Astrologia Previsionale - Astrologia oraria, elettiva, classica e Magia Astrologica
INITIATORY ASTROLOGY
The North Star and the ascension to the higher states of being. The real stellar secret of the Divine Comedy
The readers of this book will have access to secret knowledge that has never been published before. This book explains how "the ascension to the stars" happens from the point of view of initiatory astrology, that is, how to choose and use certain astrological moments for the operations of the ascent of the planes. The aim is to delineate a Stellar Way for the "ascent to Heaven" up to the Supreme State, or at least to learn how to progressively bring the consciousness to higher levels with the help of certain "star maps" that we will learn to create, interpret and revive in our Microcosm.
In fact, it is possible to transpose on the Celestial Sphere the traditional teachings about the higher states of being.
The influence of the various parts of Heaven that colors the stars differently according to the various phases of their precessional cycle is one of the important things which is entirely unknown to modern astrologers, and was known only to the initiates of the most remote antiquity. It confirms the existence of a "secret" initiatory astrology, very different and much more useful and profound than that commonly practiced.
The ascension to the higher states of being - up to the Supreme State - can take place only along the lines of the colures. This supreme state is represented by the point of intersection between the two colures, represented by the North Pole.
As we will see in the course of the book, in order for this ascension to take place, it is necessary that there are stars along the colures, corresponding to various states of being that are like so many stations that one must pass through. At the same time, they are similar to vehicles that can transport us higher and higher. The higher the northern declination of the stars, the higher the state of being they represent, not because of their own nature, but because of the part of Heaven in which they are located The more one rises along the northern sky, the more one enters into a subtle and etheric dimension, which, precisely for this reason, can be inaccessible or traumatic for those who are not ready to get rid of the ego and the sense of corporeality.
These ascensions also require the presence of one or more planets along the colures themselves. In fact, our first means of transport to detach ourselves from the earth will surely be one or more planets, since we cannot directly identify ourselves with the very high state of consciousness corresponding to a star.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION……………………pag.7
PART ONE………..………..pag.19
THE STARRY ROADS OF THE SKY: THE ASTRONOMICAL MAP OF SPIRITUAL ASCENSIONS TO THE HIGHER LEVELS OF BEING
The equatorial aspects
An example of correspondence between stars or constellations by right ascension
The colures (celestial roads to the Pole)
OTHER SECRETS OF INITIATORY ASCENSION ASTROLOGY
Main and secondary roads
EXAMPLE: A PRIVATE CASE
The role of the Stars on the solstitial colure in the ascension to the higher states of being
The role of the Mother Star in Illumination
The role of the stars on the equinoctial colure in the ascension experience
TERRESTRIAL AND CELESTIAL ROADS
An example of projection of stellar rays relative to an event chart
A GOLDEN AGE FOR SPIRITUAL LIFE: THE FIFTH CENTURY B.C. AND BEYOND
The role of human-shaped images
Equatorial aspects of Kochab, the Polar Star of the time
How the stars indicate golden periods for the spiritual life
THE STARS OF YEAR ZERO AND THE COMING OF JESUS
PART TWO…………..…….PAG.72
VERIFICATION AND APPLICATION OF PRINCIPLES TO INDIVIDUAL BIRTH CHARTS
The Virgin and the shepherds: first apparition of the Madonna of Fatima
Heliacal Phases
Equatorial configurations
Aspects of the Polar Star The fundamental importance of equatorial "angular" aspects
The projections of the constellations in sensitive images through the altazimuth coordinates
PART THREE…………..…PAG.87
THE STELLAR JOURNEY OF DANTE ALIGHIERI
The Empyrean and the Candid Rose
The other protagonist stars at the time of Dante and their "disguises" in the Comedy
The subdivision by nine and the parallels of declination
The relationships between the stars by right ascension
First example: the sixth section of each of the three kingdoms
Second example: the ninth section of each of the three kingdoms
Purgatorio, Canto 29: The 24 elders in the apocalyptic procession
Dante and the ancient polar symbolism
BY THE SAME AUTHOR….....pag.127
INTRODUCTION
I dedicate these two books to the divine and magical Fomalhaut. May you silence all noise of the profane world and illuminate my mind and heart, O royal and solitary celestial gem shining in the mouth of the Southern Fish!
The purpose of this book is to teach how to read the starry sky as a map of your spiritual reality and how it manifests both in our earthly dimension in general and in our microcosm.
All this will be done with regard to the peculiarities that characterize the circumpolar stars, particularly the North Star.
This first purpose of the work is functional to the second, which is of a more purely practical and operational nature. It will explain how "the ascension to the stars" happens from the point of view of initiatory astrology, that is, how to choose and use certain astrological moments for the operations of the ascent of the planes. The aim is to delineate a Stellar Way for the "ascent to Heaven" up to the Supreme State, or at least to learn how to progressively bring the consciousness to higher levels with the help of certain "star maps" that we will learn to create, interpret and revive in our Microcosm.
In fact, it is possible to transpose on the Celestial Sphere the traditional teachings about the higher states of being.
Heaven itself is a living being, and its various parts each have their own nature. Each star can acquire different nuances according to the part of the sky in which it comes to be in the various eras. This is true both for its more or less northern declination, and for its right ascension, and therefore the meridian along which it is gradually located.
The influence of the various parts of Heaven that colors the stars differently according to the various phases of their precessional cycle is one of the important things which is entirely unknown to modern astrologers, and was probably known only to the initiates of the most remote antiquity. It confirms the existence of a "secret" initiatory astrology, very different and much more useful and profound than that commonly practiced.
Most of the circumpolar stars have in whole or in part the nature of Mars and their effects on the terrestrial plane are often destructive, or at least potentially dangerous. They participate much more than others in Fire, that is the divine element par excellence. And Fire towards material life (i.e. that of our planet) has destructive effects. In Exodus 33:20, God says: "You cannot see my face, because man cannot see me and live."
Precisely for this reason, the circumpolar stars can only manifest on Earth through the "lower" stars that correspond to them by right ascension (or even by conjunction, opposition, and other ecliptic aspects, but at a different and lower level).
There is then a further level of lowering, represented by the planets, which act as activators of both.
However, the highest spirits can live all or part of that Fire: they are the great prophets, the Avatara Logos, and all those who manage to carry out the Great Work or to accomplish it, identifying themselves with the divine level. For them, the highest stars are not destructive Fire, but projective and Divine Fire, a source of inspiration and bliss. They are ready to disidentify themselves from the physical body and the psychic soul.
So the same stars that have brought and bring the greatest spiritual illuminations and revelations can be the greatest destroyers of material things. Their Fire becomes Light only for those who can rise to the higher levels. Even God manifested Himself to Moses in the form of a burning bush.
For them, the fiery Chariot (of which the Big and Little Chariots are the circumpolar symbols) that destroys the physical aspect of things does not take the form of airplanes that crash into the Twin Towers or that drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima, but of the Body of Light that allows perception in the divine world. However, for this to happen, one must be willing to accept a certain degree of ego-death.
It will be seen how, by studying the lines of right ascension of the circumpolar and other stars and constellations found there, we can verify which starry images correspond to them at the lower levels, that is, in the southernmost sky, and which are therefore in a sense more accessible, or at least less remote from the human level. Men are usually able to perceive only the material dimension of archetypes, which all have a single origin, identifiable astronomically with the celestial North Pole. They therefore have their highest levels of meaning in the stars that, being close to this point, have narrower parallels of declination, that is precisely the circumpolar stars that rotate around the Pole without ever rising or setting.
Rereading the myth of the cave of Plato will help to better understand the way the Divine World is translated into faded images, as you go down in level to the material plane.
The eventual manifestation of these potentials in a metaphysical/spiritual key also depends on various upstream factors, including the era in which one lives. It is evident that in the Kali Yuga there are much fewer who can access this plane. For example, Pegasus and the Big Dipper can also manifest as astral travel, Body of Light, etc., and there are no rigorous ways to understand from the birth chart if the native will live them in this sense. Or, as in the case of Einstein, in a scientific key, through revolutionary studies on the nature of time and the speed of light.
So there are not multiple realities, but only different ways of perceiving the same, unique Reality. And, for this reason, the same stellar factors that are more effective for ascension are the most powerful ones in normal "earthly" astrology. On the contrary, most of the time they translate themselves into remarkable events on the earthly plane since there are and will always be few who are able to channel them for the higher spiritual purposes and to live them in this way. This also depends to a great extent on the epoch of kali yuga in which we live: with certain stellar factors being equal, in other epochs likely new cults, religions, initiatory systems, great prophets, esoteric philosophies, etc. would have been born. But in the "dark age", as we know, everything tends to translate and manifest itself at its lower octave.
With this, we come to the second purpose of this work, which is of a more exquisitely practical and operative nature, in the sense that it will explain how the "ascension to the stars" takes place from the point of view of initiatory astrology. To this end, each reader will be able to use the means that he finds more congenial, from meditation to magic, up to the targeted use of substances used as "philosophical vinegar". Whatever means he chooses, knowing what are the "magical" moments that greatly favor the success of these operations will be of great help.
The ascension to the higher states of being - up to the Supreme State - can take place only along the lines of the colures. This supreme state is represented by the point of intersection between the two colures, represented by the North Pole.
As we will see in the course of the book, in order for this ascension to take place, it is necessary that there are stars along the colures, corresponding to various states of being that are like so many stations that one must pass through. At the same time, they are similar to vehicles that can transport us higher and higher. The higher the northern declination of the stars, the higher the state of being they represent, not because of their own nature, but because of the part of Heaven in which they are located.
In order for this transformation of being to take place, however, it is necessary for the human soul to be able to rise to these heights. In order to reach the stars, we must be able to carry out the transformations that they ask of us in order to board their vehicle and be taken higher and higher. It is basically a matter of progressively burning the individual ego, disidentifying from the physical body, and progressively transferring the consciousness into an etheric vehicle, the so-called Body of Light. This operation can be carried out at different levels, and usually does not happen all at once but progressively, as we rise to the higher stars, that is those with more northern declinations that are found along the colures.
The more one rises along the northern sky, the more one enters into a subtle and etheric dimension, which, precisely for this reason, can be inaccessible or traumatic for those who are not ready to get rid of the ego and the sense of corporeality.
We will see that in reality not only constellations such as those of the Dragon or the Lynx, but all the northern constellations and their stars can transform themselves into even terrible Guardians of the Threshold for those who are not worthy of accessing this state.
Each energy is dual, so all the northern stars can manifest as monstrous Guardians of the Threshold to those not worthy to cross it.
These ascensions also require the presence of one or more planets along the colures themselves. In fact, our first means of transport to detach ourselves from the earth will surely be one or more planets, since we cannot directly identify ourselves with the very high state of consciousness corresponding to a star.
The planets by themselves do not have the strength and power to transport us to the Supreme State, if they do not have stars to which they can be attached in the ways we will see, that is, through the presence on the same line of right ascension, especially if they are the colures.
But to reach the supreme state it is always necessary to cross that Abyss which consists in the loss of the individual ego and in the abandonment of the very sense of individuality in which the so-called "initiatory death" is substantiated. In this kind of experience, there is always a "scary" moment, and you must be ready to overcome it to come out on the other side of the tunnel.
We will talk about all this in a very technical and in-depth way, including some examples. And we will do so after demonstrating how these particular stellar factors were well present and active in the periods when the greatest turning points in the history of human spirituality occurred. We shall thus examine the stars of the Buddha and those of Pythagoras, of Moses and Jesus, and much more.
Above all, we will teach how to use certain particular stellar factors of the individual birth chart in the periods in which they come particularly to the fore, in order to identify the most propitious moments for the "climb to Heaven'', not only from a general point of view but also for our individual Microcosm. We should learn to take advantage of these golden moments in which these rare and precious convergences between Macrocosm and Microcosm occur.
This is the real secret astrology of the great initiates of ancient times. It is even demonstrated by some recent research related to the famous caves of Lascaux in France, where mysterious graffiti was made about 18,000 years ago. This location is located at 45° north, that is, at the northern latitude exactly median between the minimum (0°) and the maximum (90°). Many of these cave-sanctuaries were made at this latitude. For example, one of the images we find in these caves is that of a shaman being transformed into a bird. It has been ascertained that the angle between the vertical line represented by the wand and this type of terrain is about 45°, which is precisely the latitude of the Lascaux cave. And when this bird-man stands up, the stick indicates the north pole. According to the symbolism proper to all these prehistoric populations, the bird is a symbol of the pole, the polar star, and the circumpolar constellations. The etno-astronomer Chantal Jègues-Wolkiewiez has highlighted the correspondence of this representation with some astronomically relevant points, expressed in azimuth at 45° latitude:
1) rising of the Sun at the summer solstice (56°)
2) setting of the sun at the summer
solstice (304°)
3) rising of the Sun at the winter solstice (124°)
4) setting of the Sun at the winter solstice (236°)
5) rising at the equinoxes (90°)
6) setting at the equinoxes (270°)
In these caves, the ancient shamans performed their rituals aimed at reaching a state of trance, or out-of-body experience, that allowed them to ascend to Heaven and reach ecstasy. It was believed that certain space-time coordinates were essential for the success of the operation. For the ancients, space and time were not "neutral" as for the moderns, but every moment of time and every point of space had its own "coloring" that determined its quality, making a certain point of space/time more or less suitable for certain purposes. So even the ecstatic journey of the shaman had to take place at certain times of the year and in certain places. It was also important to assume specific postures that connected the body of the shaman with the axis of the world.
The axis of the world obviously has azimuth 0 and in the cave of Lascaux is represented by the stick with a bird floating atop it. By standing the bird-man through a rotation, the inclination of the axis of the world is 45°. We can therefore think of a shamanic posture that has a link with a specific sector of the vault of heaven. At that time the North Pole was located in the constellation of the Swan.
We will examine all this always in light of the particular and decisive role that the North Star and the circumpolar stars have in this type of experience. As revealed by Renè Guènon himself, the true central Sun of the occult Universe that lies behind and above the sensitive Sun is the Polar Star. It is not by chance that the original symbolism of the primordial Tradition was polar and axial, and only later did this symbolism shift to the solar and equatorial plane.
There is, therefore, a close relationship between the mountain and the cave, as they are both traditional symbols of spiritual centers.
There is no doubt that among all the "axial" or "polar" symbols, Cosmic Mountain is certainly one of the main ones. The Mountain joins Heaven and Earth, representing a symbolic equivalent of the "Universal Man" as King and Pontiff.
The top of the Sacred Mountain, or the top of the pyramid, represents the North Pole, which is the pivot of Heaven, and the way to get there is that of the colures. This position, therefore, seems to indicate the highest spiritual power active in the world, that is, what all traditions designate as the "Pole".
We will illustrate the specific astrological value of the North Star and the circumpolar stars. We will explain how to use the various astronomical coordinate systems to bring out these meanings, and we will see what equatorial aspects are and how they are used, i.e., those formed between stars - or between stars and planets - based on right ascension. They are of great value both in ascension astrology and in normal natal and world astrology.
We will then give some examples related to the uses of all these techniques both in individual birth charts and in world astrology.
We will give many concrete examples, relating both to actual experiences of this nature and to the way in which some of these astronomical factors were fully activated at the times when the figures who marked the great spiritual turning points in human history appeared. It will conclude with the stellar interpretation of Dante Alighieri's otherworldly journey and the very similar conception underlying the message carved in the stone of Castel del Monte.
There are many clues that suggest that in the Commedia Dante described in the allegorical form a "stellar journey" very similar to the one we describe in this work. It is no coincidence that Dante concludes each cantica with the word "stars," and it is no coincidence that the last verse of each cantica is isolated, in the sense that it is not part of a triplet like all the others.
All this must have a precise meaning because a medieval and sapiential poet like Dante did not do anything by chance or for simply "poetic" reasons.
In our opinion, it is likely that Dante had access to initiatory knowledge about some traditional techniques of ascension to Heaven through the stars, and that is why he included in his poem so many references to the stars, closing each poem with an isolated verse ending with the word "stars".
In Dante's time, the North Star was located on the equinoctial colure, and it is from the North Star that we will start to discover its secret message.
