Cycles of Destiny

My own first "close encounter of the third kind" with Vedic astrology occurred when I asked James Braha, author of the classic "Ancient Hindu Astrology for the Modern Western Astrologer", to do a reading for me. James' reading, done over the phone from out of state, was so specific and accurate that I seriously wondered whether he had somehow run into a friend of mine and clandestinely extracted my life story. Now that I've studied the system he used, that of the ancient astrologer/yogi Parasara, as well as the Vimsottari Dasa system which describes the planetary cycles that play out during one's life, I can easily see that James didn't need to conduct a private investigation to find out about me. All he had to do was glance at my birth chart and compare it against my planetary cycles. Mercury is associated with education in my horoscope, and during my Mercury period I was in school. In my birth chart the Vedic shadow planet Ketu represents spirituality, and during my Ketu period I moved into an ashram to devote myself to spiritual practice. As Ketu gave way to the Venus cycle (Venus governs both marriage and material luxuries), I left the ashram, got married, and started purchasing the accoutrements of a more normative American life like a car, furniture, and a stereo system. I knew absolutely nothing about Vedic astrology at the time, yet every major event in my life was unfolding right on schedule according to principles outlined by the ancient sage Parasara. We Western astrologers tend to see the birth chart as a psychological map, a mythologically based key to the human psyche. We use our clients' birth charts primarily as an entry to personality and compatibility issues, often downplaying an overly literal interpretation of the chart as a predictive tool. Vedic astrology, however, has a strongly predictive focus. For thousands of years clients have gone to Indian jyotishis wanting to know when they would get married, if they would meet with professional success, the most auspicious time to start a new business, if health problems loomed in the future, if their children would do well. And for thousands of years in an unbroken tradition, jyotishis observed the positions of the planets and carefully correlated their data with events in the lives of their clients. Today there exists more astrological literature in Sanskrit and the other Indic languages than in the astrological traditions of all other cultures combined. In ancient India qualification standards for someone wishing to become a jyotishi were extremely high. Astrological schools, without exception, were founded not by men and women who were only astronomers, scholars or priests, but who were also yogic adepts--founders of Indian astrology like Bhrigu and Parasara are still universally hailed as spiritual masters. They understood that looking into the destiny of sentient beings was not a frivolous affair, and that it required more than ordinary intelligence and insight to guide a client to break free from the yoke of a particular chain of destiny (such as unsuccessful relationships) that may have dogged that soul for lifetimes. The sage Varaha Mihira insisted that the serious student of astrology must possess not only intellectual brilliance but the highest ethical principles, advanced command of meditative states, excellent communication skills, profound compassion, and a thorough knowledge of "occult" techniques such as mantra science, gem therapy and ceremonial magic. Unfortunately, times have changed and with the collapse of the traditional education system, Vedic astrology has to a distressing extent fallen into the hands of "street astrologers," poorly trained and sometimes ferociously greedy soothsayers who prey off the naivety of the credulous, often for substantial fees. Until comparatively recently, however, Hindu astrologers did not specify payment for their readings. They cultivated a sense of contentment with whatever donation their clients might be moved to make, whether it was a purse filled with gold or a handful of lotus petals. Srila Bhaktivedanta Swami, the spiritual leader who brought Krishna consciousness to the U.S. in the 1960s, fondly remembered the astrologers who appeared outside his home when he was a boy. "They were honored as very respectable guests. When we were children, such brahmanas would visit householders like humble beggars, and people would derive great benefit. The greatest benefit was that a householder could save a great deal of money from being spent on doctor bills because the brahmanas, aside from explaining the past, present and future, could ordinarily cure all kinds of diseases simply by giving instructions and some medicine." The scripture composed by the sage Bhrigu, Bhaktivedanta added, "describes a system by which anyone can immediately get information about what he was in the past and what he is going to be in the future. The brahmanas who went door to door as if beggars had perfect command of such vast knowledge. Thus the highest knowledge was easily available even to the poorest man in society. The poorest man could inquire from an astrologer about his past, present and future, with no need for business agreements or exorbitant payments. The brahmana would give him all the benefit of his knowledge without asking renumeration, and the poor man, in return, would offer a handful or rice, or anything he had in his possession... In a perfect human society, perfect knowledge in any science--medical, astrological, ecclesiastical and so on--is available even to the poorest man, with no anxiety over payment." The jyotishis originally performed their work as a spiritual service, not as a means of enriching themselves, and many of them cheerfully remained quite poor. They would not dream of beginning a reading without a chant supplicating the grace of God and acknowledging the insight and altruism of their teachers. Every ancient and medieval astrological treatise in India opens with a prayer. Vedic astrology had (and in some circles still retains) a strong esoteric component. Advanced astrologers are taught to move beyond the birth chart to contact their internal planets. In fact the most important mantra of the brahmanical tradition, the Gayatri, is specially formulated to help one remain in a state of continual alignment with one's "inner Sun." Also, one of the five major schools of Hindu Tantra, Surya Vidya, is primarily astrologically based. The original jyotishis were not only spiritual prodigies but also formidable astronomers, a fact made all the more amazing considering their lack of telescopes or sophisticated time telling devices. Vedic texts more than four thousand years old reveal knowledge of previous pole stars (Polaris has been the "north star" for only a short period of time by the standards of the ancient Vedic civilization), the precession of the equinoxes, and the lunar nodes. Their obsession with astronomical accuracy led the jyotishis to adopt the sidereal system of the zodiac and to base much of their predictive work on the Moon's movement through the 27 lunar houses. It is probably the combination of intuitive insight developed through yoga practice, superb astronomical and mathematical skills, and a database of thousands of years of observations of human behavior in relation to stellar movement that led the jyotishis to create an astronomical prognostic system so precise that a student of Bhrigu could sit down and write a remarkably accurate delineation for a person who would not be born for another thousand years. Keying into the cycles of destiny, a long departed jyotishi was able to discern the tide of fate that would bring one Donald Walters from a foreign land called Amerika to the tiny town of Barnala in some distant century for a nonplusing lesson in Vedic astrology! Fascinatingly, during several historical epochs Greek and Indian astrologers appear to have been in close contact. Both systems use almost identical solar signs and solar houses, and some Vedic texts frankly acknowledge Greek "gurus." Robert Schmidt, a scholar associated with Project Hindsight (the incredibly exciting research effort which is translating long forgotten Roman, Mediterranean and Arabic astrological texts into English) reports that as more and more ancient Greek texts are translated, more and more completely unexpected similarities to Vedic astrology are being uncovered. Evidently as the Greek tradition gradually died, its vestiges being incorporated into and to a great extent modified by Persian astrology, the once blatantly clear link with Indian astrology was forgotten. Therefore when we study the still very much living tradition of Vedic astrology, we may be catching glimpses of our own long lost Western astrological roots. Sometimes we forget that most Indians, like most Europeans, are Caucasian and use Indo European languages. Ethnically, linguistically and astrologically, Western and Hindu traditions are far more closely linked than most people imagine. However, the philosophical underpinnings of the two civilizations could hardly have diverged more radically. By the sixth century Christian clerics had managed to root reincarnation out of the Western consciousness. Theologians, usually so quick to take the Bible literally, insisted Jesus' teaching that we must be "born again" was purely metaphoric, and the fact that Jesus himself considered his cousin John the Baptist to be the reincarnation of the fiery Jewish prophet Elijah4 was carefully glossed over. Christianity shares the doctrine of karma with Hinduism ("As you sow, so shall you reap"), but has pulled this doctrine so completely out of its broader spiritual context that today many Christians sincerely believe that the worst criminals who accept Jesus will go to heaven, while the greatest saints of other cultures (many of whom may never even have heard of Jesus) are damned to eternal torment. In India, however, reincarnation is an integral part of astrological understanding. Jyotishis see the birth chart as a "snap shot" of the karma one has generated in previous lives, and as the basis from which to prescribe upayes or "remedial measures" to help a soul break free from destructive patterns brought over from past incarnations, consciously creating a more positive future. The whole of Hindu religious thought is based on the belief that most of us languish in samsara, the repetitive cycles of destiny, because of which an astrologer can sit down using the principles of Bhrigu or Parasara or the other great astrological masters and give generally accurate predictions for souls still struggling in the same cycles centuries hence. But the entire point of Hindu religious thought, and concurrently of Vedic astrology, is mukti, liberation from subservience to the all powerful deity Mahakala, "the Great Wheel of Time." The yogis developed the science of astrology so that, working with the planets who in their movements are the apportioners of fate, we learn to create our own destiny until at last, like the liberated masters, we free ourselves from the force of destiny all together.