16
Stan:

I do apologise for the confusion regarding the time of the chart! I plead Mercury retrograde. . . sorry!

Tara:

Yes, you and I agreed on the reading of Mars and surgery:

Spirlhelix:

I do think the doctor will discuss a serious condition, but one which can be managed with hopes of recovery. Mars rules the house of treatment and Moon's final aspect in this sign is a trine to Mars. I hate the thought of surgery, but according to Saunders, Mars ruling the house of treatment and in the eleventh house indicates "chirurgery" (surgery); the more so, I imagine, with an upcoming trine of the Moon to Mars.
And what is more important, so did the doctor! Nice work.

Warmly,

Pam[/quote]
"Id rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance"

Dates for Charts

18
Hi, Cosmic Dolphin!

The only date I have at this point is for my meeting with the surgeon. I prefer to use actual times than planned dates, however, for event charts. Dates can change so easily before the fact. I have found that even the times of medical procedures on the correct date are subject to last-minute change!

So I will probably use a horary question instead of a time of meeting with the surgeon (which does not qualify as a decumbiture anyway, since it is a meeting with a second doctor on the same medical condition). I like to keep a peaceful state of mind, but it would not surprise me if I found myself asking an urgent question some time before my meeting with the surgeon.

Thanks so much for all your support!

Warmest regards,

Pam
"Id rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance"

Illness in the Body, or Spirit, or Both?

19
Hi, all.

Lilly has an interesting section on this. I have been looking it over, and will post comments about how these techniques apply to this chart. This material would be useful in a situation where it is difficult but necessary to distinguish between the eighth house emphasis as "anguish of mind" as opposed to a physical condition, etc.

Warmly,

Pam
"Id rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance"

20
Pam wrote: Lilly has an interesting section on this. I have been looking it over, and will post comments about how these techniques apply to this chart. This material would be useful in a situation where it is difficult but necessary to distinguish between the eighth house emphasis as "anguish of mind" as opposed to a physical condition, etc.
I look forward to this!

Best wishes,
Tara

Mind or Body?

21
Greetings, Skyscripters!

I attmept to approach astrology practically, and to learn something if I can from each new chart I read.

By attempting to be practical, I mean that I try to have some real-life equivalent concept or practical application for whatever I see and describe in the chart.

I find Lilly is the most outstanding astrologer to turn to from a practical point of view. He includes in his comments on decumbiture a section on

"Whether the Disease be in the Body, Mind, or Both"

The practicality of this topic is that when curing a disease, if we attempt to cure the body when the mind is causing the illness, we will not be sucessful. Likewise, vice versa: "mind over matter" will not address
an illness that requires a drastic physical treatment like surgery.

And to balance the equation, Lilly points out that there are illnesses which exist both in the body and mind. One is not necessarily exclusive of the other.

Lilly's opening remarks on the topic, CA p. 264, remind us of the formula for the Part of Spirit vs the Part of Fortune; Ascendant, Moon and Sun are all in play. As we consider esoteric terms like spirit and soul, we also need to remember that in the intervening ages since Ptolemy, philosophers in each succeeding era have continued to re-define terms like spirit, soul, and mind. I would suggest that when attempting to apply these rules, we need to know as nearly as we can what was meant by the author when using terms like "spirit" and "soul" to describe where the illness is to be found.

I regret that I have not yet developed a keen appreciation of what these terms (soul, spirit) would have meant in Lilly's historical era. So I will excuse myself for the moment from commenting on the spirit and soul, terms Western philosophers have ebued with such a ripe and varied morphology, and focus on the mind and body as Lilly describes them in the chart.

The reading of this example by Lilly's rules is a little cluttered due to the virtually wholesale dispositorship of Saturn in the chart. Here is one interesting feature of the chart we can read in Lilly's rules:

". . .This general rule many astrologians observe, viz., that Saturn naturally foreshadows or causeth Melancholy. all manner of distempers from Melancholy, and by consequence the disturbed Mind, wherefore wherever you find Saturn Lord of the Ascendant or of the Hour, or of the twelfth House, or sixth, or if the Moon separate from him, or if Saturn be in the sixth house, or in the Ascendant, or in conjuncrtion, square, or opposition of the Lord of the Ascendant, the sick party labors with some affliction of Mind, or with some vexatious care wherewith his mind is more troubled. . ."

But despite the pervasive dispositorship of Saturn, the interesting thing is that none of these conditions exist in the example chart.

We do have eighth-house activity and the querent has experienced a recent bereavement. So if we want to see if the illness can be attributed to greif, we might double-check to see if the Lord of the Eighth of anguish and death (Saturn) is afflicting the querent (Ascendant, Lord of the Ascendant, Sun or Moon), whether bodily or mentally. In this case, Saturn, though ruling several, is not afflicting any of the places named.

Comments are welcome! More thoughts on Lilly when I have time to post them.

Warm regards,

Pam

* * * * * * *

Side Note:

Melancholy is a fascinating condition which was thought by the ancients to have more of a physical basis than we think "melancholy" has, in a modern sense. Lilly himself claims to have survived a bout of "hypochondriac melancholy" which lasted more than six years. I am sure some of our modern decumbiturists have written on this many-faceted subject.

Hypochondria is a condition which we moderns think of as being "in the head". In Lilly's time, it was located under the ribs on the right side, in the front and side of the body. It was attributed to a liver condition.

* * * * * * *
"Id rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance"

Another Example of Lilly's Cleverness

22
Wouldn't it be interesting to have a conversation with William Lilly?

We usually remember him as a great anthologist and translator of the literature of astrology; however, we must never relegate Lilly to the strict role of the pedant. His statements about the ancient teachings of astrology and lists of rules are backed up by his own experience reading charts and making predictions. Because the stars themselves are consistent, there are both "rules" that are passed down, and "rules" that the stars themselves teach us if we are able students. One can hardly practice astrology so rigorously and regularly as Lilly did without making some observations of the motions of the stars which consistently correspond to similar results. Sometimes we can find a gem in his work of the "do what works" school which balances our comprehension of the genius of this man: wise in both tradition and in observation of his art.

I have been studying a section of Lilly's CA in the chapter on the Sixth House. I am fascinated by the section called, "Cause of the Disease Inward or Outward".

For those who do not have ready access to CA, I am reproducing this section here:

"The inward cause and condition of the Disease we require from the ill disposition of the Significator, in sign, House, and place in Heaven, his good or ill configuration with the malevolent Planets: where generally observe, any Planets may in this case can be malignant, if he be Lord of the eighth, twelfth or sixth, and &c.

The outward cause is required from those Infortunes that afflict the Ascendant, or from the principal Significators in the Figure, or the Moon; for if you find the Lord of the Ascendant sufficiently strong in essential Dignities, swift in motion, in a good house of Heaven, you may then judge the querent is not naturally Ill, but accidentally and outwardly afflicted, and if you find notwithstanding the strength of the Lord of the Ascendant, that either Saturn or Mars have some square or opposition aspect unto him, and neither of them be Lords of the sixth, or dispositors of the Moon, you may judge some outward cause hath happened to the party, whereby it comes to pass he is not well, but not perfectly sick; do you then observe what house the Planet is, or of what house he is Lord, and from the judgments belonging to that house, require satisfaction in Art, as for example:

If you find the Lord of the Ascendant casually afflicted by Saturn or Mars, &tc. and either of them are Lords of the second house, and there appears no inward cause of a Disease, then do you judge the Querent is in some want of money (if the significators apply) or hath had lately damage, if the significators are separated; the greatness or smallness of his loss judge according to the Planet afflicting, and the quality of the aspect, where note, Oppositions herein are worse than Square aspects or Conjunctions. If it be the Lord of the Fifth, be the Planet good or ill, that afflicts, or hath evil aspect to the Lord of the Ascendant, either by evil Diet, Surfeit, 7c. or by loss at Dice, Tables or Sports (if Querent be capable) or that the Father comes off not freely with his Pension; (this is when young people demand a Question, or are distempered) if it be the Lord of the Seventh that oppresses the Lord of the Ascendant, the party has lately had some difference with his Wife (and so a woman, on the contrary, with her Husband) or some Lawsuit, willful Neighbor, contention, or Partner is the outward cause of his evil indisposition. In Youth, if the like configuration be upon the Question from the Lord of the seventh to the Lord of the Ascendant, it's a Love-melancholy, his Friend or the Maid he affects, or the man she longs after is unkind, and disontent for that occasion is the outward cause of all this ill affectedness in the Body, yet will no sickness follow it. This is the method I ever observed, which I freely communicate to the world, which, if well understood, will give knowledge sufficient to this way of judicature. "
"Id rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance"