Where did astrology first start?

Question

Give me the history of astrology please:)

Answer 1

Some four thousand years ago, the Babylonians began to predict the future according to the positions of the sun, the moon, and the five most visible planets. They claimed that these heavenly bodies exerted certain forces that affected human behavior. Later they incorporated the signs of the zodiac into their predictions.



Here are two *excellent* articles for your researching pleasure:



"Is Astrology the Key to Your Future?"

- What Is Astrology?

- A Long History of Failure

- In Conflict With Bible Teachings

http://watchtower.org/e/20050808/article_01.htm



"Should the Zodiac Influence Your Life?"

- Historical Background

- Hidden Dangers

http://watchtower.org/e/20001108a/article_01.htm

Answer 2

You'll have to understand that a 3000 year plus history is tough to condense into a few paragraphs. Depending on how you define, it we can say that Western Astrology originated in Mesopotamia, i.e. the area between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers some 3 or 4 thousand years ago. But it did not look like what astrology is today. The Babylonians made observations of celestial phenomenon for a few thousand years. They made predictions from these omens and kept extensive records. Gradually this developed into Horoscopic astrology that is recognizable to moderns as astrology. Although not much is known about this transition period, what is known as Western horoscopic astrology was credited to the Hellenistic Greeks.



About the beginning of the Christian era some 2000 years ago astrology was fully recognizable and an elaborate system had been developed. When the Roman empire fell the Christian Church discouraged acceptance of astrology, but the Persians, always fascinated by anything mathematical, picked up the system and ran with it. Until we get to about the 13th century most medieval astrology was developed and written by the so called Arab astrologers. I say "so called" because they weren't all Arabs. Some were Christian and some were Jewish. In the 13th century Guido Bonatti wrote his "Book of Astronomy." From there we get what is known as the medieval Latin astrology tradition, which dominated through the Renaissance and the early modern period.



About 1700 astrology went to sleep in Europe. It was kept alive largely in England and to a lesser extent, France. After the 1820s a resurgence in interest in the subject began in England. However, astrology was always based on a philosophy and that link was either ignored or changed into something the 19th century astrologers understood as spiritualism. This had little to do with religious spiritualism. In the late 1800s and early 1900s astrology took another turn this time towards psychology. Part of the reason was this was considered a good way to avoid problems with the law and to separate astrologers form gypsy fortune tellers. Traditional methods were called into question and re-evaluated. This abandonment of tradition resulted in something of an intellectual free-for-all and several new schools of astrology emerged, including Uranian astrology and something called cosmobiology. But mostly astrology tried to associate its techniques with Jungian psychology.



In the 1970s astrology became "new age" and the hippies hijacked it and once more, as in the 19th century, it became associated with a faux spiritualism this time however it included drugs and sex so it claimed a lot of young adherents.



In the 1980s another movement occurred as interest in old texts now available in modern languages helped re-establish the astrological tradition that possibly hit its high point in the middle ages or Renaissance period. This resulted in even more texts being translated from ancient languages this time by astrologers who understood the subject and they avoided many of the pitfalls and errors that well meaning but unknowledgeable academics committed in their translations.



Today astrology is mostly of the psychological variety, but a healthy contingent of traditionalists are keeping the connection with astrology when it was at its finest.



I hope you get an A.

Answer 3

Sometimes it seems fake because of people's interpretations of aspects, signs, and houses. You have to remember that there are people just like you who decide that this planet in this sign square this planet in this sign means you will be like THIS (or whatever). There are core qualities, core forces to astrology, but people interpret them differently. You learn through other people's interpretations - that is why it is excrutiatingly important to find a good astrologer's book to read, not stuff on the internet or those crappy books that are there to feed your ego. It is also important to look at the different interpretations and try to combine them so that YOU understand what they mean. Sometimes a person may explain an aspect or something that represents the forces they describe but it does not mean anything to you because you don't understand the underlying principles behind it. Knowing the planets and the signs is very important for your own understanding of astrology as it goes further. I know exactly how you feel, I've felt similarly when I've been reading different people's interpretations. I, however, am lucky enough to know a very good astrologer who puts things into perspective when it seems like a load of crap is being spewed out. This has made me realise that it is not astrology that is in the wrong, it is people. Don't trust just anybody... who's to say they even know more than you? Astrology is subjective, it relies not only on learning but on intuition. So, at times it really will feel like people are giving you suggestions to make you think certain things, and they actually will be, because they CAN due to the nature of astrology. People exploit everything. Just educate yourself, and then you can trust yourself and your knowledge without having to rely on others as much.

Answer 4

The history of astrology probably started as far back as 3,000 BC in Mesopotamia. However the available records so far point to the Chaldeans and Babylonians as the earliest in the West (1,000 BC). In India and China, different systems emerged.



It’s not known exactly when the Zodiac signs emerged. One theory is that they were developed over time in Babylon. As the practice became more popular, the Zodiac symbols came into use to help in the interpretation of the facts. It’s been suggested that the other basic elements were also formed there. Whatever the case may be, it became very popular even in Egypt.

Answer 5

The ancient Chaldeans and Assyrians engaged in astrological divination some 3,000 years ago. In India, astrology has been practiced for at least two millennia. Known as Jyotisa, it and several variations such as Nadi astrology are still widely practiced in India where reincarnation is a prominent belief. The light from the heavens supposedly affects each incarnation and these systems of astrology claim to be able to discern useful information for guiding a person through his or her current life.



By 450 BCE the Babylonians had developed the 12-sign zodiac, but it was the Greeks--from the time of Alexander the Great to their conquest by the Romans--who provided most of the fundamental elements of modern Western astrology. The spread of astrological practice was checked by the rise of Christianity, which emphasized divine intervention and free will. During the Renaissance, astrology regained popularity, in part due to rekindled interest in science and astronomy. Christian theologians, however, warred against astrology, and in 1585 Pope Sixtus V condemned it. At the same time, the work of Kepler and others undermined astrology’s tenets. Its popularity and longevity are, of course, irrelevant to the truth of astrology in any of its forms.



Astrology was also adopted in ancient Persia and throughout the Arab world where it was taken up by Muslims whose work found its way to Europe during the Renaissance.



The ancient Chinese adopted an elaborate and intricate system of astrology that is intimately connected with various metaphysical notions such as yin and yang and wu xing. Many Westerners are familiar with the cycle of the twelve-year cycle of animal signs in Chinese astrology, e.g., the year of the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, etc.



The most popular form of traditional Western astrology is sun sign astrology, the kind found in the horoscopes of many daily newspapers. A horoscope is an astrological forecast. The term is also used to describe a map of the zodiac at the time of one’s birth. The zodiac is divided into twelve zones of the sky, each named after the constellation that originally fell within its zone (Taurus, Leo, etc.). The apparent paths of the Sun, the Moon, and the major planets all fall within the zodiac. Because of the precession of the equinoxes, the equinox and solstice points have each moved westward about 30 degrees in the last 2,000 years. Thus, the zodiacal constellations named in ancient times no longer correspond to the segments of the zodiac represented by their signs. In short, had you been born at the same time on the same day of the year 2,000 years ago, you would have been born under a different sign.



Much more at the link.

Answer 6

Mesopotamia about 4,000 years ago. Eastern astrology started in China about 3,500 yrs ago. Meso-american astrology started about 1,500 years ago

Answer 7

In space, but I can't be a 100% sure