Behold, ye are gods! Yes, that's fine and good, but tell me, when's a good time to buy a new car? Well, probably when Mars (cars) trines Jupiter (opportunity) but you may be inclined to overspend! John Anthony West in A Case for Astrology laments that astrology, in truth a Sacred Science, has become separated from its metaphysical origins and all too often unfortunately resembles the typical Chaldean soothsayer of old who set up shop in the bustling Agora marketplace and who, for a fee, could read your fortune from the stars. Whatever happened to the Harmony of the Spheres, Plato's majestic vision of the Cosmos that depicts the Physical Universe as impregnated by Soul (Spirit), each planet playing its part in a Celestial Symphony echoed perfectly in Earth's greatest manifest creature, man?

For sure, even as Plato was teaching his Metaphysical Cosmogony, popular astrology imported from the East, and probably as old as civilization itself, never lost its footing. Well, what interests the average person more, philosophizing and meditating on original causes or personal prophecy on how your business will rise or fall in the next six months? What concerns you more, how your refrigerator works or simply getting it fixed?

Whatever the case, establishment astrology as West dubs modern practice, has certainly won the day thus far. Establishment astrology, West contends, is based largely on superstition, backed perhaps by some genuine intuitive understanding.

West picks up the thread from ancient times of an initiatic astrology, sometimes practiced in secret, sometimes encased in the stone of tombs and pyramids. This astrology, the science of individual human transformation, without which no civilization in any meaningful sense is possible, was known by some of the greatest minds of the ages. Pythagoras and Plato, the latter undoubtedly a Pythagorean himself, clearly understood and applied the principles of this esoteric astrology. In fact, Plato is the first among the classic great teachers of whom we have records to speak openly and at length about divine dynasties and their relationship to man.

The great and late astrologer Dane Rudhyar believed that astrology has no basically valid meaning except as part of an implied metaphysics. Unfortunately, the average astrologer, even when sincere in his/her care for the client knows little if anything about metaphysical foundations. This, I believe, is about to change. If Rudhyar, West and others haven't made a bigger impact to date in this vein it was because the time was not ripe. The time for change has, I believe, arrived. Aquarius has come!

Plato, and his good friend, Socrates, paid a high price for their exalted musings. But today we ride the crest of a new wave. In the words of Astrologer Charles Harvey, the overall picture which is re-emerging is of a universe which is unfolding in time through a great interlocking hierarchy of Ideas (Ideas in the Platonic sense, that is).

Plato called the planets the great visible gods. The gods were archetypes, primordial ideas, existing on the ether (etheric) dimension. They were endowed with soul (spirit) and intelligence. Helena Blavatsky in The Secret Doctrine expounded upon Plato's notion of soul. It is the invisible imponderable Spirit of things and the invisible but too tangible fluid that radiates from the fingers of the healthy magnetizer, for it is vital electricity, Life itself. In other words, and in accord with Biblical theology, the Creator, seeking an outer manifestation of Himself, created soul and then the corporeal universe. In Plato's words, the created image of the eternal gods.

Specific meaning is given to the mathematical relationship of each sphere to another and to man, and of the spheres represented within man. Here we see a metaphysical cornerstone to the modern astrologer's use of aspects, upon which he or she relies heavily for precise prediction. These Ideas outpictured in the heavens are reflected in the microcosm, as above so below. So within man are contained the laws of the universe. This correspondence, which is fundamental to astrological thought, was called by Carl Jung synchronicity. Understood in this way, a journey through your chart, or the chart of a nation, or even of the world itself, would constitute a journey in consciousness. The planets become outer symbols for internal psychological processes. Plato sought to delineate in detail the manner in which God manifests through the phenomenal world through these Universal Ideas.

For Rudhyar, consciousness is another word for relatedness, the crux of the astrologer's art. If any modern astrologer has approached (and extended) Plato's cosmological vision, I would say it is Rudhyar.

Spirit is the state of perfect relatedness. The consciousness illumined by spirit sees the entire universe as all-encompassing Harmony, as a perfect Chord in which all vibrations blend. In the Chord space is fulfilled as a plethora of vibrations. It is also a plentitude of consciousness, for consciousness is another term for relatedness. Where there is relationship, there also is consciousness; and as there are levels of relationship, there are also levels of consciousness, material, mental and spiritual.

Plato, and Pythagoras before him (who probably garnered much of his teaching from India), taught that musical harmony was an expression of cosmic harmony. The same mathematical ratios of the musical scale can be applied to the concept of planetary aspects. In Timaeus, Plato argues that we have sight expressly to be able to contemplate the Order of the Heavens. Through this contemplation, the soul is brought into harmony with the Harmony of the Spheres of which is born divine purpose.

Now throw in time, for without time how could we even speak of past, present and future? Here is Plato's definition of the genesis of Time (from Timaeus): The Creator resolved to have a moving image of eternity, and when he set in order the heaven, he made this image eternal but moving according to number, while eternity itself rests in unity; and this image we call time. Harvey sums up the essence of Plato's cosmic order: The planetary cycles are the threads of eternity which weave the great tapestry of life in time.

In particular, Plato's Great Year, is becoming once more a tenet of at least mundane astrological thought. Long time president of the Astrological Association of Great Britain, the late John Addey has been the principal exponent in modern times of harmonics, bringing back once more, after centuries of being shelved, so to speak, an understanding of astrology as a paradigm of divine order. With Addey's work, interest has revived in Plato's Great Year, particularly as it determines the cyclic ebb and flow of ideas in the collective unconscious of mankind.

Plato particularly strove to describe the interrelatedness of all life and its ultimate link to the Creator. The Platonic Great Year describes the entire Universe, once the great unity of the soul was divided, as the inbreath and outbreath of opposing principles. All this in rhythm with the motion of the five basic elements: fire, air, water, earth and ether. Astrologer Nicholas Campion sums up Plato's complex description: As the Universe breathed in there was a gradual increase of Strife, and as it breathed out there was an increase in Love. As one increased the other would diminish until a point of imbalance was reached, the four elements unraveled, the world collapsed and human civilization ceased to exist. At this point God would intercede and reverse the process, initiating the rebirth of civilization.

This process was seen as part of a cycle. One year of the Universe lasted 36,000, a cycle in itself. However, a complete breath involves two motions, 72,000 years, constituting a complete cycle of civilization from birth to decay, from beginning to ending, and beginning again. Thirty-six, according to Plato who surely based his understanding on Pythagoras, was the key number of change. Like the Assyrians before him, Plato saw the beginning and ending of the cycle coinciding with powerful conjunctions. The Assyrians considered the Capricorn/Cancer to be the major polarity in the Great Year. Some have assumed that Plato envisioned the cycle beginning at 0 degrees Aries, the point where exoteric astrology begins, but this is not necessarily true. According to Plato, astrology helps us harmonize with these universal rhythms and so help the universe balance itself, and therefore delay the inevitable increase of Strife over Love.

Applying these principles to every-day life, Plato thought, for example, that politics should act in accordance with the laws of time. In Laws Plato outlines that the ideal State, then, would be governed by 360 councilors, divided into 12 groups of 30, each group ruling for one month. Harmony happens when mundane life imitates celestial geometry. As above so below.

Note that the 2,144 year period of an Astrological Age which is part of the precession of the equinoxes is receiving more attention in outer astrological circles today (as opposed to being confined to inner metaphysical circles such as Blavatsky and the Theosophists). This is probably due to the transition from the astrological Age of Pisces to that of Aquarius. The time of precession through one sign is called a platonic month or an astrological age. There is a mathematical correlation, hence a significant interpretive corollary, between Platonic Year and a Precessional year. This is due to the fact that the constellations precess over the vernal point by one degree in every 72 years.

Campion brings up a striking point: predetermined fate has been replaced by man's use of free will. History doesn't have to repeat itself as it did in the past. We are co-creators with God. In a metaphysical sense, things have changed since Plato's time, through the work of Jesus Christ and a dispensation of grace. If mankind in its majority elevates consciousness to a higher frequency, the individual can intervene in an active sense in the collective destiny. Individual astrology, when seen from this vantage, and mundane or world astrology become inseparable.

Despite a blistering tongue, John Anthony West's study, A Case for Astrology, concludes on a hopeful note. We stand on the threshold of recouping what once was a valid and crucially important aspect of the ancient initiatic discipline, the Sacred Science. In Timaeus, the latter recounts to Socrates the destruction of Atlantis by Flood about 9,000 years previously. He says that Athens is Atlantis come again but that we are like children in that we have forgotten that which we once knew and have to learn it all again. Perhaps Plato was representing Astrology as the esoteric science that once thrived on Atlantis. Atlantis is come again in Aquarius. This, to many, is the promise of Aquarius.

But first, oh mankind, awaken to your divine potential. Ye are gods incarnate!