Response to NASA: On the 13th Sign

There's been a lot of buzz around astrology traditions as NASA made the pronouncement in this past week that there are in reality 13 signs, a statement designed to discredit the practice of Astrology. This same topic crops up every now and then, and this time it seems to be making the rounds on social media more than ever before. After being asked by several people, I thought it was important to address the issue, here.

This 13th sign charade is based on a misconception about what astrology means, and what the signs actually are - namely symbolic markers for the twelve-fold cycle of the Sun (due to the earth's movement) through the seasons. I think that world-class astrologer @Steven Forrest said it best when he remarked - regarding this statement by a NASA suddenly attempting to make its mark upon astrological understanding:

"We keep seeing this damaging, stupid, evilly-intended crap about how 'you were not born under the sign you think you were.' Astrology is sacred and this misinformation can cut people off from the help it offers - that's why I say this so strongly.
The story is bogus. It gets circulated every year or so too. It's based on a total misunderstanding of the basis of astrology. We hear 'Aries' and of course we think of the CONSTELLATION Aries in the sky, but when Western astrologers say Aries that is not what they mean. To us, Aries begins exactly where the sun is on the first day of spring in the northern hemisphere. The confusion arose because a few thousand years ago that point WAS in the constellation Aries. Not anymore! There is a slow 26,000 year shift in the position of the Equinox and enough time has gone by to bollocks everything up.
In a nutshell, western astrology is based on the seasons, not the stars."


The seasonal basis for the signs could use a little further explanation. The Spring Equinox is the one day of the yearly cycle when the length of the day equals the length of the night (hence 'equinox') and sun's available energy is building — at least in the Northern Hemisphere. This signals a period of time, leading up to the Summer Solstice, during which the height of the noon-time sun grows, and the day is longer; at this final moment in the daylight's building arc through the sky, on June 21st or so, the sun at its highest point appears to stand still (hence 'solstice') and after that the sunlight recedes toward the Autumnal Equinox and the Winter Solstice, when in olden times everyone would pray for the return of the light. Currently, we celebrate Christmas.

In astrological (and astronomical) practice, the Spring Equinox signals 0 degrees of Aries, the Fall Equinox, 0 Libra, while the solstices signal 0 degrees of Cancer and Capricorn respectively. These are symbolic moments. The twelve signs, or twelve-fold divisions of this entire cycle, have symbolic resonance that has echoed down through the ages of man as representations of organic stages of growth, from the birth of the young organism to the seed of the next. You might call them the mythology of universal time, not as measured by clocks and calendars but by the movement of the heavens. This leads to thoughts regarding the prevailing collective attitudes and the centuries-old patriarchal over-valuation of rational thought as supreme. Astrology is one of the very ancient traditions that has been much scorned in modern times, and that yet even today serves to support us in self-discovery and for navigating the challenging times that we live in.

So, therefore, in another nutshell, this type of misinformation from so-called scientists (and I say so-called because the derivation of the word "science" is from "knowledge" including the well-founded symbolic understanding that informs mythology, religious thought, and depth psychology) is actually a form of superstition — call it scientism — that is unfortunately rife in the prevailing culture. Such prejudicial judgment has the unstated underlying belief that the only true basis of knowledge is a purity of rationalism; leaving out an entire universe of meaning that is, in its fundamental nature, symbolic.