Astrological Ages ~ Are We there Yet?

The complex subject of astrological Ages came up in an unrelated comments conversation here last week. This topic is a constant source of fascination, first and foremost is the question: has the much anticipated Age of Aquarius already begun - or will humanity wait a century or more for its arrival?

I'm copying, below, my comment conversation with Gian Paul, an astrologer who lives in Brazil, sometimes writes posts at Astrology Mundo. Since making my own "off-top-of-head" comments I've refreshed my rusty information on the topic. I've reminded myself that the Ages are calculated, not with direct reference to our tropical zodiac, but by the points at which the Sun enters each astronomical constellation at the vernal equinox, as equinoxes precess. Because the constellations are of varying size, Ages are of varying lengths.

There's good information at astrologer Robert FitzGerald's website "Signs of the Times" - but good as it is, the author still states that "this can use more research by others to verify these conclusions".


The spanner in the astrological works to my mind, though, is that delineation of constellations was a manmade construct. Humans designated the shape, extent and patterns of constellations, who's to say the delineations we use are the correct way to carve up the sky?




All becomes murky. The best we can do, with any certainty, is relate events to astrological symbolism and use that as guide. What we come up with may not be astronomically accurate - but who's to say that astronomy has the last word on this particular topic?

A copy of our recent comment conversation, very lightly edited:

Twilight:

I'd like the age of Aquarius to be coming in quickly. I'm not quite sure what to think on this though, and have tended to accept Robert Hand's view on it - that there's a long way to go yet.

But....and it's a big but...who's to say when the "start date" happened? If that's wrong, then everything is wrong. We don't have a secure "start date" (start date for life on Earth - or conscious life on Earth) as far as I can tell.

Logically I think we still seem to be in a belligerent Age - Taurus, Aries? Astrologers think not. They see Pisces as representing the Age of Christianity and organised religion, ruled by Jupiter. But religion is not all that has gone on these 2000 years. It's not even the important part of what has gone on - although it has been the cause of much mayhem.

So I really don't know - and wonder at times if the whole "Age of...." thing isn't just so much Taurean Excrement aka BS.
;-)


Gian paul:

With around 2000 years, give or take, per sign, one could imagine that some "Ages" may be shorter and others a bit longer. There also might be some overlaps.

In that sense, I wonder if the sacred cows in India and what goes with them, are not remnants of the Age of Taurus. And the (often religious) bellicose events during the Christian Era, possibly an overlap from the Age of Aries - eye for eye and tooth for tooth...

The Christian Era, Pisces, has probably the most precise starting date we know, although there is historical doubt about the actual date of birth of Jesus. Ancient Roman sources (Plinius), diverge by about 5 to 30 years.

And, in case the Era of Aquarius already started, we now assist to the probably normal retro-fighting typical at the end of any civilization (except for the Mayas).

Here now some elements I believe are "Aquarian Age stuff":

* Aviation, very rapid transports
* Communications
* Science, bent towards the atomic,
nano, cyber etc.
* Beliefs, your's Twilight, your friends, me and who participates in this and similar blogs.
* Politics: democracy is being forced open to forces beyond human "manipulation". One man one vote does not function anymore. That started with Hitler/Goebbels, a government democratically elected. "The people" today, all over the world, increasingly know that politicians & Co. manipulate, lie and worse. And The People respond, via the media, arts, even violence and protests, riots (G - 20)...

For whom watches the stars and believes (knows) that they also preside over political events, it's obvious "who governs". How much time it will take for this perception to spread, if it has to do so (?), is open to speculation. One literally would have to look into the "speculum", i.e. the cristal ball.

Living in Brazil (at the frontier of rural Brazil and Metropolis São Paulo, in what remains of the Rain Forest), I can attest that this country is quite Aquarian. One can see that a new wind (air) is blowing, here at least.

The frontiers may be still blurred, but personally I would not be surprised to discover things accelerating, even precipitously. So lets keep watching!
July 03, 2010.

Twilight:

Yes, some overlap of Ages sounds right to me.

Although we know roughly when Christ was born and count that as the dawn of the Age of Pisces, it's the question of how they knew when the whole thing started, and the point from which they started counting that keeps niggling away at my mind. The start of these cycles must have had to be an arbitarily chosen point of when life began on Earth. Which life, which stage though? And whereas the Ages are calculated by the precession of the equinoxes, nobody can be absolutely sure where it would have been correct to have begun counting.

I hope I've written that clearly enough - it's hard to explain.

Also - another point, our solar system is part of a wider universe, which may also be part of a still wider set of universes, for all we know. Using astrology's principles, there'd be alignments and aspects made to our Ages from others which could modify meaning - the macrocosm of the microcosm?

I do agree that what has gone on on Earth since the Industrial Revolution seems to be classic Aquarius/Uranus stuff....invention, discovery etc.
Then again, Saturn was Aquarius's traditional ruler, and sure enough there's been a lot of Saturnian stuff going on too.

The more I ponder on this, the more doubtful I become about the value of any astronomically calculated Age. Observation of history and of events has to be our best means of calculation. We have to keep in mind, too, that Ages do not exclusively reflect what goes on in the USA or Europe - but, in varying ways, across the entire planet.


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