The growth of the occult 'underground' is one of the most fascinating features of late 19th and early 20th century British society. After decades of neglect, a growing body of scholarship is now dedicated to various aspects of Victorian and Edwardian magical practices and personalities, in an effort to understand why such a powerful cultural current could emerge simultaneously with the rise of modern science, and why it continues to exercise such a pervasive influence in many contemporary spiritualities. The books, articles, letters, and diaries produced by major figures in the occult revival, such as Aleister Crowley and Dion Fortune, reveal the centrality of the Jewish Kabbalah in occultist thought and practice. However, the ways in which these individuals, and the secret societies they founded, sourced and utilised Jewish esoteric lore are largely ignored in current research. Current scholarship generally assumes that 'occultist' Kabbalah is a modernreinvention of older traditions,with little relationship to its Jewish roots. This assumption ignores the documented contributions of Jewish scholars and Kabbalists to the occultists' work, and there is little, if any, in-depth comparison of the ideas expressed by British occultists and the Jewish Kabbalistic literature of the medieval and early modern periods. And why was the Jewish Kabbalah was so compellingly attractive to non-Jewish occultists at a time of turbulent social and scientific change, when religious, political, and racial antisemitism constituted a normative attitude in many circles of British society? This book provides a new, exciting, and penetrating analysis of how and why the Jewish Kabbalah was adopted and integrated, rather than reinvented or recreated, by important figures in the British occult revival, and why it remains a dominant theme in the spiritual currents of the twenty-first century.

Magi and Maggidim: The Kabbalah in British Occultism 1860-1940

History

Greene Ph.D., Liz

Europe

Sophia Centre Press

Human beings in all cultures have long used the sky to tell stories and weave myths that impart meaning to life on earth. The key to all such systems is symbolism, in which one thing is used to signify, imply, represent, or embody another. The papers included in this volume are all concerned, in one way or another, with various perceptions of the world of celestial phenomena as symbols. These explorations range from art history and analytical psychology to critiques and accounts of astrology, and roam from western to non-western cultures, as well as from the ancient world to the modern. The papers, most of which were given at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David Sophia Centre Conference in Bath, UK, in 2011, provide a valuable addition to the scholarly literature on our understanding of the origins, function, and nature of symbols, especially their use in relation to cultural applications of astronomy, astrology, and the sky.

Sky and Symbol

Sleeve Notes from Brazilian Edition  We see in the present century, after its relative decline in European societies in the seventeenth century, a return of astrology in modern urban centres, where the number of astrological consultants increases and the newspapers publish 'horoscopes' with predictions for the natives of each Sun sign. Astrology, the ancient divinatory system which has been experiencing growing popularity in large Brazilian cities in recent years, has rarely received attention in the social sciences. This book analyses the beliefs and cultural constructions of their world in a group of individuals belonging to the middle classes in Rio and involved in the use of astrology. By means of research and interviews, the author, approaching the urban middle classes, takes the following question as his hypothesis: to what extent can we say that astrology contributes to the construction of [a] particular lifestyle? The author begins his analysis from the main principles of the symbolic system of astrology and its divinatory practice, attempting to show that, in the same way as the structure of myth investigated by Lévi-Strauss, the structure of this system remains constant across its various versions. Despite this stability throughout its history, it is capable of receiving several different social appropriations. In the case of interest here, it is the appropriation made of it among sectors of the urban middle class in Rio de Janeiro, for whom psychotherapy is already an influence, and whose views are analysed in detail in the last chapter. Relating itself to varying degrees with psychoanalysis and religion, astrology shows itself to be a symbolic language capable of engaging the fragmentation of modern daily life. Thus it becomes clear that this little-known phenomenon of contemporary culture cannot be reduced to a mere irrational survival. This book is an original contribution to the study of the middle classes in Brazil, and of astrology as an "alternative culture", an area little studied by the social sciences. In addition to discussing the classics and more recent anthropological works on the subject, the author examines the ambiguous relation which modernity has with astrology: 'arising in its very heart, it presents a discourse marked by criticism of the values of modernity'. Complementing this volume, the reader will find a glossary explaining astrological terms in Appendix 2.  About the Author  Luis Rodolfo da Paixão Vilhena took his Master's degree in Social Anthropology in the Postgraduate Programme in Social Anthropology of the National Museum (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, UFRJ). He was a researcher at the National Institute of Folklore (FUNARTE), 1988-1989, where he studied the history of Folklore Studies in Brazil and was a lecturer at UERJ and of the Faculty Veiga de Almeida. He died in 1997.

The World of Astrology: An Ethnography of Astrology in Contemporary Brazil

Politics & Social Sciences

Vilhena, Luis Rodolfo

Anthropology

Astrology has recently become a subject of interest to scholars of the highest calibre. However, the tendency has been to look at the social context of astrology, the attacks on astrologers and their craft, and on astrological iconography and symbolism; i.e., largely looking on astrology from the outside. The intention of this book is to do is to look at the subject from the inside: the ideas and techniques of astrologers themselves. In both Western and Eastern cultures astrology was regarded as a pure science by most scholars, mathematicians, physicians, philosophers and theologians, and was taught in schools and universities. The greatest astronomers of the period under consideration, al-Kindi, Thabit ibn Qurra, Abraham Ibn Ezra, Galileo and Kepler, also wrote about and practised astrology. What did astrologers write about astrology and how did they teach their subject and practise their craft? What changes occurred in astrological theory and practice over time and from one culture to another? What cosmological and philosophical frameworks did astrologers use to describe their practice? What role did diagrams, tables and illustrations play in astrological text-books? What was astrology's place in universities and academies? This book contains surveys of astrologers and their craft in Islamic, Jewish and Christian culture, and includes hitherto unpublished and unstudied astrological texts.

From Masha' Allah to Kepler: Theory and Practice in Medieval and Renaissance Astrology

Life on Earth would not exist without the brilliant objects we see in it; we would not be here without the light and heat of the Sun, and the rhythmic, tidal, biologically-vital, influences of the Moon. From earliest recorded history and in all societies the stars and planets, indeed the entire sky, have been a source of meaning for human affairs. In many cultures the heavenly bodies speak to humanity and, often, humanity talks back. Sometimes the stars speak for themselves as divine entities. In much western art and literature they become metaphors, underpinning narratives - and discourses - which explore or dramatise the human condition, as in the epic narratives of modern, cinematic science fiction. And for millennia human beings have imagined a journey to the heavens. This dream finally became a reality on 12 April 1961 when Yuri Gagarin made his single, historic orbit of the Earth. This date inaugurated the period of human space travel, and has a claim to be one of the most significant moments of human history.    The Heavenly Discourses conference was a celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of Gagarin's achievement, held at the University of Bristol and sponsored by the Sophia Centre for the Study of Cosmology in Culture at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. This volume brings together selected papers from that conference and provides a valuable resource in the emerging discipline of Cultural Astronomy.

Heavenly Discourses

Arts & Photography

History & Criticism

From the earliest times, human beings have been driven by the basic needs to procure food and water, shelter and defence, and communication with other members of the group. The skyscape was different from these, as it was beyond the reach of people and could not be manipulated. Yet, the innate imagination of human beings could not be unmoved by the sun and the moon, which dominate the day and night and apparently move in a well-ordered fashion, and the stars, which provide a splendid canopy on clear dark nights. Although celestial objects could not be handled and exploited in a tangible manner, people's creativity sought to understand them, to find some use for them in relation to one's needs and activities and to generate ideas about their nature and their meaning for humanity. In addition, concepts, patterns, myths and other creations of this intangible culture could be transformed into material culture, including iconography, calendars, structural orientations and other human creations. These manifestations constitute the materiality of the sky and bear witness to human beings' interest in the sky. The chapters in this volume illustrate the variety of research activity generated in this field of study across a broad spectrum of ages, cultures, and geographical regions.

The Materiality of the Sky

Archaeology

Is astrology an art? How does art represent astrology and its practice? Is the visual language used by astrologers artistic? From Mesopotamia and Mediterranean culture to Mesoamerica and into the European Renaissance and the modern era, the nine chapters in this anthology explore the meanings of art and astrology, the iconography of astrology and the nature of its practice, the use of zodiac signs, and the portrayal stars and planets in literature and the visual arts. With contributions by Spike Bucklow, Ruth Clydesdale, Richard Dunn, Martin Gansten, Liesbeth Grotenhuis, John Meeks, Suzanne Nolan, Micah Ross, and Claudia Rousseau.

Astrology as Art: Representation and Practice

This anthology brings together chapters from astronomers, historians and writers who are inspired by the sky, and who originally gathered at the conference on the Inspiration of Astronomical Phenomena at London’s Gresham College in 2015. Its topics range from the representation and exploration of the sky in the arts, architecture and literature, and from the ancient world to the digital age.

Imagining Other Worlds: Explorations in Astronomy and Culture

Science & Math

Astronomy & Space Science

The Messianic Star: New Light on the Star of Bethlehem (Studies in Cultural Astronomy and Astrology)

Religion & Spirituality

Wells, Martin

Christian Books & Bibles

Astrology is a major feature of modern popular culture. Its westernised form has spread around the world yet has attracted almost no academic attention. Skylights breaks new ground in paying systematic attention to the theories, claims and practices of western astrology in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Three chapters set the scene by examining the roots of astrology in classical interactions with the divine, Islamic apocalyptic belief, and the introduction of the astrology of the Islamic world into medieval Christian Europe. Eight chapters then explore issues which have ancient roots but run through modern astrology. The book explores how astrologers interpret history and portray the soul. It discusses the emergence of modern psychological astrology and the popular horoscope column, and asks how astrology can be understood as a language and relates to traditional notions of nature as conscious.

Skylights: Essays in the History and Contemporary Culture of Astrology

New Age & Spirituality

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