Nature & Temperament: Of the Power of the Planets & the 2 Forces [According to Egyptian Ptolemy]
last updated: 30/Nov/2021
Considerations
In the first part of Book I; Chapter IV (Of the Power of the Planets – In Greek: Περὶ τῆς τῶν πλανωμένων ἀστέρων2 δυνάμεως [something like “On [about] the Planets and their 2 potencies/forces”], the polymath begins measuring forces with the Sun and Orbs of influence of the planets, beginning with the Sun itself and its magnitude.
The original translation [page 19th of original translation by j. m. Ashman & paraphrase of Proclus] of Chapter 4 of Book I, it was actually titled “The Influences of the Planetary Orbs” as opposed to the popular modern transtlation which omits the Orbs (“Of the Power of the Planets”), and again, the degrees are not discussed, but only the planetary operation and their basic associations to earthly affairs and their magnitutes, comparing the meeting point of the Sun to how further it gets from it.
From “heating” to “coldness”, Ptolemy wants you to know that the ancients cared to talk about you and me with the same concerning, at cosmic [astrological in this case] level and your general disposition towards the world knowing the conditions and “temperament” of what happens above from the “Orbs” of the planetary motion.
Of the [Orbs] Power of the Planets
In this chapter, Ptolemy describes in Greek the essential nature and the operation of the 7 traditional and visible planets relative to the daily motion/revolution of the Sun and the conditions that follow having the Zenith as reference (a part of the day is heat [at the zenith] at its extreme, other part dry, the night brings about the moisture [Moon] and so forth).
It is in this Chapter that Ptolemy writes about Planetary Orb without saying/writting “planetary orb”. We are so used to think “Orbs” only as degrees, but we forget that such is pointed only later when you detail orient, but even then, during the whole treatise the author didn’t care to write how far each planet could influence the configuration by degrees, so we have to rely on others sources and how their reached such conclusions.
It is important to remind that such significations are also interpreted how the ancients view the closeness to remoteness the body is relative to the all powerful heating Sun. They viewed the sky very differently from how we do nowadays; of course we now know planet Earth is not the “center” of the universe [or the Solar system more specifically] and the Sun does not transit Earth but the other way around [heliocentric].
The Chaldean order of the planets makes a statement by itself: symbols are essential to us, such order is symbolical and it works just fine at fundamental level in astrology. The tropical Zodiac is based on the Sun’s Ingress in Aries of a fixed board/Zodiac [tropical system] and not the actual constellation on the ecliptic [due to precession of the equinoxes] but still based on the Solar System and its ever motion/operation; it is metaphoric [as above, so below] and denotative [points out], and sometimes pre-determined and determined (as I personally understand it). As I also understand, they not only saw the planets from a geocentric perspective but they also fathomed it as a vertical system relative to the Sun [ex. Mars sphere is above the Sun in the vertical view when put Earth “centered” yet below all planets], and although things are relative, astronomers teach us we are quite in a horizontal trip where the Sun and the whole solar system travels 200km per second.
Each planet is understood as possessing 2 (two) classifications of nature & temperament: the “Heat & Dry and/or Wet & Cold”. A native owning a predominant Sun in a chart, is very different from someone who has the Moon in dominion; the Sun is said to be that of “Heat”, a warm identity or disposition, when the Moon has the “Wet” quality which nature is to “humidify”, a sensitive complexion let’s put it.
For predictions and prognostics, knowing these essential basic natures in advanced is a clever way to reach for the stars and their (orbs of) influence. Read it:
Planet | Nature & Temperament | |
Sun Fire |
… The active power of the Sun’s essential nature is found to be heating and, to a certain degree, drying. This is made more easily perceptible in the case of the Sun than any other heavenly body by its size and by the obviousness of its seasonal changes, for the closer it approaches to the zenith [highest point overhead] the more it affects us in this way
| |
Moon Water |
…Most of the Moon’s power consists of humidifying, dearly because it is close to the earth and because of the moist exhalations there from. Its action [operation] therefore is precisely this, to soften and cause putrefaction in bodies for the most part, but it shares moderately also in heating power because of the light which it receives from the Sun
| |
Saturn Earth |
…It is Saturn’s quality chiefly to cool and [moist] rarely, to dry, probably because he is furthest removed both from the sun’s heat and the moist exhalations about the earth.
Both in Saturn’s case and in that of the other planets there are powers, too, which arise through the observation of their aspects to the Sun and the Moon, for some of them appear to modify conditions in the ambient in one way, some in another, by increase or by decrease
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Mars Fire |
… The nature of Mars is chiefly to dry and to burn, in conformity with his fiery colour and by reason of his nearness to the Sun, for the Sun’s sphere lies just below him
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Jupiter Fire |
…Jupiter has a temperate active force because his movement takes place between the cooling influence of Saturn and the burning power of Mars. He both heats and humidifies; and because his heating power is the greater by reason of the underlying spheres, he produces fertilizing winds
| |
Venus Water |
…Venus has the same powers and tempered nature as Jupiter, but acts in the opposite way; for she warms moderately because of her nearness to the Sun, but chiefly humidifies, like the Moon, because of the amount of her own light [as visiable to us] and because she appropriates the exhalations from the moist atmosphere surrounding the earth
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Mercury Fire/Water |
…Mercury in general is found at certain times alike to be drying and absorptive of moisture, because he never is far removed in longitude from the heat of the Sun; and again humidifying, because he is next above the sphere of the Moon, which is closest to the earth; and to change quickly from one to the other, inspired as it were by the speed of his motion in the neighborhood of the Sun itself
Note: Mercury as result is subordinate of the Sun or Moon [positions].
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The qualities can be quite ‘Aristotelian’. If you read On Generation and Corruption By Aristotle [Translated by H. H. Joachim], you will notice Aristotle doctrines on the 4 elements and the temperaments’ combination:
“The elementary qualities are four, and any four terms can be combined in six couples. Contraries, however, refuse to be coupled: for it is impossible for the same thing to be hot and cold, or moist and dry. Hence it is evident that the ‘couplings’ of the elementary qualities will be four: hot with dry and moist with hot, and again cold with dry and cold with moist. And these four couples have attached themselves to the apparently ‘simple’ bodies (Fire, Air, Water, and Earth) in a manner consonant with theory. For Fire is hot and dry, whereas Air is hot and moist (Air being a sort of aqueous vapour); and Water is cold and moist, while Earth is cold and dry.”
Altough the association, astrology was of course thousand years old/present before the philosopher, and such knownladge was at it seems, already imprinted in the occult of very ancient times (?), yet, the teaching can be quite useful to astrological perspective.
Conclusion
The Orbs of the Planets are “extracted” from the result of planetary interaction with the solar system itself. We tend to associate Orbs only to degrees these days. However, when you being talking about the Orbs of the planet, you are actually primarly pointing out their power/influence or simple participation over/with others’ bodies; hence their main operation is based on the relation/participation with the Sun. The Orbs of Influence.
In the last chapter of Book I, Ptolemy writes down more on the Orbs of the Planets, click here.
This table [above] is important for the astrologer to know before one begins to decipher how come the planets are rather benefic or malefic as well.
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References
Tetrabiblos Ptolemy’s four books of the influence of the stars [or the Quadripartite Mathematical Treatise] translated from the Greek paraphrase of Proclus by j. m. Ashmand – [London, Davis and Dickson; 1822]
Ptolemy. Tetrabiblos. Translated by F. E. Robbins. Loeb Classical Library 435. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1940.
Generation and Corruption By Aristotle [Translated by H. H. Joachim; 1922]