Pertaining to the Stars
Many thanks to my teacher Penny Farrow on the culmination of this work, extended version is in Cosmic Kaleidoscope Journal.
Photo taken on Mauna Kea, HI at the Onizuka Center for International Astronomy
“We have calcium in our bones, iron in our veins, carbon in our souls, and nitrogen in our brains. Ninety-three percent stardust, with souls made of flames, we are all just stars with people names" - Nikita Gill
It’s a long way from home to the upper slopes of Mauna Kea, Hawaii. I remember that first night. As we drove up the Mauna Kea access road to 9,000 foot elevation the air pressure began to drop, breath shortening. The breeze felt dry and crisp, and the earth would crackle on every pebble as we walked. We rolled out a number of small telescopes onto the stargazing patio. I had seen stars before but not in these numbers. It was like being engulfed in an ocean of phosphorescent lights.
It was there that I could see the very workings of the universe in full bloom -
the constancy of the Sun and Moon and our ancient history in the stars.
And within me lived the innate desire, shared by humanity in all ages, to learn the story of our origin by understanding the cosmos.
We arrived here, predestined to observe our place in the cosmos from the mineral rich and watery planet we call home. In modern times our innate desire to know where we came from, has driven us into the far reaches of space, searching for answers. Like a newborn baby peeling open its little eyes onto the world for the first time, we looked up to see, to know, who and what we are. As we look at the night sky, our celestial mother, we see the effervescent full moon out-shinning its assembly of stars. Or maybe something subtler calls - the faint and innumerable distant suns. Carl Sagan famously said, there are more stars in the universe than all the grains of sand on earth.
How deeply we can perceive our known universe with two feet on the ground ends with the limitations of our sense of sight. Classic Indian Astrology, Jyotiṣa, is known as ‘the eye of the Vedas’. Its foundation rests on the many subtleties of pratyakṣa- ‘what is near to the eyes’, to show us, as our lens onto the cosmos, who we truly are. Ancient sky watchers were not as limited as one might think in understanding our place in the universe from where we are here and now, our Earth.
In the absence of the Sun’s rays, nightfall reveals to us a canopy of shimmering stars. The furthest we can see in all directions with our naked eye is known as the celestial sphere. The ‘fixed’ nature of these stars is but a reflection of their great age and distance. The average lifespan of a star is 10 billion years, far beyond our limited experience, with the light we see today traveling for hundreds of years to reach us. The further we gaze out in space the slower time becomes, to the point of seeming permanence at the edge of our perceivable universe with the backdrop of stars, they remain the oldest visible link to our origins and ancestors.
This brilliant orb of stars holds the limits of our eyesight in a celestial sphere, in Jyotiṣa, gola means sphere. The celestial sphere is the outermost orb of the three golas (spheres) suspending earth in space. Bhā gola, meaning ‘to shine, illuminating’ represents the map of fixed stars, it is like our outer celestial skin. Bhū gola, the earth is the centermost sphere, our point of perspective, and kha gola ‘space’ represents the space between bhū (earth) and bhā (stars, heavens) that contains our orbiting celestial bodies, the solar system.
How we observe our place in the universe from earth is an important key to understanding two systems of astrology that are distinctly different in modern times. Jyotiṣa uses the Sidereal Zodiac translating to ‘as pertaining to the stars’ for predictive astrology, and the Tropical Zodiac, meaning ‘the moving zodiac’ is most commonly used by western astrologers. Astronomy and Astrology used to be unified system. So, astrology traditionally began with observation, which then lead to calculation to predict, map and codify the cycles of the planets, and interpreting the myriad of patterns they create. Harmonizing with the cycles of nature was an integral part of daily life as a natural impulse for survival.
While observing the night sky, planets look like moving stars. The Greeks called them planets which means ‘wanderer’. In Hawaiian star-lore, they are called Hoku’aea, which quite literally means moving star, Hoku ‘star’ and ‘aea’ moving. Indian astrologers use the word graha which means to seize or grasp. Since planets have no light of their own, they can only ‘grasp’ that which can be reflected by the Sun, the star of our solar system.
The Vedic tradition focuses on nine celestial bodies. The seven visible to the naked eye- Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. With Saturn being the furthest visible planet. As well as Rāhu (the north node) and Ketu (the south node) of the Moon, which are the mathematical points that cause eclipses. Known as chara grahas ‘shadow planets’, they have no real form and are simply the points where shadows are created over the luminaries, the Sun or Moon, when aligned during full and new Moons. This creates a system of divination with nine celestial bodies, seven of which are visible.
While Vedic astrologers were well aware of the heliocentric nature (Sun as center) of the solar system, we observe it in reverse. Our view from earth naturally shows all the planets and stars circling around us, creating a geocentric view (earth as center). From earth it appears that all the grahas rise in the east and set in the west; this is due to the one full counterclockwise rotation of the earth on its axis every 24 hours. The ‘proper’ motion of the grahas through the fixed stars is from west to east.
In one solar year the ‘path’ the Sun appears to make through the fixed stars is called the ecliptic plane, it is the cosmic highway from which all the planets in our solar system appear to wander. The image below shows a magnified view of the Sun making its way westward through the stars with the other grahas traveling alongside within 8° north and south of the ecliptic.
Groupings of stars (constellations) divide the stars of the ecliptic ban based on the solar or lunar orbits in the vedic tradition. Both the Sidereal and Tropical Zodiacs use the more widely known solar constellations consisting of the twelve zodiacal signs of Aries, Taurus, Gemini etc. The Sun moves through these constellations on a monthly basis completing one cycle in a year. Each of the 12 constellations represent 30° of the 360 ban of sky that all the planets wander. However, the vedic tradition actually began watching the lunar orbit that divides the brightest stars of the ecliptic into 27 distinct lunar asterisms. The nakṣatras, or 27 lunar mansions are based on the Moon’s orbit of exactly 27 days. The solar constellations were inter-weaved into Jyotiṣa at a later point in time.
The Moon being the most visible graha is easy to track on its journey around the ecliptic. Night after night the waxing Moon makes leaps from one star grouping to the next, distancing itself from the Sun and quickly showing off its pearly skin among the stars. The “mansions” are spaced to accommodate the Moon’s swift average daily speed of 13°20’ (27 x 13°20’ = 360°). Bright stars that dot the ecliptic beckon the Moon to the right “address”. These marker stars are known as yoga tārās, the ‘chief stars’ of the lunar asterisms marking 13°20’ zones of the ecliptic.
This diagram shows the ecliptic stars divided by both the solar and lunar cycles, in the process of constructing a horoscope. The center square with triangles is used in Vedic horoscope analysis, while the circle represents the transposition of the sky onto paper. The symbolic emphasis placed on this band of sky is related to the visual reality of these being the only stars that contain the space behind the grahas as they wander through the night sky from our perspective on earth.
Locating a graha along the ecliptic is the principle measurement used in chart analysis. The two main systems of astrology (Sidereal and Tropical) use different reference points due to the precession of the equinoxes.
Due to the tilt of the earth on its axis, the earth rotates at about 23° angle to the plane of the solar system. This causes the Sun’s path to intersect with the celestial equator at the seasonal marker points of the Vernal (spring) and Autumnal Equinoxes. The equinoxes are vital to understanding the seasons and a reference point by which planets can be located.
On the Sun’s annual journey, there are two equinoxes (equal hours of day and night) and two solstices (shortest and longest days). The equinoxes occur when the Sun’s path crosses over the celestial equator (earths midpoint). As the earth rotates on its axis year over year, it wobbles ever so slowly, causing the two points on the ecliptic that we attribute to the vernal (spring) and autumnal (fall) equinoxes to inch themselves westward (opposite to the proper motion of the planets). This westward motion of the equinox points is what we call the precession of the equinox, and remains on a ~26,000 year cycle. One complete ‘wobble’ of the earth on its axis creates one full rotation of the equinox points around the ecliptic plane.
While the Vernal Equinox still occurs within a few days of March 21st, the position of the Sun against the background of the stars is now at roughly 5° of Pisces. It will be another twenty-three thousand or so years before the vernal equinox occurs at 0°degrees of Aries again. As a result of this motion, the slowly widening gap between Sidereal 0° Aries and the vernal equinox equated with 0° Aries in the Tropical system is known as the ayanāṃśa (moving portion).
Today this translates to an approximate 24° gap on the placement of the planets between Sidereal and Tropical Zodiacs as they travel the ecliptic.
The dotted circle shows the seasonal marker points based on the Tropical Zodiac, and the solid circle represents the Sidereal position of the sun. The Sun enters the constellation of Pisces around March 15th, leaving to transit through Aries mid April and so on. As you can see the precession has shifted the placement of the Sun almost one full constellation away from where it resided about two thousand years ago. The Sun spends around thirty days in each constellation connecting twelve constellations to an approximately three-hundred sixty day year.
The ongoing precession over the ages shifts the marker star for the Celestial North Pole. Over twenty-five thousand years ago, Indian Astrologers were aware of the movement of the the poles because of the recorded movement of marker stars through the ages at the junction of seasons. Since agriculture used to be a regular part of daily life, watching the stars and grahas supported agricultural planning. It was recorded that Vega (a bright star in the summer triangle) used to be the marker star for the Celestial North Pole fourteen thousand years ago, and has since slowly shifted away from Vega to Polaris, the current marker star for the celestial north pole. This is why the north pole star does not move, it is the point from which the earth spins. The south pole does not currently have a star aligned with its axis.
While stargazing during this late summer's eve, Jupiter shown above rises over the eastern horizon into view during the early evening hours. At first glance, it looks like a star, although Jupiter is strikingly much bigger and brighter. The reason you can tell it is a graha is because it moves very slowly night after night, i.e. planets look like moving stars. Jupiter will spend approximately one year traversing the constellation of Sagittarius before it moves into the zone of Capricorn. It takes Jupiters 12 years to travel through all the stars of the ecliptic band (equal to its orbit around the Sun). Saturn, called Shani ‘slow’ in Jyotiṣa takes the tortoise route, the most faint and distant visible graha, it submerges its identity with the stars on its 30 year journey around the ecliptic. It is important to note that our view from earth does directly link to ascertaining the cycles and orbits within our solar system. Observation uncovers the gems of Jyotiṣa- in how this oral tradition, passed down for thousands of years, can connect us to our view of the night sky today.
It occurred to me while writing this article that on my first night stargazing on the upper slopes of Mauna Kea, Hawaii I had a very clear question in mind, “What is the truth that can be seen? Is Jupiter residing in the constellation of Leo, as it would be according to Tropical Astrology, or Cancer according to the Sidereal Zodiac?” As I stood under the blanket of emerging stars at dusk, I set my sights on gas giant Jupiter. The grahas are the first thing to appear in twilight and don’t twinkle like stars do. On its ascent to the highest point of the heavens, Jupiter gazed down amidst the faintly lit crab formation of Cancer.
It was only today that it dawned on me what a beautifully auspicious moment this was. With no prior knowledge of what would be visible that evening, I stood poised between the two brightest grahas, Venus setting in the west and Jupiter rising to the midheaven. This sight opened a path of knowledge through the lens of pratyakṣa and I realized that what is “near the eye” can lift the veil, leading to greater awareness.
Many thanks to my teacher Penny Farrow on the culmination of this project, for an extended version of this article check out the Cosmic Kaleidoscope Journal.
