Why Use the Sidereal Zodiac?

There was a time before street lights and the fugue of incandescence obscured our view of the stars. We looked to the sky and its rich symbology for guidance in navigating our world. We were not separate from the stars; their influence was woven into our consciousness. As beings made of stardust, we knew that the stars were our oldest and wisest ancestors, and that what was happening in the sky was a reflection of our existence. The constellations and their stars were sentient beings with whom we could commune. I believe the stars are still the guiding messengers they always have been. We have an opportunity, now, to remember and connect with them. I believe the evolution and survival of our species depends upon it.

In regards to the zodiac…

As far as we know, the 12-sign zodiacal wheel, used in both Western and Hindu astrology, has its roots in ancient Babylonia (with the Babylonians drawing from the wisdom of the earlier Sumerian civilization). The Babylonians observed between 17-18 zodiacal constellations, which they, eventually, consolidated to 12. From this, they devised their 12 zodiacal signs, each being 30 degrees of the wheel and, roughly, aligning to their corresponding constellations.

The wheel was sidereal in nature, anchored to the stars Aldebaran (in Taurus) and Antares (in Scorpio). These stars were chosen (in part) because they are directly opposite one another in the sky and close to the ecliptic (the sun’s apparent path across the sky). The stars are easily spotted orange and red giants, respectively, and were perfect markers for fixing 15 degrees of Taurus and Scorpio. Thus, the zero degree point of the zodiacal wheel could be consistently measured utilizing these stars.

Greek astrologers adopted the Babylonian Sidereal Zodiac and many of their astrological techniques. They, eventually, altered the method of anchoring the zero degree point to the stars. Instead, they made the vernal equinox (from the Northern Hemisphere) the determiner of zero degrees Aries. Up until this point, the equinox had been observed by the Babylonians and utilized for timekeeping and determining latitude. It was not, however, tied to their zodiac.

The Greek astronomer, Ptolemy (AD 100-175), is credited with institutionalizing the switch to the equinox, which is still what is utilized by most Western astrologers as the tropical system. Interestingly, during his life, the Tropical and Sidereal Zodiacs were in near alignment. This alignment only occurs, approximately, every 25,722 years. This duration is termed the “Great Year.”

Hipparchus of Rhodes (flourished 146-127 BCE)—an astronomer who lived a few centuries prior to Ptolemy—is credited with the discovery of precession. Precession is the westward movement of the equinoxes with respect to the stars, and is responsible for the discrepancy between tropical and sidereal reckoning. Hipparchus, though, believed the stars were were what were moving, in respect to a fixed Earth at the center of the universe (rather than the equinoxes in respect to the stars). This geocentric model was concurrent with the time. The equinoxes move westward at a rate of one degree every 71.6 years, and currently, there is about a 25 degree difference between tropical and sidereal calculations (utilizing Babylonian sidereal reckoning).

There is evidence, however, that precession was observed long before Hipparchus. A Babylonian astronomer by the name of Kidinnu, is theorized to have observed precession several hundreds of years prior to Hipparchus (from about 343 BCE). Many ancient cultures, too, spoke of a sacred cycle of alternating dark and golden ages, which could connect to this phenomenon of precession. The Yugas are the ages within Hinduism that describe this concept, and Plato also wrote of this, coining the term the “Great Year.” Even prehistoric cave paintings of the constellations, from as far back as 40,000 years ago, suggest an awareness of the apparent shifting of the stars over time. These prehistoric peoples are believed to have used this knowledge of the precessional cycle in order to make accurate astronomical calculations. Also, the mathematics of the Mayan calendar could connect to the precessional cycle, as could the dimensions of the Great Pyramid of Giza and other ancient sacred sites.

Precession is believed to be caused by the gravitational influence of the sun and moon (and, to a lesser degree, the planets) to the Earth’s equatorial bulge. Due to this, a cyclic wobbling is thought to happen at the earth’s poles, much like the motion of a spinning top.

There is also a theory, called the Binary Companion Theory, that precession is, actually, not caused by this wobble. Instead, our entire solar system is moving through curved space-time in its long-cycle orbit around a common center of gravity. This is shared with another star. This movement—of our entire solar system—-could be what is causing the apparent shifting of the stars over time. This would not be the first time our cosmological understanding of the universe would change (should this theory be adopted over the wobble theory), just as the geocentric model (from which Tropical Astrology was born) has since been discarded. Also, the majority of stars within the observable universe are believed to have at least one companion star; the notion that our sun is without a companion is improbable.

All these technicalities aside, my primary reason for using the Sidereal Zodiac is philosophical. The Sidereal Zodiac is anchored to the stars. The Tropical Zodiac is anchored to the seasons in the Northern Hemisphere. If the zodiac has little connection to the stars from which it originated, our paradigm, itself, has become severed from the cosmic whole. Detached from the stars, we are left with the delusion that the earth and ourselves are the center of the universe.

This geocentrism, at the heart of Ptolemy’s insistence of the Tropical Zodiac, is no longer a relevant cosmological model. Fixing the zodiac to the equinoctial and solsticial points was believed to be the only way to maintain consistency, as the stars were believed to be the ones moving. Again, however, the equinox has drifted westward since this time roughly 25 degrees, while the stars’ proper motions (the term describing the actual motion of the stars) have moved only tiny fractions of arc-minutes.

In other words, the equinox has shifted almost an entire sign, while the stars’ positions have remained the same to the unaided eye. We are viewing, in large part, the very same skies the ancients saw...just with exponentially more light pollution. And, with Tropical Astrology having become the dominant astrology in the West, our consciousness has drifted further and further out of alignment with both astronomy and the stellar gnosis, which is at the root of all astrology.

More questions I ask myself and pose to you, the reader:

What happens when we detach our worldview from our ancestral past—the stars? What happens when we observe ourselves as the center of the universe? What would change if we saw ourselves as a piece of a much larger whole?

As the Tropical and Sidereal zodiacs continue to diverge, I am curious what their growing discrepancy will mean to the field of astrology. At this point in our history, the zodiac is split—-one now aligns with the Northern Hemisphere’s seasons and one is anchored to the stars (not speaking to the Constellational Zodiac, Chinese, Mayan, or any other astrological system).

Should the zodiac be fixed to the seasons or to the stars or both? What about the experience of the seasons in the polar regions, near the equator, or in the Southern Hemisphere? Clearly, a Eurocentric seasonally-based zodiac is problematic for the entirety of Earth. Is there some way to synthesize the tropical and sidereal understanding? Is it possible to reunite the zodiacs, as they aligned near the time of Ptolemy? Or is this just part of the cycle of the Great Year, and they will realign in about 24,000 years?

OR, is insistence of the Tropical Zodiac in Western astrology an incomplete system, which centers us in our egos to the detriment of our collective evolution? What if it is part of a cosmological model that is no longer relevant? One could argue that the entirety of astrological understanding is geocentric, and, thus, what’s the problem? The problem, I believe, is that the geocentricism at the heart of Tropical Astrology has had a distancing effect in our connection to the cosmos. While there is geocentricism at work within the sidereal system (the entire arrangement of the constellations is a geocentric consideration), this system is anchored to the greater universe from our earthly vantage point.

The stars are available and eager to assist us in our consciousness evolution IF we are willing to look up and remember them. Thus, I’m sticking with sidereal as my anchor. Aldebaran and Antares are at 15 degrees Sidereal Taurus/Scorpio, just as they were in ancient Babylonia. That, to me, is pretty impressive.

*Since writing the writing of this blog post, I now utilize the system of Constellational Astrology as my preferred method of casting charts. In my experience, this uneven zodiac, which correlates to the various sizes of the zodiacal constellations, yields the greatest accuracy and nuance. I continue to also use the 12-sign sidereal zodiac, as it has its own value for my methodology, and I stand by this article as evidence for its utilization and efficacy. I will be writing another post, specifically, on why I now use the Constellational system, so watch out for that.

REFERENCES:

Bowser, Kenneth. An Introduction to Western Sidereal Astrology, Second Edition. American Federation of Astrologers, Inc. 2016.

Gregersen, Erik, Senior Editor. “Precession of the Equinoxes.” Encyclopedia Brittanica. 2010.

Cajori, Florian. “Babylonian Discovery of Precession of the Equinoxes.” Science. February 1927. Vol. 65, Issue 1677, pp.184.

University of Edinburgh. “Prehistoric Cave Art Suggests Ancient Use of Complex Astronomy.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 27 November 2018. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/11/181127111025.htm>

binaryresearchinstitute.com

www.ancientwisdom.com/precession/htm

Aldebaran, orange giant that is the eye of the bull in Taurus.

Credit: Unknown