Horary, where do I begin?

OnOrionsBelt

Minderwiz said:
IThere are some things you really need to do even before you start reading a chart.

I don't know how much you know about Astrology, and this would be the first thing to address. If you know very little, then even the posts of Sharla and Barleywine may not be very helpful. So your first step is to equip yourself with some sort of textbook, which wil give you the basics and a lot of examples. There are several listed in the resources section. Allied to this, you could do with some software. Traditional Morinus is free and it's very good for horary.

The second and more important thing you need to know is that horary involves distinct roles, the person who asks the question and the Astrologer who answers it by understanding the question asked and then casting and interpreting a chart.

Now there's absolutely no reason why both roles can't be played by the same person. However, in such cases it's very important that both roles are still carried out. It's very easy for you, playing both roles to miss an important step for the Astrologer. That step is understanding the question. If I was the Astrologer and you asked me this question I would be unsure what you meant. I can see several possible meanings and I'm not sure which you are using.

Do you mean a girlfriend or boyfriend... Something that will lead to romance? Do you mean a 'mate'.... Someone you can go to a club or football match with or play games with? Do you mean someone at work, or college you'd like to know better. Do you have a specific person in mind for any of those roles or are you asking because you have difficulty making friends and want to overcome that difficulty (in which case the question is about you, not the possible friend)?

Getting the question clear in the mind of the Astrologer is vital, otherwise you will not get the right answer. You might think that you know your own mind but it's very easy to slip up on this stage. The other day I asked a question about my wife's missing watch. It's a question that she had asked some time ago. I cast the chart and started reading it using the second house for personal valuables. It was only part the way through my search for the watch based on that chart, that I realised I'd referred to her by name in the question. She wasn't the person asking the question; that was me; and the second house was not her valuables. So I didn't understand my own question and had to start again.

Barley wine speculated that this might not be a suitable horary question and I can see why. There's no time frame and it could quite easily be a question about your basic personality and therefore more relevant to natal Astrology and our natal chart. It would be making the lines of 'Are you naturally predisposed to difficulties making friends?' If so then that is where you should look, your natal chart.

If you have no clear birth details and a natal chart is problematic, then horary might be a substitute, but not a perfect one. If your question is about making a friend in the next month or year then horary might well be the preferred way to go.

There's a lot to think about there but, in any horary question, getting the question clear is the hardest part. If you were consulting me for a readind we'd talk this over till I was satisfied I knew what you were asking. Reading for yourself means that you have to carry out that discussion with yourself. Only when you know exactly what you are asking and you have the right wording do you cast the chart.

Hi Minderwiz, thank you for the response. Yes, I am infantile and will need to back track on my learning. I can see the importance of how you ask the question and how very holey mine is. I'm feeling very confident in my understanding of what I was asking, would I still start all over?

I'm a little confused because I made a chart based off the moment I asked the question. I would still need to incorporate my own birth chart?

You gave so much information, thank you!!

Also, is this the software? http://www.sevenstarsastrology.com/?p=17
I recently acquired a windows machine too, so this is actually a possibility. So much of the free software is Windows.

OnOrionsBelt

Minderwiz said:
Barley wine speculated that this might not be a suitable horary question and I can see why. There's no time frame and it could quite easily be a question about your basic personality and therefore more relevant to natal Astrology and our natal chart. It would be making the lines of 'Are you naturally predisposed to difficulties making friends?' If so then that is where you should look, your natal chart.

Yes, definitely I naturally have difficulties. I'm sure it's written all over my natal chart. That's why I want to know how to make just ONE.

OnOrionsBelt

I have to go for now. This sounds like a weekend project. I know what Ill be doing this Sunday. I just need to gather my resources.
I'll check back later.

Sharla

If your an ABSOLUTE beginner in Astrology, then.....

1. You need to first know what each house means in a chart.

2. Learn all the symbols for each zodiac sign.

3. Learn the symbols for each planet.

4. Then memorize the planetary ruler for each zodiac sign i.e neptune rules pisces in a natal chart, but in a horary chart jupiter is the ruler of pisces.

5. Know what each aspect means (square, conjunct, opposition etc).

6. Know which signs are fixed, mutable, cardinal......and are they active/passive and water/earth.

Id say this was more or less your base then to build on.

Then you can start looking at essential dignitys of planets and angles etc.

Minderwiz

OnOrionsBelt said:
Hi Minderwiz, thank you for the response. Yes, I am infantile and will need to back track on my learning. I can see the importance of how you ask the question and how very holey mine is. I'm feeling very confident in my understanding of what I was asking, would I still start all over?

In principle, no. However, as you indicate only a rudimentary knowledge of Traditional Astrology, I would say you should start there.

OnOrionsBelt said:
I'm a little confused because I made a chart based off the moment I asked the question. I would still need to incorporate my own birth chart?

Again in principle the answer is no, you would not. However if the issue comes down to an innate difficulty in making friends, then both natal and a horary chart would be useful. The natal chart to look at the underlying problem and the horary chart to look for possible immediate courses of action.

Also, is this the software? http://www.sevenstarsastrology.com/?p=17
I recently acquired a windows machine too, so this is actually a possibility. So much of the free software is Windows.[/QUOTE]

I have that software but for horary and indeed the traditional approach in general, Traditional Morinus is the one I would prefer. Software is often a matter of how you like the 'handling' of the program, rather than just with what it can do (though that is obviously important). As both are free, try them both.

OnOrionsBelt said:
Yes, definitely I naturally have difficulties. I'm sure it's written all over my natal chart. That's why I want to know how to make just ONE.

Then, as I hinted above, the approach is to look at the natal chart first to see if there's any clearly defined difficulties and then to do a horary to look for the best possible actions to overcome those difficulties.

Now a modern approach would look to counselling as the follow up to the natal chart and I don't want to give the impression that that would not be a good course of action. However you might not like counselling, or you might have tried it and found that it didn't help. But don't rule it out otherwise. It's something to consider and indeed it's quite possible that it might be one of, if not the main, suggestions that come from the horary chart.

Barleywine said:
Minderwiz will know more about active web sites than I do. I mainly refer to John Frawley's book, The Horary Textbook.

A couple of the earliest threads that I did on Horary explained the technique in some detail, as well as a lot of examples from members who asked questions. I think there's something like 8 separate and long threads.

There's also in the forum notes, the thread on the terms used in horary.

www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?t=170562

I'll find the first thread and take the relevant posts to put into a 'How to' thread for Horary as several people seem interested in the topic. I'll pin it to the top of the threads with the other notes.

Horary seems 'rule bound' to many beginners. That's because it involves learning the traditional approach to reading a chart, rather than the more nebulous modern approach. The aim is to produce an objective outcome, rather than simply a 'feel good' factor.

The link you cited is quite good. I've only browsed it but the only objection that I had was the injunction not to use 'arabic parts'. I do use them, on occasion and that's because the first author of a recognisable horary textbook, Sahl Ibn Bishar (9th century) used them and indeed they have been part of Horoscopic Astrology since its inception around 50 - 100 BCE and should be more properly referred to as Hellenistic Lots.

The most well know Horary Astrologer, William Lilly (17th Century) used the Part (Lot) of Fortune extensively in his readings. I think he would have used more than this, if he had realised that the 'Parts' were not a foreign invention which corrupted Astrology but a genuine component of the orginal article (or at least a fair number of them were there from the start).