Is astrology religious or spiritual?

December 17, 11:04 AMAstrology ExaminerMaria Barron

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Illustration by Maria Barron

Ability in Vedic astrology remains an important requirement for a Hindu priest. The magi who “followed the star” to the newborn king in Judea had followed the stars regularly as part of their duties as astrologers, probably as members of a priestly class in service to royalty in Persia, where the Zoroastrian religion had taken root.

At the time of Christ, the Jewish Torah’s words gave weight and religious honor to the practice of following signs in the sky and seeking opportunities to stand under (and understand) their light. Bibles today continue to bear these words from Genesis: Then God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth”; and it was so. (Gen. 1:14-15)

The people who could distinguish and calculate the signs above and their correlations on Earth were not only vital to the survival of civilizations dependent on nature. In the view of the ancients, they were also undertaking an honorable contemplation of God’s creation and how we fit in it.

Jesus also spoke of signs in the sky. But institutional Christianity, holding Christ as the sole redeemer of souls, clashed with the pantheons of gods and goddesses of the Greek and Roman traditions and of the Hindu way. Of course, those were the very gods and goddesses for whom the planets were named and who had come to be seen as rulers of stretches of the sky – of the mathematical plane of space through which the planets travel. But the practice of astrology does not equate to the practice of a dead pre-Christian religion of Olympus – nor, necessarily, to the practice of a living pre-Christian religion like Hinduism.

In my particular case, I do respect the living faiths that honor God’s unlimited aspect and see God manifesting many ways. I think of Mother Theresa, immersed in the culture of India, seeing God in everyone. I respect people who have found a form of spirituality that sustains them, I hold a special love for those who are searching, and I know and honor people whose moral code is not religious. As a Christian who understands astrology and relies on the western Greco-Roman approach, I assure you I don’t worship Jupiter or Zeus.

I do confess to a great deal of fondness for the archetype of Athena. I also sprang, fully formed and wearing armor, from my father’s forehead! And my mama raised me, bless her soul. My Capricorn moon, which is a part of my own inborn nature that I understand far better now that I’m conversant with ancient symbolism, bends me toward a tendency of holding deep respect for those who went before, for our ancestors, if you will.

For me, it is usually quite easy to honor my Mother and Father and see them for the blessed representations of God on earth that they are. I see that holy essence, as well, in many figures in history and in religion, and those standing at the crossroads in those moments where history and religion intersect. Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. Of course, there can also be great evil at those intersections, as well.

As a woman of heart and mind, I delight in the resonance of deeply poetic, artistic symbolism – and I want to see God – even more than I delight in playing with the inner workings of a computer server. And I do; I’m quite the tech geek. But as I look into the patterns which the ancient priestly scholars passed down through ages and distance, I recognize the same sorts of minds at work. Minds that want to understand material reality and that also want to know God. I find them speaking my language.

Their symbolism pervades many cultures, including our own, and its use is like that of a Farmer’s Almanac, even though most of us don’t farm anymore. It gives us a cosmic weather report, a sense of the natural character of this particular time and place. In a spiritual way, it can remind us of the divine at work in nature and reflecting in us – in our material and divine natures. Astrology should certainly not be seen as competition or a threat to any religion or form of worship. Haven’t we come a couple of millennia from that culture clash?

At the same time, it’s certainly not just superstitious old rubbish. Rather, astrology is a beautiful, organic and poetic, historical underpinning of many and perhaps all forms of spirituality, through which scientific principles of the universe were developed hand-in-hand with a sense of the numinous essence; in other words, a sense of the existence of the divine.

I study the stars through an ancient symbolic system developed by spiritual people seeking knowledge of their universe – a system that still enlightens today. To me, it remains an honorable contemplation of God’s creation and how we fit in it.

In my view, astrology is neither a religion nor a form of spirituality in and of itself. However, its symbolic meanings can be a clear reminder of the moral principles held in common by the world’s major religions, and contemplation of its subject matter can be a useful spiritual tool. Used the way it’s used by most people I know, astrology helps us to stay in touch with our spirituality and with our sense of being integrated parts of a much larger universal whole, existing right now at this moment in time and space for the glory of God.