would be ready to use the teachings skillfully and meaningfully…
Then, much later, a man named Padma Sambhava (meaning “the Lotus Born”) entered into Tibetan history. Padma Sambhava is the great teacher and skilled magician, the father of Tantra who brought the Vajrayana — Tantric Buddhism — into Tibet in the 8th century A.D.
Padma Sambhava prayed deeply and powerfully to Manjushri, summoning him and asking for the astrology texts, praying that, this time, the people would be ready to use their knowledge for their own good. Manjushri granted his prayer, and told him where the texts were hidden. In this way, Padma Sambhava was able to re-introduce the ancient intuitive science of astrology to the people of Tibet.
And now, finally, at the dawn of a new age, Padma Sambhava’s teachings have come to the West, just as the ways of the West have come to the East.
Now, finally, at the dawn of the Age of Aquarius, it is time to rediscover astrology again, to see within it a powerful, valuable tool to be used for deep inner growth, for the spreading of light and love thruout the world, thruout the galaxies, wherever we may wander.
Aquarian astrology at the dawn of a new age…
Astrology involves visualizing the solar system, and beyond … It is an infinite series of cycles … cycles within cycles…
One of the most intriguing cycles which is charted in astrology is the ‘great movement’ of the ‘great age’: the precession of the equinox. Each full revolution thru all 12 signs takes 26,000 years — 2166 years for each sign … (That’s 72 years for each single degree of the precession — the length of our lifetime.)
Right now, we are on the cusp of two of the deepest signs — we are moving from the Age of Pisces into the Age of Aquarius. Cusps are the deepest places of a chart: they are the places of transformation, where one sign transforms into the next.
No one to my knowledge knows the exact beginning of the Piscean Age, but everyone traces it at least to the time of Christ 2,000 years ago.
Pisces is the final, deepest sign … the sign of the end, of completion of a cycle … of total, deep understanding … absolute reality: absolute emptiness (Shunyata — shimmering emptiness) … ruled by the energies of both Neptune, the Visionary, and Pluto, the Beyond…
The Age of Pisces entered with the world crucifying its Christ, and it is coming to an end with the atom bomb and the possibility of global annihilation…
The Age of Aquarius is the age of the dawning light … the light of understanding. Aquarius is the Water-Bearer, nourishing and healing the earth with spiritual awareness … It is the Age influenced