Tarot + Dignities
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I'm a little confused by the table of the essential dignities of the planets in the Book of Thoth, p.284
For example, it has the moon exalted in the 3* of Taurus, that would be in the first decan. But the first decan is attributed to the 5 of Disks. The next card, 6 of Disks, is attributed to the second decan and the moon in Taurus. Crowley mentions the moon being exalted in connection with this card. The problem is that we're already a decan out of sync.
So is the table on p.284 wrong? Or is there no intended correlation between the table and the minor card/decan attributions/planet exaltations?
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@Her said
"For example, it has the moon exalted in the 3* of Taurus, that would be in the first decan. But the first decan is attributed to the 5 of Disks. The next card, 6 of Disks, is attributed to the second decan and the moon in Taurus. Crowley mentions the moon being exalted in connection with this card. The problem is that we're already a decan out of sync."
The exaltation degrees (or hypsomata) bear no relationship to the decanates, so don't worry about mismatches.
These degrees date back to 786 BC. Cyril Fagan discovered their origin in the mid-1940s and published the results in his book Zodiacs - Old & New, in case you're into looking further into it.
Additionally, the decanates actually have no demonstrable effect in astrology. A lot of Hermetic symbolism has built up around them, and is important when astrological symbolism is used in non-astrological fields such as Tarot and astrology - but, despite the statistical demonstrability of sign (or, rather, constellation) influences, not one statistical study has yet shown any decanate significance in actual astrology.
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Ahh, thank you Jim. That's cleared it up for me. Just when I thought I was getting the whole system straight in my head, it looked like it was all going to fall apart again. Phew!
There is one small thing still bothering me though. Two pages earlier, p.282, Crowley list two constellations, Hercules and Pegasus, and links them in with the astrology of two of the the court cards. Even in my limited understanding of astrology I'm quite sure that actual star clusters have nothing to do with this system because it's a construct. So how can Crowley start dragging in real constellations?
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@Nudor said
"Jim, is Cyril Fagan's book, "Zodiacs Old & New" still available?"
It's not listed in the Astrology Center of America catalog
astroamerica.com
and if an astrology book is available at all new, it's usually available there. Used copies listed on Abebooks run from 27 USD to 400 USD:
www.abebooks.com -
@Nudor said
"Jim, is Cyril Fagan's book, "Zodiacs Old & New" still available?"
It's been OP for decades. However, if you really want to spend $400 for a used copy
, they'll let you do that here:
www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0000CHXKB/ref=sr_1_olp_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1212952996&sr=1-1