Horary Astrology: The Big Move
September 4, 2006 by admin
Dear Readers,
As you can see, I have decided to move the Gryphon Astrology blog to gryphonastrology.wordpress.com. Why? As I wanted to blog more often, I wanted a blog host with a little more flexibility and user-friendliness, such as the categories you can click on the left-hand side, which will bring up all the posts with those keywords. So set your bookmarks to here for frequent blogging on horary astrology, natal horoscopes and mundane astrology. Too, I think the visuals are rather spiffier and the text is easier to read.
Please enjoy, and let me know what you think of the changes.
My best,
Nina AKA Gryphon
To see whether it was appropriate to make the blog move, and whether the blog would be better off in its new home, I decided to cast a horary. Usually, I just charge right ahead, but I thought this might be entertaining.
Question: Will my blog be happier in its new home?
Here is the horary chart:
The blog is represented by my 5th house, because it is my “issue,” as William Lilly would call it, or my creation. Doesn’t matter whether it is animate or not. How is the blog right now? It is not very happy, as shown by the Moon in its detriment. Indeed, I feel it could be a lot better off in this new hosting service, what with more user-friendliness, categories galore, and so on. The Moon is on its way out of Capricorn, and will gain some essential dignity, or at least, lose the yuckiness of being detrimented in Capricorn. Too, in Capricorn, the blog is in the fall of Jupiter, Lord 1. It is a bit of a pain to maintain as it is, and I am always looking for new ways to minimize my work.
Will it be a good change, then? Yes. The blog will no longer harm me (by leaving Capricorn, it will leave Jupiter’s fall), and will improve in its new location.
Moon Phases in Astrology: The Part of Fortune, Part I
August 5, 2005 by admin
The Part of Fortune aka Fortuna has been used by astrologers for hundreds of years in natal, horary and electional astrology; many modern astrologers typically encounter it but do not use it. It can be quite a handy tool to have in natal analysis, and can substantially enrich one’s practice.
Though we will discuss this notion in greater length, the Part is generally taken to signify one’s material possessions, i.e.: one’s wealth. It is often taken to signfiy the state of one’s soul as well. Its reverse, the Part of Spirit, shows shows spiritual, inward possessions, or one’s propensity to religion and things of the Spirit. The condition of the Part of Fortune and its dispositor will determine the quality and state of one’s material and spiritual wealth.
In this article, we will discuss in detail what the Part of Fortune means and how to use it. In this Part I of the article, we will discuss the mechanics of how to implement the Part of Fortune in charts. In Part II, we will talk about the practical and philosophical meaning of the Part of Fortune.
Calculation of the Part of Fortune
The Part of Fortune is a point calculated in the chart, as distinguished from any astronomical body. To find the Part of Fortune, take the longitude of the Ascendant, add the longitude of the Moon, and subtract the longitude of the Sun (PoF = Asc + Moon – Sun).
Thus, 2 Aries is 2 degrees of longitude, 2 degrees of Taurus is 32 degrees of longitude, 17 Gemini is 77 degrees of longitude, and so on around the zodiac. The resulting point from your calculations is the place of the Part of Fortune. Its state and that of its dispositor (the planet which rules the sign the Part of Fortune falls in) will describe the state of the person’s possessions.
If you were born at night, that is, the Sun is under the horizon in your natal chart, some authorities state that you should reverse the above formula: PoF = Asc + Sun – Moon.
The Actors: The Sun, the Moon, and the Ascendant
So why use these three points in calculating the Part of Fortune? Obviously, they are the most important parts of a chart. This is especially the case in natal charts, where the Sun and Moon are the elements that power a chart, while the Ascendant is the place where the heavens meet the earth – the point of incarnation, in other words.
The Reversals of Fortune
One of the many debates continuing to rage among astrologers is whether to reverse the Part of Fortune by night (and therefore all the parts that use it also). Ptolemy, in his Tetrabiblos, states in two separate places that one should not reverse the Part of Fortune by night. However, many subsequent authorities, including Bonatti and Al-Biruni, state quite clearly that one should reverse the places of the Sun and Moon by night.
So why would someone do this? Bonatti’s chief justification for reversing Fortuna is that Parts should be calculated from the naturally stronger planet (he would have looked at our formulas from right to left). Thus, because the Sun is considered stronger by day, when it is in houses 7-12, Fortuna should be calculated from it during the day. Conversely, the Moon is stronger by night, and therefore the calculation should begin from the Moon by night.
However, there are a few problems with Bonatti’s reasoning. First, just because we are looking at a nighttime chart does not mean the Moon is stronger than the Sun. We could imagine a chart where the Sun is on the IC, thereby gaining some accidental strength, and the Moon is below the horizon in the sixth house. Unlike the Sun during the day, the Moon does not have to be above the horizon by night. Automatically considering it the stronger planet at night is simply wrong.
Second, the Moon is considered the “luminary of the time” in nighttime charts. All this means is that it has more of a responsibility for the native’s wellbeing on its planetary shoulders; it does not mean it can effectively take care of those responsibilities. Therefore, we should not artificially put it in the driver’s seat by reversing the Part of Fortune by night.
Third, reversing the Part of Fortune gives you another part, the Part of Spirit. The two parts are obviously related, since they are mirror images of one another. Bonatti writes that the Part of Fortune shows the soul’s strength, fortune, substance, etc., while the Part of Spirit (aka the Part of Things to Come) shows faith, prophecy, and religion. The two Parts are obviously distinct in some fashion, and transposing them by night causes us to get two entirely different beasties depending on when we were born.
Stay tuned for Part II. – the meaning and interpretation of the Part of Fortune.
(Sources used for analysis in this article: Robert Zoller’s translation of Guido Bonatti’s treatise on the Arabic Parts; Al-Biruni’s Book of Instruction in the Elements of the Art of Astrology.)
How to Read William Lilly’s Christian Astrology
July 20, 2005 by admin
Hint: With your wits firmly ensconced about you. Or, to paraphrase the 17th century physician and astrologer Nicholas Culpeper, you must keep your brains in your head where they belong and not in your books.Let’s get this out of the way first: why even read William Lilly’s Christian Astrology? Because it is the greatest book on astrology that has been written in the English language. Ever. Whatever you may think of the most recent editions of Neptune or Solar Arcs or that timeless classic, Astrology to Instantly Firm Up, Groom, and Tone Your Karma. Reading CA is guaranteed to turn you into a better astrologer, provided you use some common sense when reading. There can arise an infinite number of charts, each different from the last, and even the most explicit 1-2-3 instructions (on which Lilly tends to skimp, anyway) will not work in all cases.
Reading William Lilly is frequently crazy-making, and it’s not because of his archaic language (you should know by now that Lilly’s “clown” so often mentioned in CA = our peasant/country bumpkin/hick). Rather, it’s because he is not a particularly methodical writer or explainer. Don’t get me wrong – he was a truly excellent astrologer. It’s just that in the conveying of the information, he would be somewhat stream-of-consciousness. Disorganized, we would say nowadays.
So, how do you read Lilly for pleasure and profit? Since he himself provides no handy manual, here are some necessary steps:
1. Check and recheck that brain is in your head not book. Less messy that way.
2. Get pen & paper.
3. Open your CA, and start writing. Organize Lilly’s instructions numerically; break each segment down into an outline. Once you have a good algorithm for a certain operation (e.g. how to tell if it will be a girl or boy in a horary), go and test it out on some charts. As you do this, keep asking yourself at each step, why? Why do we care what the 11th house is doing in a pregnancy chart? (Answer: because in most pregnancies, it takes two, and the 11th house is the 5th house of the partner, who is signified by the Querent’s 7th. And it’s the partner’s kid as much as the Querent’s.)
Note that in many if not most chapters, Lilly will give several possible algorithms for a certain operation. In such cases, try to use both when learning, but mainly, be very analytical. Observe what common elements arise among the instruction sets. Then try to figure out why these elements are important.
4. Rinse and repeat, banging head against wall as little as possible.
Good luck, and let me know if you have questions. You can always reach me at nina ” at ” gryphonastrology.com.
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