Astrology

ASTROLOGIA. - It is the art of knowing the future by observing the appearance, position, and influences of the planets and constellations.

1. HISTORY

Such an art was the heritage, to varying degrees, of all peoples, civilized and primitive, and was, from the very

origins, was closely connected with astronomy, so much so that in the Mediterranean world a distinction began to be made only from the 1st century A.D., and it was only in the 14th century that judicial astrology—aimed at formulating judgments on people's characters, predetermining the fate of an enterprise or a human being, or interpreting the arcane meaning of natural or extraordinary events—clearly differentiated itself from that which simply had as its object the study of the vault of heaven.

Among primitive peoples, astrology assumes particular importance, even without rising to the level of superior knowledge, due to the lack of the knowledge necessary for the pseudo-scientific cartography of judicial astrology. In fact, the course of the stars is often closely connected with agricultural practices and major hunting or fishing expeditions, which are extremely important for the life of the tribe. Thus, while the vault of heaven becomes the object of constant observation, there is a tendency to draw prognoses and omens from the sky, and peculiar powers to control human events are attributed to those heavenly natures that are believed to be endowed with powers similar to those of humans. The Malays, for example, even have an elaborate system in which the year is divided into propitious and unfavorable periods, depending on the rotation of the days, each connected with deities, planets, and colors; and all savages, in general, are inclined to believe that a child born under the sign of Leo possesses leonine qualities. A system of astrology was undoubtedly in vogue among the primitives of America as well: the Mexican codices include the Tonalamanti, a book of fortunate and unfortunate days, and there is clear evidence of the existence of a priestly class dedicated to divination through the observation of the stars in Mexico, Guatemala, and Peru.

However, it is in the Mediterranean world that astrology, united with astronomy and religion, had its birth: and precisely, according to the assertion of Diodorus Siculus, in the intermediate valley of the Tigris and the Euphrates, where "an incomparable atmospheric purity allows one to see the stars closer and clearer than is possible elsewhere." Diodorus Siculus's report

received singular confirmation in the second half of the last century, when a series of excavations on the soil of ancient Nineveh brought to light the library of King Ashurbanipal (c. 668-626 B.C.), composed of about 4000 tablets written in cuneiform characters, containing original texts, astrological predictions, and exegetical inscriptions. The doctrinal part of this library refers back to a general work entitled, from the initial words of its first period, "When Anu, Enlil...", and whose author, certainly dating back beyond the 7th century, remains unknown to us. On the other hand, from the preserved astrological predictions, we are informed of the astronomical knowledge of the Babylonians-Assyrians, and of the objects towards which their investigation was directed. In addition to the 7 planets, 270 stars and constellations were known (there is a single vocabulary word in the texts to indicate both), Zodiac (v.) (from the Epic of Gilgamesh until the Seleucid and Arsacid era numbering 11, inasmuch as the Scales were considered the gills of the Scorpion), and comets. Such a vast and precise patrimony of astronomical knowledge gave great impetus to the art of predicting the future from the course of the stars, and from the observation of celestial and atmospheric phenomena. And the observations were reduced to a system by the Babylonian priests, who formed a hereditary class whose progenitor was Eumedmanki, the seventh of the kings before the flood according to the catalog of Berossus, who, in turn, was said to have been initiated into the divinatory art by the gods Šamaš and Adad. These priests, who had the precise task of watching the sky from the observatories of Nineveh and Borsippa, believed their divinities were personified in the planets, and followed the occurrence of solar and lunar eclipses. The predictions therefore had an official character (concerning mostly the king and the destiny of the country) and were in close relationship with religion. The method of astrological investigation included the observation of the intensity and color of the light of the star or planet at dawn and dusk, of the connection with other planets, etc. While these data concerned the moon, the sun, and Mars, for the remaining ones consideration was given above all to their conjunction with other planets; comets, meteors, winds, and storms were also placed in dependence on the planets and stars. The extraordinary simplicity of the language in which the astrological predictions are expressed has led some to think that in these cases the Babylonian is the translation of analogous predictions in the Sumerian language (thus of a non-Semitic population), which would trace the origin of astrology right back to the threshold of the 3rd millennium B.C.

Starting from the 6th and 5th centuries B.C., astrology began to spread from Babylon: first in Persia (from frequent allusions in Sasanian literature it is gathered that astrologers made calculations concerning the propitious or unfavorable conjunction of the stars), then in India (whence it passed throughout all Asia, especially after the relations between India and Greece, which had by now matured in this science, gave a more scientific character to the knowledge), and finally in Greece.

Prior to the Hellenistic age, Greek culture does not seem to have concerned itself willingly with astrology. In the Minoan-Mycenaean age, the symbols of the sun, moon, and stars do not appear frequently, at least from the results of archaeological research. In epic poetry, only Venus seems to be known from Homer's frequent citations. With the beginning of Ionian speculation, the teachings—direct or indirect—of the East begin to bear fruit: Thales and his successors knew

the system to predetermine, it seems, a solar eclipse, the number of planets, the name and location of the principal constellations, the division of the day into 12 hours, etc. But this was knowledge in a primitive state, and entirely devoid, as it would be for the entire classical period, of any attribution of religious significance to the stars. (Only later, probably from the Pythagoreans, was each planet consecrated to a specific divinity). In this period, however, the name of a. begins to appear. The school of Pythagoras, and the master himself, are under the influence of oriental fatalism: here for the first time appears the idea of the harmony of the cosmos, and consequently the possibility of favorably considering the idea of an influence of heaven upon earth. This is not yet a. in the strict sense of the term, but it is the beginning of the era in which oriental religions and astrological beliefs will arrive in Greece with increasing distinctness. It is in the Hellenistic age that these teachings conquer the Greeks. A short time earlier, the situation was still such that Eudoxus, a friend of Plato, denied all knowledge to the "Chaldeans," the astronomers of the Euphrates, although he himself was acquainted with Babylonian meteorology and a. In Theophrastus, instead, a disciple of Aristotle, we discover a profound admiration for the science of the Chaldeans. A. became known little by little through the Babyloniaca of Berossus, the priest of Bêl in Babylon. Having founded a school of a. in Cos to which famous disciples flocked, he wrote a work dedicated to Antiochus I of Syria, in which for the first time he comprehensively presented to the Greeks the history of the gods and of Babylonian creation, together with their "philosophy," that is, astronomy and a., which he indicated as the "wisdom of Bêl." Some similar appearance followed this first teaching, and the translation of small Babylonian texts aided the work of Berossus. "The seed fell into fertile soil: a., immobilized for long centuries in a hieratic tradition, begins to submit to discussion, troubled and transformed by the inventive genius of the Hellenes, and at this epoch, the beginning of the 3rd century, from an oriental religion it becomes a science." A science that finds its support in the philosophical doctrine of cosmic unity, whereby the universe, formed of four or five elements (water, earth, air, fire, ether) is subjected to a continuous exchange of actions and reactions among them. In this system a. is united with other pseudo-sciences, alchemy, astrological medicine, magic, etc., that is, with those occult sciences (v. occultismo) that would hold the field through the entire Renaissance. Man as well, compared to a small world (μικρός κόσμος), is the theater of this process of exchanges, and in some texts every part of the human body is under the influence of an element or a planet or a celestial body. In this way a mythology is created that is even more fantastic than that of tradition. Natural laws, subjected to such influences, are no longer intelligible through reason, but require a particular occult science of the whole, not devoid of religious coloring. No longer a distinction, then, between science and religion, where the unity of the whole is not an order of formulas or a system of laws, but a unity of concrete things.

Violent polemics against a. were not lacking: Carneades exerted all his dialectical arts to refute its possibility; Panaetius, instead, broke with his master on this point and granted his favor to the new science; and Posidonius of Apamea even more so. And the disputes could be said to have closed when, around the middle of the 2nd century A.D., the Tetrabiblos or Quadripartitus appeared, the famous work of Ptolemy, a product of the progress of a. and mathematics in the school of Alexandria.

In Rome a. appears at the time of the Punic Wars. It is brought by oriental slaves, for the most part Greeks. The Roman Senate, a jealous custodian of civic traditions, opposed a., as it did all foreign cults that, beginning from this epoch, initiate their infiltration into Italy. Adversaries of a. were in a special way the haruspices, and numerous are the edicts that forbid the practice of the Chaldean art. Nevertheless a. makes its way: and at the end of the Hellenistic age the legions of Caesar carry everywhere the symbol of the Bull, the zodiacal sign of Venus, the ancestress of the "gens Iulia"; while Augustus allows his horoscope to be published and coins to be minted with the star of his birth, Capricorn. The triumph of a. can be said to be complete when oriental cults, especially Mithraism, triumph over the ancient Roman religion. Marcus Manilius, in the age of Augustus and Tiberius, wrote the poem Astronomicon; astrologers are found alongside emperors in the capacity of consultants, most famous of all Balbillus, the astrologer of Nero, who attempted to reconcile a. and haruspicy. Cicero, Tacitus, Pliny the Elder sided against a., which instead found favor with Seneca.

Christianity strenuously opposed the Chaldean art, which it fought for moral reasons, as a demonic art.

Moreover, it is obvious that a. degenerates into a form of superstition when from the position and movement of the stars one wishes to deduce with certainty the occurrence or the course of events that are the product of the free wills of men; it ceases to be such, however, when one limits oneself to formulating conjectures, taking into account the undeniable influence that the stars have upon the earth, upon living organisms and therefore, by reflection, upon the human soul (v. OROSCOPO; ZODIACO).

A good soil in which to vegetate was found by a. in Islam: Muhammad first taught the absolute dependence of God and the complete slavery of man, thereby giving rise to an unlimited determinism; not only that, but the stellar cult of ancient Arab paganism made its consequences felt. The abundance of astrological writings in Arabic is prodigious. Theophilus of Edessa, astrologer at the court of the caliph al-Mahdi, affirms that a. is the queen of sciences, whereas Avicenna rails against its futility. The positive and enlightened tendency of Arab philosophy, which links up with Averroes, was favorably disposed toward it, instead. In Italy we find the Studium of Padua with Pietro d'Abano and Cecco d'Ascoli entirely imbued with astrological doctrines, and at the court of Frederick II Michael Scot professes a mitigated astrologism according to which the stars are the signs of events. Meanwhile, still in the 13th century, Guido Bonatti is famous who, in the service of Guido da Montefeltro, climbs the tower of S. Mercuriale in Forlì before any military action, to consult the stars.

Humanism and the Renaissance held a. in great esteem. "No wonder when one thinks that a. found its place in the ideal, then professed, of a human nature that lives in full harmony and in active exchange of influences with the rest of nature; everywhere in the world, energies analogous to those of man are recognized. The human spirit operates with admirable efficacy and purposefulness on its own body; thus it acts upon others, and these, animated in turn among themselves, and the soul of the world upon all. The heavens, therefore, act upon the earth. And this philosophical theme unfolds in a moment of passivity and heteronomy which finds its expression precisely in a., which makes human life determined by the stars, a slave to conjunctions and oppositions that are beyond its power." From this moment on, a. split into natural (astronomy) and judicial. All universities had a professor of a. However, opponents were not lacking: Pico della Mirandola, for example, with his Disputaciones in astrologiam, drawing partly on the authority of the Church Fathers and partly on experience, rails against a. which "corrupts philosophy, adulterates medicine, infirmsthere, produces and spreads superstition, favors idolatry, makes men miserable, anxious, fatalistic, and from free makes them servants and unhappy in all their actions." And other adversaries of a. are found in Girolamo Savonarola (Adversus astrologos) and Geminiano Montanari (L'A. convinta di falso). Nonetheless, Pope Julius II commissioned astrologers to choose the day for his coronation, Paul III to determine the best hours for each consistory, and Leo X even appointed a professor of a. at the Sapienza.

But these were the last flickers. With the development of the experimental method, a. began to lose ground, and by the early 1700s it was completely neglected. A revival was attempted by occultists at the end of the 18th century, but precisely in this era the discovery of two new planets, Uranus and Neptune, upset all astrological postulates, marking its end.

The main forms of a. cultivated by the Greeks in the 1st century, the very same ones then, not without some change, flourishing until the late Renaissance, were, according to Nallino, the "system of interrogations," to satisfy the needs of daily life; the "system of elections," to determine the propitious moment for the beginning of an action; and the "system of nativity," aimed at knowing the future events of persons, peoples, cities, etc., by studying the influence of the constellation and planet that at a particular moment was on the eastern horizon, according to the indications of the astrolabe. Such an operation was called "ascendant" or, in Greek, "horoscope" (v.). In casting the horoscope, one had to carefully observe zodiac (v.) the planets appeared, since their influence varied from sign to sign, and which constellations and planets then dominated the sky.

2. A. AND THE CHURCH. - To form a correct judgment on a. and understand the reasons for the Church's intervention and the condemnations issued by it, one must distinguish two kinds of a., natural and judicial. Both have as their object the forecasting and prediction of future events; but, while natural a. is based on research and the logical and scientific conquest of the physical laws of the universe, judicial a. pretends to determine the influences of celestial bodies on terrestrial beings and especially on man, formulating, by means of certain rules, conclusions on the various fates of individuals and peoples by simply considering and calculating the configuration and position

position of the planets at certain specific hours of their lives (e.g., birth, marriage, commerce, wars, etc.). It thus enters the field of morals and religion, insofar as it teaches that this influence is a determining and decisive element on the history, life, actions, and therefore also on the very economy of the eternal salvation of men. "Astrologers," testifies St. Augustine, "claim that there is in heaven the inevitable cause of sin: it is Venus or Saturn or Mars that made us perform this or that action, wishing thus that man—who is flesh and blood and verminous pride—should be without blame, and that the blame should fall upon Him who created and rules heaven and earth" (Confess., IV, cap. 3).

Now the Church, while it has never had nor will ever have anything to say against natural astrology, because true science will never find anything in its researches that is against religion, could not fail to intervene, and even energetically, against judicial astrology, because the latter ended up denying on the one hand the free will of man and on the other the providence and saving will of God, casting souls at the mercy of a desperate fatality.

Even the pagans, who, given the state of scientific knowledge at the time, hardly knew or were able in this field to draw the limits between true science and superstitious imposture and therefore called astrologers indiscriminately by various equivalent names—astronomers, astrologers, mathematicians, planetarians, genethliacs, Chaldeans, Babylonians—had words of disdain and contempt for the cults of judicial astrology. "Mathematici genus hominum potentibus infidum, sperantibus fallax" (Tacitus, Hist., I, 22). And Cicero: "Contemnamus Babylonios et eos qui ex Caucaso, coeli signa servantes, numeris et motibus stellarum cursus persequuntur ; condemnemus hos aut stultitiae, aut vanitatis, aut imprudentiae" (De divin., I, 19). In the same sense, but for higher motives, Holy Scripture: "Do not turn to sorcerers, nor consult diviners, so as not to become contaminated by contact with them: I am the Lord, your God" (Lev. 19, 31). "Do not be afraid of the signs of heaven, which the Gentiles fear, because the rites of the peoples are vain" (Jer. 10, 2; cf. also Is. 47, 13).

When Christianity appeared and the practices of judicial astrology tenaciously persisted, ecclesiastical tradition shows us the Fathers and councils always hostile to these kinds of superstition. Suffice it to cite St. Augustine: "In my deeds, in my sins, I do not accuse fortune, I do not say: 'destiny made me do this', I do not say: 'Venus made me an adulterer, Mars made me a thief, Saturn made me a miser'" (Enarrat. in psalmos, 40, 6). "This man [the converted astrologer], seduced by the enemy while he was a believer, was for a long time an astrologer, seduced and seducer, deceived and deceiver. He enticed, he deceived, he uttered many falsehoods against God, who would have given men the power to do good and not to do evil. Adultery is not committed by my personal will, but by Venus; homicide is not accomplished by personal will, but rather by Mars; the righteous is not made by God, but by Jupiter; and many other sacrilegious absurdities. From how many Christians did he take away money! How many bought lies from him!" (ibid., 61, 23). One may add the anathemas launched by the Council of Toledo in 447 (Denz-U, n. 35) and by the Council of Braga in 561 (ibid., n. 239); the condemnation by Sixtus V with the bull Caeli et terrae Creator of Jan. 5, 1566, retaken and expanded by the bull of Urban VIII Inscrutabilis iudiciorum of March 31, 1621.

The condemnations did not change the state of affairs; the disputes at the University of Paris, which in 1210 and 1215 prohibited Aristotle's Metaphysics, which was being interpreted in favor of astrology (H. Denifle, op. cit. in bibl., pp. 70-79), and the subsequent condemnation, in 1277, of several propositions favorable to the same doctrine (ibid., p. 543 ff.), far from extinguishing it, kept the controversy all the more alive; and the field of professors continued to be divided into two opposing camps. It must be noted, however, that some of them, although favorable to astrology, nevertheless remained on this side of the line that divided them from superstition.

St. Thomas knew how to follow a more moderate and almost divinatory middle path, which would later also be followed by Dante. His doctrine, set forth in the Sum. Theol. (1ᵃ, q. 65, a. 4; q. 70, aa. 1, 3; q. 115, aa. 3, 4, 6; 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 9, a. 5), in the Summa contra gentes (III, qq. 84-85), in the De sortibus and in the De iudiciis astrorum, can be gathered into these points: 1) the influence of heavenly bodies is exercised upon the intellect and the will only indirectly and mediately, through the varied participation offered to that influence by the lower powers (sensibility), which are bound to the corporeal organism; 2) however, the intellect undergoes the backlash of every kind of turmoil produced in the imagination, in the instinct, in the sensitive memory, whereas the will always retains the power to resist and oppose passions; 3) the wise man knows how to master even the stars; 4) inclinations, having their seat in the organism, can under the influence of the stars in turn influence the character of individuals and make someone more prone, for example, to anger or concupiscence; 5) the influence of the stars varies with the varying dispositions of the subject who undergoes it; 6) it could be that when astrologers divine the future, this does not happen by pure chance, but because they have obeyed a sort of subconscious instinct, "instinctu quodam occultissimo, quem nescientes humanae mentes patiuntur" (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 9, a. 5, ad 3); 7) in all cases, it must always be maintained that the will remains free to follow or not the influence of the stars in its actions. Man therefore maintains his responsibility intact.

This is the philosophical and theological doctrine to be held so as not to fall into the heresy that denies freedom and Providence. As for the theoretical part, however, that is, the reality of the influence of the celestial spheres, it must be said that, as it stands, it is no longer admitted by science. Yet it always remains true that a relation exists between the material part of our being and the environment in which we live, and that the stars exercise upon us, by means of their mass, their temperature, or their radiations, a certain action more or less defined or definable. With this we are far removed from the pretentious body of doctrine of the astrologers, who wish to establish precise relations between celestial phenomena and all the actions of our life.

Regarding medicine, on the other hand, the Church was much broader in its concessions, permitting the practice of astrology regarding medicine as well as navigation. This we can gather from the Summa caietona (one of those compendiums used for the practice of the confessional, Venice 1572, but reprinted several times): "... de astrorum autem iudiciis circa corporales effectus (puta sanitatis vel infirmitatis, fertilitatis vel sterilitatis, pluviae vel siccitatis) nulla est quaestio, quia haec absque peccato fiunt; quoniam effectus quaeruntur et reducuntur in suas causas naturales" (p. 25).

Some have wanted to see in the journey of the Magi, provoked by a star, a confirmation of astrology. But this cannot be; both because in astrology a particular star is never given a special significance regarding human destiny, but certain stars and constellations are considered in their reciprocal positions, and above all because the star of the Magi moved with them, disappeared and reappeared, and stopped over the dwelling of Jesus.

Celestino Testore

3. A. NELL'ARTE SACRA. - Pure avversa, come già veduto, a ogni genere di superstizione, e in particolare al fatalismo inerente alla dottrina astrologica, la Chiesa non impedì che gli elementi del mondo astrale completassero lo specchio della vita umana, ed apparissero nelle decorazioni di edifici sacri. Già le miniature del Cronografo del 354 avevano presentato allegorie astrologiche d'ispirazione classica, sempre di nuovo riprodotte, con lievi varianti, nei secoli successivi. L'arte del medioevo arrivò poi sia a rappresentare l'a. personificata, in forma di donna riccamente vestita, con in mano strumenti astronomici (astrolabio, compasso), lo sguardo fisso in alto, sola o nel gruppo delle Arti liberali, sia a comporre complessi di figurazioni simboliche, come l'anno, circondato dai mesi, ai quali corrispondono i segni dello zodiaco, e dai giorni, ai quali corrispondono i pianeti. Documenti celebri di queste composizioni sono il pavimento a musaico del duomo di Aosta, gli affreschi del battistero di Parma e della cattedrale di Lucca, quelli della chiesa degli Eremitani a Padova, della cappella del Sacramento nel tempio malatestiano di Rimini, della Sala del Cambio nel Palazzo Pubblico di Perugia, ecc.

Inoltre, dopo che l'ingresso nell'arte sacra delle immagini dei pianeti, cioè delle personificazioni stesse di divinità pagane che determinano il destino dei mortali, venne facilitato dalla posizione assunta da s. Tommaso d'Aquino nei riguardi dell'a. Lo spirito enciclopedico medievale seppe addirittura coordinare, nei rilievi al campanile di Giotto a Firenze, i sette pianeti non solo con le sette arti liberali e meccaniche, ma anche con le sette virtù ed i sette Sacramenti; non molto diversamente fece l'autore dell'affresco che rappresenta il Trionfo di s. Tommaso nella Cappella degli Spagnoli a Firenze. L'apice dello sviluppo di questo tema iconografico viene toccato dai musaici nella cupola della cappella Chigi in S. Maria del Popolo a Roma, raffiguranti, su disegni di Raffaello, Dio creatore del firmamento, in mezzo ai simboli dei pianeti, ciascuno dei quali guidato dall'angelo del suo ordine motore.

4. L'A. NELLA MEDICINA PASTORALE. - Dopo che rapporti fra medicina e a. si erano stabiliti fin dai tempi di Galeno, che volle formulare leggi regolanti i misteriosi rapporti tra rivoluzioni d'un astro e determinate malattie, questa scienza entrò francamente nel campo astrologico nel medioevo, dopo che l'influsso arabo improntò di sé il pensiero occidentale. Alle varie parti del corpo si riconobbero corrispondenti e patroni i segni zodiacali; ai pianeti, caratteri umorali e qualità benigne o maligne, che vennero attribuite anche alle

various reciprocal positions assumed by them; the moon held the office of transmitting astral influences from heaven to earth. With these elements, complicated by many other secondary ones, it was believed legitimate to formulate diagnoses and prognoses, and to prescribe treatments, based solely on the hour in which the illness had begun, in order to know the state of the heavens at that instant and draw its horoscope, as for births and other events. Medical astrology undoubtedly proved detrimental to the progress of medicine, although one must recognize in it a dim intuition of the effects that cosmic and perhaps even astral waves and influences have upon human health; down to the seventeenth century it enjoyed a flourishing life and an ephemeral revivescence with mesmerism. - Vedi Tav. XXII.