Hand's Talk: 'Towards a Post-Modern Astrology'

1
I just found this. I hadn't seen any discussion or mention of it. Point after point he addresses thoughts and questions I?ve had. This is the neglected side of studying traditional astrology. You gotta read it!

http://www.astro.com/astrology/in_postmodern_e.htm

"Yet, what appears to be happening, and what I certainly align myself with, is not really a revival of traditional astrology. Rather it?s a healing of the break that occurred in the 18th century. We are not trying to do astrology exactly as it was done, rather we?re trying to recreate astrology as it would have been if it had never stopped being an active tradition."

"What do we do with the 20th century? This is where I will demonstrate conclusively that I am not a traditionalist: we keep it! We keep its best features. The single most important advance in 20th century astrology was the recognition that astrology actually could be used as a tool for human potential and self-actualization."

"I do not share the contempt that many traditionalists feel for psychological astrology. I think it is extraordinarily important. My only criticism of it is that in the hands of some of it?s less competent practitioners it has been an extremely mushy sort of astrology where anything can be made to mean anything, depending on the emotional frame of mind of the client and the astrologer. The language of 20th century astrology as a language tends to be imprecise, vague, inarticulate and unclear. But the goals of 20th century astrology are absolutely commendable."

"Modern astrology has had one really tragic flaw in addition to its inarticulate language: its complete lack of a philosophical foundation rooted in any coherent philosophical or spiritual tradition of the world, except in the case of Jyotish."


There is much more to think about.

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I Like that comment too. In fact, a comment that Garry made about Liz Green in another post has stuck in my mind over the last few days, and it?s strange that this ?trad revival? issue seems to be floating about all over the place.

It?s often thought that astrologers who are interested in the traditional principles of astrology are opposed to the principles of psychological exploration. Some are outspoken against it but I?m sure most would say that they benefit by incorporating psychological insights. Without some element of it, astrology would seem very dry and uncreative to me. I see many areas where astrologers such as Liz Greene have had a tremendous influence upon the revival of traditional techniques such as horary, even though you wouldn?t associate that branch with their names. I also think that Maggie Hyde does great work with her horaries by incorporating Jungian archetypal principles, and at the same time I think Dennis Elwell has made an important impact by reminding horary astrologers of the need to think creatively and to look at what the ?cosmic symbolism? is saying rather than trying to contort it into something that they expect it to say.

Going back to Liz Greene, Nick Campion?s article on the revival of traditional astrology reveals that she took out two subscriptions to ARHAT in order to support their initiative. When I was editing the Traditional Astrologer magazine I was also told by a reliable book store owner that she regularly bought the issues, maybe to support it, maybe because it was so darned good :) I?ve never mentioned that before but it?s time that astrologers stopped focussing on divisions and got rid of the suggestion that you can have modern (or psychologically probing) astrology or traditional astrology, but you can?t have the best of both. I agree with everything that Rob Hand says here and I hope the day will come when most astrologers have enough passion and natural curiosity about their craft to want to respect and explore the history and traditional practices of it without getting labelled by that term ?traditionalist?.

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A couple of points with the following caveat: I haven't read the whole article, yet, and may be guilty or reading things in that aren't there.
"I do not share the contempt that many traditionalists feel for psychological astrology ..
.

That contempt is probably more important than Hand implies, unless it is based on pure blind prejudice. There are some in and out of astrology, that have little use for psychotherapy (which is not the same as having contempt for the entire field of psychology). Why then, would an astrologer with such an attitude (who me?) think very highly of "psychological" astrology? As Hand goes on to say:
My only criticism of it is that in the hands of some of it?s less competent practitioners it has been an extremely mushy sort of astrology where anything can be made to mean anything, depending on the emotional frame of mind of the client and the astrologer. The language of 20th century astrology as a language tends to be imprecise, vague, inarticulate and unclear. But the goals of 20th century astrology are absolutely commendable."
Amen, and, some would argue the same charge could be leveled at certain practitioners of psychotherapy in any and all of its various forms. If someone models his craft after something that is vague, mushy, and imprecise, it should not be surprising that the resulting product is vague, mushy, and imprecise. This is particularly true when:
[There is] one really tragic flaw in addition to its inarticulate language: its complete lack of a philosophical foundation rooted in any coherent philosophical or spiritual tradition of the world, except in the case of Jyotish."
I would argue this is more than a tragic flaw; it is a near fatal weakness. This is the reason for mushy, vague, and imprecise language. There is no foundation. The very reason the "three Roberts (Hand, Zoller, and Schmidt) ventured on the ambitious task of translating everything astrological they could find, was to establish a philosophical basis for astrology (as related by Robert Hand at a workshop given in Bucks County PA some ten or more years ago according to my "nearly infallible" memory). What they discovered is that the philosophical basis existed long before the three Roberts arrived. What was left was to report it. Perhaps it would be in the best interests of scholarly minded modern astrologers to embark on a similar project. It wouldn't be easy and it would require the best of the best to accomplish anything. It would go a long way towards eliminating a serious weakness.

This looks like a great article. Thanks, Kirk, for bringing our attention to it.

Tom

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There is nothing post-modern about this article or the views expressed in it. Indeed, since the author wastes no time demurring from the conventional view of the post-modern I wonder why he left it in the title. Any ideas?

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I?m not sure I understand your point, but isn?t your answer in his first few paragraphs? He isn?t referring to literary or cultural criticism with the term ?post-modern?. He is referring to the fact that astrology was disrupted after the 17th century, was rediscovered and suffered drastic changes (?modern? astrology), and now is going through changes following that modern rediscovery period. We are simply in the period after the emergence and dominance of ?modern? astrology.

?But what I refer to instead is a very real historical phenomenon in astrology, which is this: we have astrology up until about 1700, which had certain consistent patterns, ideas and principles and which had a more or less a continuous tradition from something like ? this date is extremely flexible ? the fifth century B.C.E. Then, in the 18th century we had a very long break...?
...

?The beginning of what I will call ? for lack of a better term ? post-modern astrology...?

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I read it as 'post-modern' 'astrology', not 'post-' 'modern astrology'. I also read it as lacking in means to bring about its desired end.

"Astrology has never been part of the modern world and cannot have in the same way a post-modern period. I would actually suggest that astrology is ideally suited to be both pre-modern and post-modern in the French philosophical sense." - Hand

Either these two statements are contradictory or the author has a poor grasp of what constitutes the nature of the post-modern apart from "a set of philosophical movements largely arising out of contemporary French philosophy featuring in particular the work of Jacques Derrida, post-structuralism and the philosopher and historian Michel Foucault." As for that definition of post-modern it confuses cause and effect. The philosophers did not come first, but emerged from the attempt to gain reflexivity of social trends and phenomena with obscure and recondite causes which could not be explained in previous ("modern") terms.

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This is one of those times when I'm happy to be more astrologist than astrologer.

"When I use a word", Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less".
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things".

For "words" try substituting "planets", "signs", "charts".

But why stop here? Let's have an astrology jamboree (aka Conference)and call it 'Astrology and the New World Order'. Gosh, it might even have more relevance than the question of Who stole the tarts?

8
Thanks to Kirk for spotting this.

Its a very helpful contribution to the debate of how astrology can proceed while still respecting its basic foundations.

Hand is undoutably right that modern astrology lacks a firm philosophical basis. Equally, his emphasis on astrology's incompatibility with the new dominant philosophy of scientific materialism strikes a chord.

Hand's solution seems to be for us to return to the early Greek philosophers: Pythagoras, Plato, Plotinus etc. While I agree that ALL astrologers should study these sources I wonder if trying to gain a unified philosophical position is really possible?

Even in the classical period there were many philosophical views about the nature of reality. Neo-Pythagoreans, Neo-Platonists, Stoics, Epicureans, sceptics. Moreover, over the centuries we have seen astrologers adopt various religious approaches. In the west Christianity and Judaism. In the middle East Islam and Judaism. In India Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists.

In todays multi-cultural world is it realistic to expect people to coalese around just one philosophy or system of ideas to explain astrology? Moreover, when Hand states modern astrology lacks a solid philosophical basis isnt that just a description of the pluralist modern world in general?
Indeed , what makes us so confident even those assuming a traditional perspective are any more consensual in this area?

Clearly its desirable for astrologers to think deeply and reflect on what their view of life is. However being an inherently individualist, cantankerous group as a whole why should we expect them to agree on anything?

While I have studied Greek philosophy and really like Plato's description of Socrates I am personally more connected to Buddhism. Robert Zollers's Lutheranism and John Frawley's Roman Catholic beliefs are well known. So beyond agreeing the world is not a meaningless, materialist jumble is there enough common ground to state more?

Nick Campion's forthcoming book ''What do Astrologers Believe? will demonstrate the widely differing range of beliefs amongst astrologers today. Indeed a sizeable proportion of astrological practitioners claim not to 'believe' in astrology at all according to Campion's research. Noone would seek to deny the importance of classical philosophy in gaining a better understanding for much of hellenistic and medieval astrology. However, whether you love it or loathe it I think philosophical diversity amongst astrologers is here to stay.

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I agree largely with what Mark has said. Certainly the ancients never came to any agreement about one particular philosophy. And many of the greatest philosophers had no time for astrology. However, I have a real problem with the idea of a ?philosophy of astrology.? Astrology is not meant to be an isolated discipline and never was meant to be like that. I can?t see that there can be any such thing as a philosophy of astrology. Astrology can fit into a philosophical framework but it cannot be the philosophical framework. To me, astrology is the practical application of a wider philosophy. Similarly, liver divination was the practical application of a very deep and vast philosophy. These practices are not the philosophy itself. They are simply a way of expressing the philosophy. When we draw an astrology chart it is so much more than which planet is doing what with whom (so to speak). There is thousands of years of philosophy behind it that is so much more than that. I don?t see that we can express that without taking into account all of the other disciplines that go to make up that vast philosophy. Astrology was always part of a multidisciplinary approach that saw a wide range of ideas coming together for greater understanding of the human condition.?The whole is greater than the sum of its parts,? to quote a well used phrase.
How can we ever truly understand traditional astrology if we know nothing about its history? Deb said something like this in her earlier post. But I think it needs to go further than this. It?s not good enough to know the history of astrology in isolation from the rest of history at that time. The same goes for philosophy. Astrology was always part of a larger philosophical framework, one of the most well known being Stoicism. And it beats me how anyone can call themselves a psychological astrologer without ever having studied psychology. I realise that it is unrealistic for most people to be able to take this course. Most people who come to astrology just want to do charts. Most have jobs and families and do not have the opportunities to do any more than this. In a perfect world we would all have the opportunity to do more. Of course, it is possible to be a successful astrologer without all of the other stuff. But I believe that just learning how to do charts is a bit like painting a picture using only green paint. It might be an okay picture but it would be a rather limited view.
Astrology?s problem isn?t that it doesn?t have a philosophy. Its problem is that it fails to recognise its very important part in the greater whole.

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I have a real problem with the idea of a ?philosophy of astrology.?
So do I, only my problem is specifically with the 'idea of philosophy', yet this is something that Hand's argument is relying on.

The notion that philosophy is proper only when it is a philosophy of X is a distinctly modern idea which conceives of philosophy as a "meta"-activity related to and parasitical on some other activity X. This is reinforced by implication in the way university philosophy courses are structured. Thus "philosophy of mathematics" explains and justifies the key concepts of maths, "philosophy of law" does the same for law, "philosophy of religion" ditto. And philosophy itself is seen as about language, words, mere trifles so to speak, (pejoratively: nit-picking, "pouring from the empty into the void"), the self-conscious designation for most of what is practiced under the label being 'linguistic analysis' or more briefly and obscurely 'analytical philosophy'. Medieval experts will of course know there was no such conception of philosophy then. One studied logic, dialectic, rhetoric. But even that was a specialisation of philosophy compared to philosophy conceived and practiced by Socrates.

This modern conception of philosophy is so flawed it doesn't take an expert (philosopher?) to pick it apart. Just to mention one of the more remote implications: that of 'professional expertise' - not just in philosophy, where an 'expert' in say ph. of art is not really welcome in say ph. of science when the argument gets to the bone - but in regard both to "professionalism" (i.e. necessary requirement to accept or at least conform to the prevalent "philosophy" [read: ideology] of the field), and in regard to "expertise", where those without the credentials of subscribing to a philosophy/ideology are not welcome to participate in its internal debates or contribute to its issues. Of course, this type of 'profession' is exactly what some astrologers seek, perhaps feeling that a 'philosophy of astrology' might assist in silencing their various critics, and as more and more people are exposed to astrology via the Internet and it becomes a lucrative business for some, to that extent the need for justification might be felt pressing.

Leaving aside the question of whether astrologers need justifying, and the (different question this) sceptics challenge whether astrology needs justifying, are there not separate questions as to whether a particular horoscope judgement is justified and whether a particular astrological technique is justified? These are analogues of issues in science, e.g. whether a particular conclusion is justified from the experimental evidence (e.g. whether the AIDS virus is mutating rapidly), and whether a particular theory is justified (e.g. whether gravity adequately explains all cases of red shift). Hand seems to consider the latter two questions quite irrelevant to his pursuit of supplying an answer to the first. In doing so he would appear to be far more post-modern than he himself realizes!