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Astrology is a symbolic language. Astrology measures time and cycles through the movement of planets. Meaning is then derived from the placements and relationships between planets. Astrology began as an observational science, astronomy & astrology were initially one and the same. Astronomy broke off from astrology around the 17th century and only kept the observational quality devoid of meaning.
What is the difference between Sidereal & Tropical astrology systems?
Western astrology is based on the movement of the Earth; its tilt causes the seasons. The zero Aries point is placed at the beginning of spring in the northern hemisphere. This system has been used by farmers for millennia. They used it to determine when to plant crops & when to harvest.
Where the confusion between Sidereal & Tropical systems come in, is because they use the same zodiac names and symbols but meanings and the frame of reference is different. Sidereal is based on the apparent movement of the Sun along the ecliptic. Fixed stars in the sky are used as reference points to mark the beginning of the Aries point. The reference points are the backdrop of the constellations rather than seasons.
Both systems use the same zodiac names and the beginning is 0 Aries in both systems but the starting point where 0 Aries is placed is very different and based on different things. One uses the beginning of the constellation Aries in the sky & the other uses the beginning of Spring marked by the vernal equinox.
Sidereal uses where the planet appears to be in the physical zodiac as viewed from earth in the night sky taking into account the precession of the Earth’s axis. Tropical is not attached to actual planet locations in outer space. Tropical is purely seasonal based as the seasons change on Earth. They are two different systems finding meaning for two different reasons. There was a distant point in time when 0 Aries & the vernal equinox happened at the same time. That is no longer true because of precession, and 2 different systems now exist.
People have this tendency to think only one thing can be correct. There can only be one astrology system that is “true”. Astrology at its heart is a language that studies time cycles using various abstractions. There are many different languages in the world. Is Spanish more correct than German? Each language has different nuances and maybe some languages are more suited to expressing certain concepts better than others but that doesn’t mean the other languages are false and don’t work.