Astrological Chart as Koan
Hi, Taal here. I want to introduce you to my Dharma friend, @fourteenclayballs. He and I met on Twitter back when that was a thing that was good, and… look, I don’t want to use the “s” word or the “t” word, but he asks me Dharma questions from time to time, and I answer them, or I non-answer them, and he has gotten quite into Zen and stuff while we have known each other.
Anyway, I think I expected my astrology pivot to be somewhat perplexing to him, but instead he apparently totally gets it. For no reason I can discern — which is of course the #1 reason for doing anything, as I am constantly advocating to him — @fourteenclayballs has written a short treatise on how he has come to understand what astrology is through the lens of the “public case,” or koan in Japanese. As someone who has been desperately trying to articulate a Zen point of view on astrology and produced absolutely nothing, I was ecstatic to read this. I asked @fourteenclayballs if he would allow me to publish it, and he relented.
Astrology is a collection of techniques for uncovering insights and cultivating awareness of human-being, through the study of a readily accessible portion of the wider expanse. Perhaps because of the portion’s quality of ready availability, astrology has been successfully transmitted through many cultures, who have skilfully adapted its techniques to better fit their own localities and people.
An astrological chart is a public case, documenting the interaction between typical roles, turning over in recurring forms.
People who adopt the practice of studying astrological charts may find sufficiently many of the cases to be curiously uncanny or comfortingly familiar enough to warrant continued consideration.
Studying cases may induce a feeling of “I get it” or “I don't get it”. Both sensations can provide potential for an adjustment to the way roles are being played out.
Discussion of cases with other practitioners may be elucidating. Indeed, it's common to seek the guidance of a well-experienced practitioner on these matters.
Common devices for analysing cases are to consider the reverse, negation, and inversion of the forms within.
Practitioners may approach a case with a view to obtain an answer to a particular question.
“What is my nature?"
“Given the current conditions, what may arise?"
“What are the correct conditions for transformation?"
For any given case there could be many plausible interpretations. Causes of variation in interpretation could be the location of the case and its practitioner, the time the case is being observed at, and what role the practitioner is taking when consulting the case. In this way, the interpretation arrived at by the practitioner may be less illuminating than the arrival of the practitioner at their particular interpretation. This is especially instructive in private discussions between a less-experienced and a more-experienced practitioner.
Even amongst the most skilful practitioners, ultimate clarification through consideration of a case may not be met (should a thing such as "ultimate clarification" even be considered a valid term in a discipline so firmly rooted in impermanence). While it may be the practitioner's original intention to arrive at some clarification, not arriving at clarification does not mean the practice has not worked in a meaningful way. Rather, the entire purpose of studying cases could have been to act as a distraction for the superfluous, allowing situations to flow properly.
