Understanding the concept of the “Levels of the Chart” is important when working with the charts. It is not an element of construction as much as an overall concept to be understood. I initially learned about the five levels of the chart as described below while studying with the Hubers. Although these levels have always been there, I have never seen the concept of levels discussed anywhere else, nor do I believe that many astrologers actually think about the aspects, planets, signs and houses in the way that they are described here. For me, learning to initially look only at the aspects and aspect pattern, and to see it as the inner wiring, was new and has been instrumental in strengthening my astrology. As you will see, by layering each level on top of the ones coming before, the format of both understanding and delineation are both changed and, I believe, improved upon. Hopefully, after having digested this material, you will come to agree with me.
Here is an example of an Inner Chart. As you can see it depicts the houses outside of the signs which fits correctly with the Levels of the Chart concepts given below.
The five levels or layers of the chart are to be seen as working from the inside as Center, working their way outward. Working from the center the levels are: Center, Aspects, Planets, Signs, and Houses on the outside. This works in a way like the workings of an individual.
CENTER OF THE CHART:
You are at the center of the chart. This is like what we have described above. Symbolically, the center also represents the unknowable atman, self, or essence. The Soul. It is difficult to define or describe what you are in the purest most simple yet complete form, but whatever we wish to call it, it is located at the center.
ASPECTS – THE ASPECT MAP
The second level is the level of the aspects. This is where we find the aspect map, which contains all of the individual aspects. The aspects are shown in red, blue and green. The aspects define the relationship between the planets and between you and the planets.
Aspects – “aspectare” Latin “to look at each other”. The aspect structure shows the internal mechanism at work so to speak. The aspects describe how the “Center” utilizes the planets. The aspect structure is of the greatest importance in my system. With the Inner Chart, this structure shows the internal circuitry, the unconscious motivation, the structure of subconscious activity. In the Outer Chart, we see how this circuitry is wired for use when interacting with the external world. The aspects describe the type of energy and harmony or incongruence of the urges of the specific planets. Individual aspects show how specific planets work together or modify each other whereas, when all planets aspecting each other are taken together, you get a more complete picture of the subconscious or unconscious activity. Your internal wiring. You will also see when certain planets are not well connected to the main circuit plan such that their energies stand somewhat separate from the main focus of one’s energies. The entrance to the chart is the aspect structure. We need to be open to the messages contained therein. We will find, when working with aspect figures later, that doing so helps us achieve a more holistic interpretation of each person’s individual planetary components, the specific urges and energies.
This is why the study of the aspect figures, as well as the overall pattern, becomes so important in understanding the makeup of the individual. They tie the planets together. They show the inner workings in a way more basic and integral than simply describing individual planets, or possibly following the path of dispositors (Sun in Sag in 12th, it’s ruler Jupiter in 9th in Libra, etc.). This is also why I draw the horoscope in a way that emphasizes the aspect map. This is where we find the entrance to the chart, whether looking at it from the view of the native at center or from the perspective of the onlooking astrologer.
I only use the seven aspects as described above under “Colors”.
PLANETS:
The third level is where we find all the planets, the Sun, Moon and the 8 Planets (all planets except Earth).I include Pluto as a planet.These are “characters”. These are the players that occupy our local universe, the tools that we have to work with representing our urges and energies, the needs (the need to love, to be physical, to communicate). Sometimes called the Actors in the play. The active urges originate in the subconscious. The planets form aspects based upon their zodiacal position relative to each other. The aspect pattern is more sub-conscious, at least until it is identified and worked with. The planets are well understood and their effects can be described and established, and then blended together as described within the aspect pattern. The almost infinite variability of placement for each planet and between the planets creates uniqueness, just as each person is also unique.
The centrality of the planets. From Margaret Hone’s Modern Textbook of Astrology: “The planets are to be studied first of all, because they are the Centre and core of astrological tradition.” The ancients were perhaps more specific about just how planets were the “core,” but modern astrologers say essentially the same, if only sotto voce under the rattle and din made by the clash of abstruse parts, nouveau planets and esoteric points. As Geoffrey Dean and Arthur Mather note in Recent Advances in Natal Astrology: “Without planets there is no astrology….” see (“http://www.planetos.info).
SIGNS – THE ZODIAC
The fourth level out is the circle of the zodiac, the twelve signs that divide the circle into twelve equal parts. Somehow, we have arrived at this division by 12. The signs provided a describable backdrop for the planets as they marched on their way around the Sun. From the time of Ptolemy and before the signs described the collective environment and the genetic structure for each and all humans. The twelve signs of the zodiac conveniently fulfill this requirement. These are the “styles”. Sometimes called the Roles the Actors play. The mode of expression of these urges. The Signs represent various Inherited Qualities, the twelve basic archetypes or roles of being a human being. They are our tie in or relationship with the larger time/space that surrounds us all.
Traditional Astrology uses a division of twelve for the signs in a fundamental way. I find the traditional approach interesting in its breakdown of the manifestation of primal matter as hot, cold, moist and dry, along with three modes of creation described as: (1) the out-going which carries the initial impulse from the source into the creation;(2) the expansive, which maintains and explores within the creation; and (3) the returning, which returns the impulse back towards its source.One can compare these to the modern breakdown (3×4 combination of Cardinal/Fixed/Mutable with Fire/Earth/Air/Water).
You will see that. In the charts, the signs are shown in the colors of the elements. Red is Fire. Green is Earth. Yellow is Air. Blue is Water. This is, again, a subtle way to spark the intuitive function within the chart presentation.
I need to mention that, as a tropicalist astrologer, I use the Sun’s position on the day of the Vernal Equinox as the beginning of Aries. In the current physical sky, you will find that the Sun actually looks to be in the constellation of Pisces and almost now into the constellation of Aquarius on that calendar date. This is due to the effect called the Precession of the Equinoxes, or axial precession, which I will not define or discuss here other than to point out that tropical astrologers use the Vernal Equinox date as the start of each year’s cycle of signs beginning with Aries.
HOUSES:
The fifth level out is the level of the Houses. The planets, their aspects and the signs forming the backdrop behind them all involve actual physically visually available elements. That is, you can actually see the planets and the signs behind them (outer planets need a telescope). The aspects are simply the angular relationships between the planets at the time the picture is taken. This physical system is fixed in the sky and functioning outside of human control. The HOUSES, however, are a construct external to this “physical” system. The houses are earthbound. The houses describe the various venues or arenas of each person’s natal or present local time/space. They are our environment. In my Two-Chart System we are able to work with a chart and aspect map that focuses on the external world, our environment, exclusively.
We can manipulate the physically defined area of each house in many ways. They are seen from the earth and are the way we section off the various rooms of the outside world, the arenas of your life. There are 12 houses and they will each have 30 degrees IF you use the Equal House system for houses. However, only very infrequently will the sky in any location actually present each six-hour quadrant as 90 degrees. And, the area of space will rarely be found to be 30 degrees for each house when using two hour increments. Various house systems have been developed describing a breakdown of the houses which divide up space differently.
The Ascendent is always the eastern point of the horizon. The houses end up with unequal areas when created using various approaches that divide them using either time or space as the mode of measurement. The various house systems break up the circle in different ways. You will find that the actual sign and degree of the house cusps will vary depending on which house system you use. There are many house systems. I use Koch and have found it clearly to work for me with the Huber tools that I use. I know many who use Placidus. I do believe that Koch works better in higher latitudes. It becomes a matter of choosing which is working best for you.
The important end result with whatever house system you use, is that not only by quadrant but additionally, by house, different areas of the chart seem to activate different areas of activity or focus in life. The houses become the different “settings” that the Actors find themselves in. Sometimes each house is described asthe Stage on which the Actors find themselves, the various arenas of expression for the differentenergies or urges. The houses describe various rooms of the external environment; one’s fields of activity.
As an example, Jupiter in Libra in 9th square to Saturn in 7th in Cancer and sextile to Sun in 12th in Sagittarius will have a focus on one’s personal vision of how to accomplish self-fulfillment and also somehow tied to their spiritual sense of self but also dependent on reckoning with the responsibilities it has to others. That person will first have to be aware of the internally structured or wired manifestation of these energies, and then reckon with both the internal introjects placed on them as well as to determine the potential value of externally based options that present themselves. Is the person aware of the unfiltered inner-wired version? If so, are they also aware of the potential difference between the unfiltered inner-wired version and any suggested or introjected versions that were presented in their familial and/or cultural upbringing? Are they aware of the possible options to their wiring and/or internally introjected versions that the external world offers through the different potentials available by utilizing their house placements?
COMPARISON OF SIGNS WITH HOUSES:
Rudyhar described the zodiac as “an expression of collective being and of relationship between the parts or organs which together constitute an organic whole . . . the collective environment of the Earth, and thus of mankind as a whole”. Rudyhar then points out that “The definite public discovery of the Earth’s rotation corresponds with the beginning of the age of individualism, the Renaissance.” Prior to that time there was no focus on individualism. “Our point of view is that if we adopt our modern astronomical outlook, we must cease to consider the Ptolemaic zodiac as the basic factor in astrology, and instead we have to emphasize the circle, or dial of houses. For, with the latter we are doing in our own new way, what the ancients did when they spoke of the zodiac as the symbol of the yearly drama of integration – collective and planetary.”
Rudhyar describes the twelve-fold breakdown of the signs as: “the generic structure of all human individuals is fundamentally the same”. Each of us is seen having the same generic structure as part of the collective. Aries ruled everyone’s head and Pisces ruled everyone’s feet. There was no astrology of the individual at the time the signs were initially defined and were later developed prior to the discovery of the Earth’s axial rotation. The only form of individualism was the secret process of initiation. With the conscious understanding of the rotating Earth, we no longer could base our astrology with the Sun as the center of our world. While the twelve-fold structure of the houses became the symbol of individual selfhood, this structure is geometrically the same for all individuals. “Any specific house has the same general meaning for anyone and everyone. What brings a relative uniqueness to an individual is the way this twelve-fold framework is correlated to the zodiac. And this correlation is indicated by the degrees and signs of the zodiac written at the beginning (or cusp) of each house.” So, the specific house locations for each individual place the generic framework into an individual context. The zodiac, the twelve signs, are a Sun centered creation. The houses are an Earth based creation.
The Hubers saw the zodiac as, “a cosmic framework that stands for Nature and her laws. The zodiac signs reveal an individual’s hereditary disposition. They indicate genetically-inherited structures that we carry inside us as potential from birth and must then develop, use and implement during the course of our lives with the help of the environment.” The Hubers like to define the impact of the houses on the individual as nurture. This concept of nature verses nurture is very useful when looking into what has been at work early in the individual’s life (and continues throughout that life). We come in with “natural” inborn traits and urges described by the various planets further defined by the signs they are found in, and by how they are aspected. This is nature. This is the genetic background. The cultural conditioning that parents, family and other culturally present factors of our environment attempt to introject or impart into us as their preferred reality, can work in contradiction to this. This is nurture. The houses also offer alternative potential realities, in the sense that each arena has more than one potential area or form of manifestation.
We attempt to understand and speak to the Center of the chart and the chart itself is an emanation of the Center by way of what is being shown by the layers outside of the Center. One must remember that what is shown is symbols. Symbols have many possible interpretations and I see astrology as a language wherein those symbols are each akin to various possible words or phrases that, when taken together with other symbols, create sentences and more detailed descriptions. Describing Sun/Libra/8th house involves tying together different possible phrases for the Sun, Libra and the 8th house. Each set of symbols carries many alternatives for specific manifestation, both in general and for different situations where those same symbols are put to use. This is true for specific locations of both single planets and planets in aspect to each other. That is why Sun in the 5th house in Sagittarius in trine aspect to Venus in the 9th house in Aries can also potentially mean so many different things.