Astrology Essay -- essays research papers

The primary astrological assumptions are not hard to grasp. For if astronomy is the study of the movements of the heavenly bodies, indeed astrology is the study of the effects of those movements. The astronomers of the ancient domain assumed a division of the universe whereby the superior, immutable bodies of the celestial worlds ruled over the cislunar or sublunary sphere, where all was mortality and change. It was assumed that the stars had special qualities and influences which were communicable downwards upon the passive earth, and which varied in their effect, according to the changing family relationship of the heavenly bodies to each other. They were led to postulate a single placement in which the seven moving stars or planet shifted their position in relation to the earth and each other, against a fixed backcloth of the 12 signs of the zodiac.      There was nothing obscure about these general assumptions. At the rootage of the sixteenth century astrological doctrines were part of the educated mans picture of the universe and its workings. It was generally accepted that the iv elements constituting the sublunary neck of the woods (earth, air, fire & water) were kept in their state of ceaseless work shift by the movement of the heavenly bodies. The various planets transmitted different quantities of the foursome physiological qualities of heat and cold, dryness and moisture. Therefore astrology was less a separate discipline than an aspect of a generally accepted world picture. During the Renaissance, even to a greater extent than in the Middle Ages, astrology pervaded all aspects of the intelligent framework in which men were educated. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries there were four main branches of judicial astrology. First, there were the general predictions based on the future day movements of the ravens and taking note of such impending events as eclipses of the sun and moon. These forecasts tie in to the weather, the state of the crops, mortality and epidemics, politics and war. They indicated the fate of society as a whole but not that of particular individuals. Secondly, there were nativities, maps of the sky at the moment of a persons births either made on the spot at the request of the infants parents or reconstructed for individuals of stature, those who could supply the lucubrate of their time of births. The horoscope at b... ...nglish churches and may put on helped to shape popular phantasmal attitudes. Pictures of the sun and moon were found in several Suffolk churches and the churches themselves were built to expect the rising sun.How far such practices affected mens basic beliefs it is difficult to tell. Anne Bodenham, who was executed for witchcraft at Salisbury in 1653 was a former servant of the astrologer John Lambe, she had long practiced as a cunning woman, claiming to be able to do more than surpass Lilly or anyone whatsoever. When she dealt with a maid who had convulsive fits, she is reported to have proposed a frankly pagan remedy -prayer to Jupiter, the best and fortunatest of all the planets. Even more striking is another Wiltshire case, which came before the quarter sessions in 1656. A Lacock weaver, Wllllam stick by was charged with atheism and blasphemy, and in particular with publicly affirming that there was no God or power ruling above the planets, no deliveryman but the sun that shines upon us and that the twelve patriarchs were the twelve houses. "This was astrology run erroneous and it is tantalizing not to know how many of William Bonds contemporaries may have held similar views.