Tag: Rhys Chatham

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Whole Sign House War – Part 2

WSH – Equal House – Porphyry

Before moving on to the astronomy of the ecliptic-based house systems, I had another thought on the current WSH war.

Those of us interested in Hellenistic Astrology owe a great debt to the research done by Project Hindsight (PH) and the folks who did the research, primarily Robert Hand and Robert Schmidt, and at the start Robert Zoller. Also we can give our gratitude to Chris Brennan, whose book Hellenistic Astrology (HA) attempted (and largely succeeded) to put the entire doctrine of HA as understood by Project Hindsight and himself into one volume. This was followed by two volumes by Demetra George on the praxis of Hellenistic delineation, with Volume 1 looking at planetary strength and other technical subjects from a mostly Hellenistic perspective, and Volume 2 to looking at house delineation in a way that included the entire astrological tradition, from Hellenistic to 20th century astrology.

Thanks to these efforts, HA and some of its techniques have become widely popular, so quite naturally other scholars and academics are joining in and looking at the relevant texts in their original languages (Greek, Sanskrit and Latin). Further interpretations and alternative views of the Hellenistic tradition are beginning to appear as time passes.  One hopes that the PH point of view will not become dogma and that folks will listen to other viewpoints with an open mind.

Deborah Houlding has an alternative interpretation of Anthologies by Vettius Valens.

I believe that folks have misinterpreted her recent talk at the Astrological Association of Great Britain in thinking that she was saying whole sign houses (WSH) never existed.  What she meant to get across was that no ancient or medieval author ever formally defined or endorsed their use, which is not the same thing as saying WSH never existed. One can either agree or disagree with her point of view. Also, she didn’t mean to leave the impression that prior to the 80s, no one wrote about or mentioned WSH, ever. She simply meant that prior to PH, WSH were not a “thing”. It wasn’t generally talked about in the astrological community, indeed, even people like her doing traditional astrology (as medieval and renaissance astrology was called back then) were considered slightly mad. Hellenistic astrology was strictly for the academics.

Unfortunately, her presentation contained inaccuracies, snide comments about colleagues and bordered on presenting PH as a kind of evil cabal. This was not helpful to her cause, which was to present an alternative view on how ancient astrologers worked with houses.  Completely lost in the subsequent furor was her fascinating discussion of primary vs secondary motion as it related to WS and quadrant houses. The lesson to be learned from this is when presenting an alternative view on a hot-button topic, it is best to stay away from personalities and stick to principles; to stay on topic and avoid dragging out the dirty laundry along the way.

Chris Brennan responded to Houlding with a video stream where he played her entire talk and calmly responded to it, point by point.  He also did interviews with Robert Hand, one of the founders of PH, as well as with Demetra George, an early PH participant and proponent, each of whom gave their reactions to the Houlding talk. For anyone who is interested in Hellenistic astrology, these videos make for fascinating watching. Responding to the Houlding talk almost becomes secondary; one gets a sense of what PH was and how it developed; the interviews are in no way a shouting match.

I saw a YouTube video recently depicting Chris Brennan as some kind of power hungry, evil empire Darth Vader type for responding to the Houlding talk.  Nothing could be further from the truth. Brennan is by no means a HA fundamentalist, just look at his podcast: He has medieval and renaissance astrologers on the show, he has psychological astrologers, he has evolutionary astrologers, vedic astrologers, he even has had “pop” astrologers present their work. Brennan promotes astrology in all its forms. Outside the context of his book and HA course, his astrology is a blend of Hellenistic and modern practices, as is D. George’s. I believe that Houlding in her talk was simply speaking from her heart and calling things as she saw them. However, because the talk unfortunately contained a good deal of hyperbole and what Brennan considered falsehoods, he felt obliged to respond. I don’t see how we can fault him for that.

With all that being said, the understanding of Hellenistic house division practice is evolving and we are beginning to hear new viewpoints.  We’ve heard the one by Deborah Houlding.  Here is a new viewpoint from Martin Gansten, a traditional astrologer who is also an academic. He reads Greek, Latin and Sanskrit and is thus able to do his research using critical editions. He recently responded to those who call him a whole sign denialist in a short piece written by an astrologer for other astrologers (rather than for academics) . He did so in a way that simply laid out his points in a line, for all to consider, to either accept or reject.  It is a model of how a debate on a controversial subject ought to be conducted.  Here is a link to the piece:

https://astrology.martingansten.com/for-astrologers/

As I mentioned in a previous post, I’d like to gently shift things away from the WSH controversy, and instead of focusing on which ancient astrologer used which house system, and for what, I plan to look at the astronomy and symbolism of the ecliptic based houses: WSH, Equal Houses, and what today we call Porphyry Houses, which is an exquisite quadrant system that was used in Hellenistic times.

Each of these systems emphasizes particular celestial circles. WSH emphasize the ecliptic itself. Equal Houses bring the great circle of the horizon strongly into the mix. The Porphyry system of house division adds the local meridian of the native or event.

In my next series of posts, I’ll discuss the interesting features of each of these three systems, without promoting one over the other. We’ll look at the celestial circles that come into play in determining the house cusps, and together we will discuss their possible symbolic implications.

Until next time!

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The Whole Sign House War

(The chart to the left was cast in whole sign houses. The same chart, to the right, was cast in a quadrant house system, today known as the Porphyry House System. Note how some of the planets and symbols shift houses)

After listening to the various responses on the internet to Deborah Houlding’s talk in 2022 at the Astrological Association of Great Britain on whole sign houses, I found that my reactions matched precisely with that of Anthony Lewis, whom I will directly quote:

“Recently I watched a video on astrological domification posted by Deborah Houlding, whose work I have followed and admired for many years. Deb expressed her concern that the current popularity of what are called “Whole Sign Houses” might interfere with the newer generation of astrologers being able to understand the conceptual underpinnings of mundane houses. Unfortunately, Deb was somewhat polemical and provocative in her presentation and at times made factually inaccurate statements, which her critics have pounced on rather than trying to understand the gist of her presentation. Nonetheless, I felt that Deb’s argument was worth pondering, and I posted a link to her video on my Facebook page. The response to the link to Deb’s video was quite startling. I felt like a tourist visiting the Holy Land when the Crusades broke out. It was like being in the midst of a religious war with opposing cults battling each other to the death over whose dogma had God’s blessing. In any case, the back and forth discussion did produce several valuable statements and references, which I’d like to summarize.” ( To read the rest of Anthony Lewis’ article, click here).

I studied Hellenistic Astrology with Brennan as well as horary (we used whole sign houses!) and I also led a study group for a number of years where we went over, paragraph by paragraph, his excellent book entitled Hellenistic Astrology, in which he attempted (and largely succeeded) to outline the entire Hellenistic astrological tradition as understood by Project Hindsight and its adherents.

I went on to study medieval and renaissance astrology with Christopher Warnock, who re-introduced me to the discrete pleasures of quadrant house systems, which I continued with horary studies with Deborah Houlding, Lee Lehman and Wade Caves.  All to say that I know and respect all the players in this Whole Sign House (WSH) war.  In my current astrological work I use both WSH as well as quadrant house systems, depending on what I’m doing, and I have had excellent results using both.

I agree with Anthony Lewis’ assessment that most of the attacks on Houlding and her talk are missing the point she was trying to make, which, as far as I can make out, was answering the question: Signs as Houses. Are astrological signs the same thing as astrological houses?

Houlding’s answer was that clearly they are not.

Signs are in the heavens and relate to the ecliptic, houses are tied to the earth, specifically, the rotation of the earth and the great circle of the celestial equator.  Houses move in a clockwise diurnal direction driven by the earth’s rotation, which is at an approximately 23.5° angle to the ecliptic. The ecliptic is concerned with the planets that move along its 12 signs in secondary motion, or counterclockwise motion. (c.f. David Cochrane for the astronomy of this, click here for his recent YouTube talk: Are Whole Signs the Oldest House System?).

Essentially, the problem with exclusively using WSH is that they are not tied to the great circles of the horizon and the local meridian: They do not reflect primary motion and local space. They are exclusively tied to secondary motion, and everything that the celestial circle of the ecliptic symbolizes.

This is not to say the WSH are useless: WSH have many uses, however, they DO have their limitations. The ancients dealt with this by also working with equal houses, which ties the house cusps to the earth’s horizon, as well as quadrant houses, which anchor the house cusps to the earth by linking them to the horizon and the local meridian (i.e. the local geographical longitude line extended out to the celestial sphere).

Does this mean we shouldn’t be using whole sign houses?  Of course not! WSH have many uses, but as mentioned the ancients didn’t use WSH exclusively; in fact, we have indications in Valens that in addition to house strength and length-of-life, quadrant houses were also used for topics, (c.f. Vett. Val. IX 3,21–25, also Martin Gansten – Platikos and moirikos: Ancient Horoscopic Practice in the Light of Vettius Valens’ Anthologies )

Personally, along with Lewis and Gansten,  I believe that WSH were used extensively in Hellenistic times for the simple reason that they are so easy to calculate. Lewis has compared the use of WS to the way Sun sign astrology has been used from the time of Alan Leo onwards.  If, for example, I know that a Taurus and a Scorpio are disputing with one another, I don’t need to see their entire natal chart to have a fairly good idea of how things will turn out, or to divine how flexible each will be in adapting to the other’s point of view. But if I wanted to go into more detail, I would need to see each of their respective complete horoscopes.

WSH work much the same way. In Hellenistic Astrology, it is possible to judge a chart just by 30° house aspects, which we call whole sign aspects. For example, any degree in Aries aspecting to any degree in Leo would be considered a trine.  But as Valens says, for more precision, one would need to use degree-based aspects along with degree-based equal or quadrant houses.

Why was the use of WSH so prevalent? Remember, back in ancient Greece, no one had computers, obviously. Nor did they have digital watches. They didn’t even have Timex watches! If it was cloudy outside, that further complicated things. Too, many people didn’t have a precise time for their birth, so using WSH and WS aspects would make a lot of sense in this context, and it gave good results! Just as today, knowing someone’s Sun sign will tell you quite a lot about the person without having to cast an entire nativity.

Many astrologers today aren’t great with math, thank goodness we have computers. It probably wasn’t any different back in the time of the ancient Greeks. The great astrologers were also astronomers and mathematicians, but alas, not everyone was. So those who weren’t would have used exclusively WSH, and get acceptable results with their clients. But as Valens mentions at one point in Anthologies, to get superlative results, one would use degree-based aspects and houses.

To finish, I think Houlding was expressing the frustration that many traditional astrologers (i.e. those practicing medieval or renaissance astrology) feel about a new wave of astrology enthusiasts being told from one source or another that WSH is the one and only true system, where WSH = GOOD, and quadrant house systems = BAD, which of course is ridiculous.

As one traditional astrologer friend recently wrote me:

“There can be few “astrologers” that are unaware of the omnipresent propaganda and pressure to adopt whole sign houses.  They are the BEST house system and EVERYONE must use them.  This has been shouted from the rooftops for some time and is increasingly fervently believed. This has a very clear practical effect, for example recently I have had a prospective client for a reading, insist that they would only accept a reading done using whole sign houses and similarly I had a student whose only question was did I use whole sign houses.  For both, the answer “no” meant instant rejection, that was all they needed to know. “

I think the main takeaway from Deborah Houlding’s talk, at least for me, was that generally we need to give our students and the public in general more awareness of how WSH, Equal, and the quadrant houses are calculated, what celestial circles in the sky they are based on, and how that affects the symbolism of the house system.  I hope to contribute to doing that in future posts.

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What is traditional astrology?

This is a short video which considers what traditional astrology has come to mean today, as opposed to what it signified in the recent past. The differences between traditional and ancient astrology are broadly discussed.

If video takes too long to appear, click here for direct link.

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Ages of Man

I’ve been thinking about the astrological Ages of Man.

Illustration: Joy Usher – A Tiny Universe: Astrology and the Thema Mundi Chart

These are divisions of time using the Chaldean order of planets to describe a psychological progression in the stages of human life, which we find described in the Hellenistic astrologer Ptolemy’s work, Tetrabiblos.

Briefly the seven “stars” or visible planets and luminaries each describe a stage of life and its experience, with a certain number of years aligned to each (see illustration above).

The quality of the period depends on the condition of the ruling planet in the nativity of the person in question, which we would determine through using either Hellenistic or medieval/renaissance traditional techniques (or both…)

I tried this on my own chart by simply using essential dignities to determine planetary condition. I’m in the crone stage of my life (i.e. I am pushing seventy…) so I’ve reached the Saturn Age already. In looking back over my life, I found the planetary ages corresponded quite nicely with what I experienced

My partner is roughly the same age as me, and their periods also corresponded accurately. I’m going to include this technique as a quick way of getting a sense of a native’s life in working with nativites.

I’ll let you know if my Saturn period works out as I expect when I am 98 years old! 😉

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Introduction to Astrological House Division videos

Astrologer Rhys Redmond Chatham presents a talk in three videos on Astrological House Division. In this talk he shows how the various astrological house systems are calculated (no math is required!).

In the first video Rhys introduces himself and his background as an astrologer and gives a tour of the various great celestial circles used in house calculation.

In the second video, he goes into detail on how the houses are calculated, starting with the first two categories of house division:



(1) The ecliptic-based houses – whole sign houses, equal house system and Porphyry Houses – and then,

(2) The space-based houses – the Meridian House System, Morinus, Regiomontanus and Campanus Houses.

In the third video, Rhys covers the time-based houses: Alcabitius, Kohn, and Placidus Houses, and then wraps up the talk with conclusions and possible next steps.

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International Astrology Day 2022

I’ll be giving a talk this weekend at an event hosted by AFAN, the Association for Astrological Networking. Here is a list of the speakers:

AFAN has a spectacular lineup to celebrate International Astrology Day. In fact, they are celebrating all weekend! Mark your calendar for March 19 and 20.

I’ll be giving a talk there on astrological houses on Saturday, 19 March. The talk will be be a tour through the major house systems and how they are calculated. We’ll look at the celestial circles upon which they are based (without going into the math…) and touch on possible symbolic interpretations of each.

The conference will be held on Zoom, it is free, but one needs to register at this address: afan.org/iad2022/ 

Here is the schedule:

Saturday March 19, 2022 (Pacific Time UTC -7)

7:00am

Doors Open

7:30am

Wendy Stacey

Using Astrocartography for Natal and World Events

9:00am (5pm UTC)

Rhys Redmond Chatham 

A Non-Partisan Overview of Astrological House Systems

10:30am  

Ema Kurent

Prenatal and Postnatal Eclipses

1:30pm | 13:30

Naike Swai

Release into Pisces’ Waters : A Sound Meditation

3:00pm | 15:00

Janay Anthony

Imperfect (Celestial) Bodies: 

A Disability-Affirming Framework for Interpreting the Planets

4:30pm | 16:30 

Keiko Ito

Positive Saturn! Understanding the Symbology of the Karma Planet (Vedic)

6:00pm | 18:00

Debbie Stapleton

Filling Our Cup, Feeding Our Soul – An inspirational talk on Jupiter in Pisces

7:30pm | 19:30

Doors Close

Saturday March 19, 2022 (Pacific Time UTC -7)

7:00am

Doors Open

7:30am

Sonal Sachdeva

Controlling Dance of the Malefics – Saturn, Mars, and the Lunar Nodes (Vedic)

9:00am

Alejo Lopez

Between Heaven and Earth:

How Myth & Astrology Can Help Us To Navigate These Difficult Times

10:30am

Nathan Theo Naicker

Introducing the Southern Tropical Zodiac: A Holistic Astrology for the Future

1:30pm | 13:30

Alan Clay

Dwarf Planets as Higher Octaves: Sedna – Ceres – Moon & Eris – Pluto – Mars

3:00pm | 15:00

Cameron Allen

Holistic Health & Astrology: The Luminaries Explored in Everyday Life

4:30pm | 16:30

Omari Martin

Legality & Ethics for Professional Astrologers

6:00pm | 18:00  

Alicia Yusuf

Taking the Crisis Out of Midlife Transits

7:30pm | 19:30  

Doors Close

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The three great celestial circles: the ecliptic, the local horizon and the local meridian.

Earlier, we spoke of ecliptic-based house systems (c.f. blog 24 January 2021).

In the course of talking about these older house systems, we are going to look at the ecliptic, the horizon and the meridian, see what they look like in the sky above us, and finally we will look at how they are represented in an astrological chart.

The easiest house systems to calculate are the ones that are based on the ecliptic. The three major house systems based primarily on the ecliptic are: (1) the whole sign house system (WSH), (2) the equal house system, and the (3) Porphyry house system.

These three house systems use as their basis three great celestial circles: the ecliptic, the local horizon, and the local meridian and are easy to calculate.  All one needs to know is the longitudinal position on the ecliptic of where the ecliptic meets the horizon, this is called the ascendant.

Then we need to find the point where the ecliptic meets the local meridian, this is called the midheaven. 

Once we know these positions, the rest of the calculations can be done in one’s head!

I’d like to introduce a more complex house system, but before we get to that, let’s review the basic celestial circles that we have covered so far: the ecliptic, the horizon and the meridian.

The Ecliptic:

The ecliptic, of course, is the apparent path of the Sun as it is seen from the point of view by an observer on earth. 

Illustration: Christopher A. Weidner

The five visible planets never drift too far from the path of the ecliptic, so in astrology we usually measure the longitudinal position of the luminaries and planets, including the outer ones, as longitudinal degrees along the 360° circle of the ecliptic, which by convention we divide into twelve sectors of 30° of longitudinal position each.  Each of these twelve sectors is represented by an astrological constellation (Aries, Taurus, Gemini, etc.), which may or may not correspond with the ones in the sky.

The Horizon:

The horizon is the great circle on the celestial sphere that is directly between the zenith (the point directly above you) and the nadir (the point directly below you).

Illustration: Christopher A. Weidner

The horizon is always perpendicular to the local zenith and nadir, that is to say the horizon is 90° from the ascendant.

The Meridian:

The meridian is the great circle passing through the celestial poles, as well as the zenith and nadir of an observer’s location. In astrology, the midheaven is defined as the point where the ecliptic meets the local meridian.

Illustration: Christopher A. Weidner

How the great circles are represented in an astrological chart:

In an astrological chart, we squish these great celestial circles together, we flatten them so that they are represented by straight lines:

The outer circle represents the ecliptic, and on it we see the degrees of the house cusps, which were calculated in Porphyry in this chart.

The vertical line going from left to right, from 5° Leo to 5° Aquarius, represents the horizon, which of course is actually a circle, not a straight line.  Because western astrology was developed in the northern hemisphere, the Sun was always to the south.  So since the chart assumes that we are facing south, the east is on the left and the west is on the right.  This convention has stayed with us through the ages, and we use it today, even if we live in the southern hemisphere.

Finally, the vertical line that goes from the bottom at 15° Libra to the top at A5° Aries represents the local meridian, which of course is also a great circle, and not a straight line (c.f. illustration 3).  The point of the midheaven represents the point where the two circles intersect: it is the point of intersection of the meridian with the ecliptic.

The beginning of the tenth house in a quadrant house system such as Porphyry, Alcabitius, Campanus, Regiomontanus or Placidus is called the Medium Coeli (M.C.), which is Latin for midheaven.

The M.C. is where the Sun reaches its highest point in the local sky, NOT to be confused with the zenith, which is the point directly above the observer. 

So, to give an example, if one is in the northern hemisphere at a mid-latitude location, for example Wisconsin, or in Europe in France, the Sun would be towards the south as it rises, culminates, and sets.  The Sun only passes directly overhead the observer at the equator.  The Sun travels along the ecliptic, the local meridian is perpendicular to our local horizon, so basic physics tells us that the Sun will reach its highest point when, travelling along its path on the ecliptic, it meets our local meridian. 

Our local zenith is also on our local meridian, it is directly above where one is standing.  But the local zenith is not on the path of the ecliptic, unless we happen to be standing exactly on the equator!

Having reviewed these three basic circles, in the next blog I hope to cover later astrological house systems.  The next one we will cover is the Placidus house system.

—ooOoo—

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A Neptunian question!

What is the difference between the way a contemporary astrologer would interpret Neptune on the descendant, as opposed to how it would be interpreted traditionally or Hellenistically? 

This is a question that came up recently in a study group that I participate in.

It’s true that the approaches would be quite different. 

Even though many astrologers working with traditional and/or ancient techniques work mostly with the seven visible planets, if an outer planet (Uranus/Neptune/Pluto) touches an angle, many of us will take that into consideration.

Here is how I would define the difference between the contemporary approach and that of traditional or ancient astrology:

In contemporary natal astrology, each of the seven visible planets represents a component of consciousness within the native, and the three outer planets symbolize an element of the unconscious mind (in its Jungian sense). The natal horoscope is interpreted as a map of consciousness and the various psychic impulses of the native. The entire natal chart and all the astrological symbols within it become a means of analyzing character and the psychology of the native.

However, in both traditional and ancient astrology, the approach is different: The ascendant, any planets in the first house and the ruler of the first house symbolize the native, both physically and psychologically.  Houses other than the first house represent everything outside of the native. 

So, for character analysis, both traditional and ancient astrologers interpret the ascendant, the first house and any symbols found within it.  Additionally, a traditional astrologer (medieval, renaissance) will make an analysis of the native’s “manners”, by which is meant the temperamental balance of the chart.  Is the person choleric or melancholic?  Sanguine or phlegmatic? Or perhaps a combination thereof…  These serve to give us effective delineations of the character of the native.

Keeping all this in mind, let’s return to the original question:

How would a contemporary astrologer interpret Neptune on the cusp of the seventh house? The seventh house being the house of marriage and partnerships.

Neptune is in the seventh house of this chart.

Simply put, a contemporary astrologer’s interpretation would be that the native approaches seventh house relationships in a Neptunian way!

If the aspects to Neptune are soft ones, the native’s relationship strategies will probably manifest in a positive way (a spiritual approach, total immersion with the other person, etc). If there are hard aspects, then the manifestations would more likely be negative (difficulty seeing the other person in the relationship clearly, confusion, etc.)

For the traditional/ancient astrologer, the approach would be to see Neptune as a type of person or situation external to the native. If I saw this in a client’s chart, one of the first questions I might ask is if they happen to be married to a musician! Or poet… Or negatively, perhaps a drug addict!

And if it turned out that they weren’t currently in a relationship, the next step would be to use various traditional and ancient time lord techniques to find out when they would be likely to meet such a person.

That, for me, is the traditional approach (renaissance, medieval) , and also the Hellenistic (ancient) one.

Another related question that came up during our study session was: if the client is having a problem of some kind with their seventh house Neptune, how do we help them with it?

Using the contemporary psychological approach, we help our client by identifying the exact nature of the problem, for example if their Neptune was square or in opposition to Venus, we might explore whether they had difficulty seeing their love interests clearly.  We’d help them identify the exact nature of their problem, and offer strategies as to how the difficulty might be solved.

The traditional astrologer’s approach would be to help the client by identifying the type of person likely to appear in their lives, when this person would be likely to next appear, and to advise them as to whether this person ought to be accepted with open arms, or to run for the hills!

 If it turned out that the Neptunian influence was negative for some reason, then the next steps for the traditional astrologer would include looking at the various significators for the seventh house (its lord, other planets contained within and aspects to them), also looking at the lot of marriage and the lot of eros.

And THEN, we’d look at Venus for the boys and Mars for the girls, and by the time we’ve finished doing all that, we’d have quite a bit to talk about and will have normally helped the client see things more clearly vis-à-vis their seventh house issues.

At least that’s what we hope!

—ooOoo—