Is Your Star Sign Out of Date? Astrology in the 21st Century

A recent article in the New York Times explained with meticulous simplicity why your Zodiac sign is 2,000 years out of date.  Based in astronomy and using excellent info-graphics, it explained how the ‘Earth’s Wobble’ changes how we view the constellations from Earth, and how over the last 2,000 years the constellations have ‘shifted’ from our perspective.

The Earth’s wobble is also understood as the precession of the Equinox.  In simple terms, as the Earth rotates, it wobbles on its axis. This wobble, draws an imaginary circle in the sky which means the North Pole moves on a rotational plane which takes 26,000 years to complete.  This means that from our view on Earth, the constellations have moved over the last 2,000 years.  So, if you were born 2,000 years BC, you may have been an Aries, but the same date today would perhaps make you a Pisces – two very different Astrological signs.

Western Astrologers are aware of the discrepancy of the constellations and the Astrological signs, but in many ways it doesn’t matter.  Western Astrology, despite its Astronomical discrepancies remains valid

The position of the planets and our perception of the constellations are actually not influencing or ‘causing’ anything.   The constellations are nothing more than a back-drop to a complex symbolic language used to describe the human condition.

Throughout the centuries, Astrologers were recognised and respected scientists making discoveries, such as Copernicus, who discovered that the Earth rotated around the sun, sparking a scientific revolution.

Today Astrology is no longer a science but is a language based in symbolism and metaphor.  Just as any language evolves, so does Astrology.

An astrological birth chart is a symbolic representation of the archetypal patterns at play in an individuals psyche.  It is also a representation or ‘mirror’ of the collective psyche.  Carl Jung’s work was largely based in this theory.  He claimed that Astrology represents the “sum of all psychological knowledge”.

Jung explored what he called ‘inherited archetypes’ in the unconscious and symbols that can be found across different cultures and generations that seem to influence our thoughts and behaviour.  He developed these theories through the individual subconscious and the collective unconscious. 

It seems that our study of the cosmos and the myths they carry profoundly influence our perception, motivation and behaviour. 

Jung calculated birth charts for his clients and used Astrology as a portal to the individual psyche.  He thought that the position of the planets at birth represented archetypal patterns that were manifesting in reality at that moment. He also saw the symbolism and myth bound up with the movement of the planets as a mirror of the collective unconscious which gave us profound insight into the human condition.  Astrology, therefore, provides an underlying structure for understanding patterns and behaviours.

‘As above, so below, as within, so without’.  The Cosmos is reflecting back to us our inner state, and our inner state is a reflection of the cosmos.

Astrology is a tool for understanding, not just the world but our existence. 

Astrologers are ascribing archetypes and symbolic meaning to individuals and to moments in time.  In some ways, it defies scientific, rational thinking and therefore, the constellations become a minor detail. The planets themselves are not influencing the individual or anything else.   They are a reflection of the psychological and archetypal energy that we are ascribing.   

Indeed, shared myths and themes appear across different systems for interpreting the stars, and despite these different systems (Tropical, Chinese, Vedic, Sidereal) they all broadly align in their interpretations. (Sidereal Astrology, in fact accounts for the precession of the Equinox and therefore one is likely to be a different sign in the Sidereal system than the Tropical system.)

A good astrologer understands psychological and archetypal symbolism and therefore uses a planetary placement in a birth chart simply as a marker. 

Indeed, Astrology is seeking to describe the energy of the Universe, and this can be said to have little to do with the constellations.  The energy of the Cosmos is vast, complex and not understood, but comes from a much greater source than the planets in our solar system. It is not understood – not by astrologers, astronomers or scientists.  

Contemporary astrologers endeavour to describe this energy and the energy they feel, often using intuition and an inner ‘knowing’.   They seek to explain this using both Astrological techniques for interpreting a birth chart and the rich, symbolic Astrological language as a way to interpret complex, abstract concepts.

Astrology may no longer be at the cutting edge of science, but it is a tried and tested art form. We cannot explain how it works, and neither can science.

Astrology has been ‘disproved’ many times over centuries, and yet we are still able to extrapolate highly relevant and accurate. information.  It may be that trying to disprove it on rational, scientific grounds is not the way to go.  Maybe the position of the planets and the constellations do not matter.  Astrology is simply the art of interpreting the mysteries and the energy of the Universe.  Until science can explain why astrology can make spookily accurate explanations, then the symbolic language of Astrology will probably endure.

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