This is Not going to be about Astrology for its Own Sake

It is going to be about a meeting I had with one who was interested in that stuff, and, well, he got the URL for this blog, so, why not here. It will have a few applications on Epistomology of Genesis.

He asked me about my sign, I told him that I was solar sign Virgo and ascendant Pisces. How do I know the ascendant? Did I go to an astrologer? No, I was born in Vienna, at 18:15, close on autumnal equinox. Vienna is close to 15° E and therefore the timezone time pretty well matches solar time. If sunset may have been like 18:15 a few weeks before autumnal equinox, sunrise would have been 5:45.

What is the relevance of this? Well, when Sun rose (this is so everywhere, all round the year) the Solar sign and the ascendant coincided, Virgo was ascending. However, we are speaking of when Virgo was at 18:00, meaning Pisces was ascending:

Pisces	06	Virgo	18
Aquarius	08	Leo	20
Capricorn	10	Cancer	22
Sagittarius	12	Gemini	00
Scorpio	14	Taurus	02
Libra	16	Aries	04

Since, at 18:15, whatever was at (solar angle of) 5:45 would be ascending, and Pisces extends one hour back and fourth from 06, i e 05 - 07. So, solar angle of 5:45 when Sun was at solar angle of 18:15 along with Virgo falls within the ball park of Pisces.

Now, it so happens, he was basically testing me, so, he wanted to know how much I knew of ascendants, funny enough me using that word if I have never studied astrology and am only sure of when two of the signs are (Virgo and Pisces). He said he was Aquarius and had Virgo in ascendant, and he said he was born 22:30. I didn't believe him, now I do, after checking.

Virgo	06	07	08	09		Pisces	18	19	20	21
Leo	08	09	10	11		Aquarius	20	21	22	23
Cancer	10	11	12	13		Capricorn	22	23	00	01
Gemini	12	13	14	15		Sagittarius	00	01	02	03
Taurus	14	15	16	17		Scorpio	02	03	04	05
Aries	16	17	18	19		Libra	04	05	06	07

As he said he was born with Virgo in ascendant, I give a table starting with Virgo 6 am.

However, Aquarius is end of January, beginning of February. Sunset is earlier than 18:00 and Sunrise later. In Brest, at end of January, Sunrise is actually 8:50, nearly 9 am. This means, we don't look at column where Virgo is 06, but where Virgo is 09. We find Aquarius at 23.

Ah, what did he say ...

Now, the lesson is not, I should have trusted an astrologer on astroogical predictions. Here is a verse with a Catholic comment:

Genesis 1:[14] And God said: Let there be lights made in the firmament of heaven, to divide the day and the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years:

Ver. 14. For signs. Not to countenance the delusive observations of astrologers, but to give notice of rain, of the proper seasons for sowing, &c. M.

I think the commenter M. stands for Menochius - "Giovanni Stefano Menochio (1575 – 4 February 1655) was an Italian Jesuit biblical scholar."

Now, the lessons I do take of this encounter, by contrast, are:

• He knew his horoscope, I should have trusted him to know (which I did)
• He hadn't met me before, I should have trusted him to tell me the truth (which I didn't, I thought he was testing me)
• While I am alien to astrology, I should have trusted an astrologer (or astrology geek) on technical detail about a horoscope.
• My grasp of how ascendants and solar signs interact with each other and the time of birth was in principle correct, but very sketchy (I knew my own case was simple enough for my sketchy view to be correct), so, my science in the matter was totally inadequate compared to someone who had actually checked (which he had, he had taken the astrological theme, a k a horoscope).
• On a very personal note, I have been exposed to so many people who could be presumed to be checking out on my coherence and grasp of things, that I am getting too wary, too suspicious, of what people, not say in general, to each other or to the public, but to me.

In a wider perspective, how I reacted to the astrology geek, isn't that somehow how many react to Creation Scientists and Creation Science Geeks?

They overestimate their grasp of technical detail (as I did, I even tried to make a clock with 12 pointers and distribute signs at one per hour, when they are one per two hours), they are over suspicious (Creationists have been presented as con men, like I was expecting con men in psychology or psychiatry trying to assess my gullibility), they don't sufficiently rely on people both knowing their own history and not having a motive of lying. If Abraham had been 50 and Sarah 40, when Isaac was born, why would they have told him they were 100 and 90? And history in general, about things that are general knowledge to a community (even if it is reduced to one beduin tribe, as the "early Genesis" lore was accessible in full purity in Abraham's tribe), works the same way. Except, a city can persuade people, what they all already know is wrong, because the élite can persuade that something else is an even more general knowledge. That is why I trust the Beduin tribe's version of Genesis over the Sumerian one (in human terms, forgetting for the moment I'm a Christian and hence believer in Biblical inerrancy). Let's not overdo the tribe's upper hand over the city : repeatedly testable things may be more testable in cities and be checkable against knowledge from further away. But preserving the tribe's ancestral history, Beduin life is superior.

Precisely as his memory of checking up the horoscope is superior to my judgement on the matter.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre UL
260 Holy Martyrs under Claudius
in Rome
1.III.2019