Abstract
The chapter II of the Brihatsamhita, an astrology and divination treatise of the 6th century AD, illustrates the figure and the challenging ‘profession’ of the astrologer. Backlit a clash arises since the astrologer operated in a context of sacredness considered from Brahmins their exclusive field. That complicated the relations between the two categories particularly at the time of remuneration. According to the Brihatsamhita, the astrologer had to be handsome, intelligent, of good birth, well versed in the subject and have the necessary competence. His duty was to identify and interpret the heavenly indications to gain possible profits. For this reason, a king who disdained the services of the astrologer would inevitably be dogged by misfortune. Aside from the risks and misunderstanding implied in the profession, being a good astrologer would bring the maximum reward possible: certainly, at his death he would attain salvation.
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Notes
- 1.
For example, the painter had to begin his painting on a propitious lunar day, under the protection of a benevolent asterism, with the moon in the Citra nakshatra (asterism) (Citrasutra, chap. 40, 11), a circumstance that was indicated to him by the astrologer.
- 2.
The treatise is attributed to the astronomer-astrologer Varahamihira and consists of three parts dedicated to astronomy, horoscopes and astrology. In chapter II the physical description of the astrologer is a kind of ‘necessary act’ which reproduced a sort of formula used also in other treatises (Kramrisch 1999).
- 3.
The pleasant figure and manners betokened noble-mindedness and wisdom according to the beautiful-good-capable identity as opposed to the ugly-bad-incapable identity, known also in the West.
- 4.
The treatise, put together perhaps between the 1st and 3rd century AD, “constitutes the first systematization of the Hindu law and is the first of the Dharmashastra, the Brahminic treatises on the law. (…) It contains the social, ethical and moral precepts that must govern the lives of individuals and instructions for carrying out rites and ceremonies” (Dallapiccola 2005); (see Doniger 1996).
- 5.
Treatise on politics and good government written in the Mauryan Age (4th–2nd century BC).
- 6.
The 1884 translation from the Sanskrit by N.C. Iyer has been tidied up by the authors.
- 7.
Astronomy-astrology constituted one of the six Vedanga, treatises considered complementary to the Veda and, like them, ‘revealed’.
- 8.
Aryabhata (5th century AD) was the scientist who gave a new and decisive impulse to Indian mathematics and astronomy. He founded two schools of astronomy and wrote some fundamental works, translated into Arabic in the 8th century.
- 9.
‘Professional’ treatises like the Brhatsamhita had a narrative structure in which a great master, if not the same divinity who presided over that art, explained the concepts and the fundamental rules of the subject, replying to the questions of one or more disciples.
- 10.
‘Salvation’ here means release from the cycle of rebirths.
- 11.
Rahu and Ketu were considered planets of past aeons: their position coincided with the ascending and descending nodes of the lunar orbit. They were personified, the former by the demon of the eclipses represented by the sole monstrous head, and the latter by the demon of meteors and comets, with the body of a snake. Eclipses, meteors and comets were generally perceived as phenomena of ill omen.
- 12.
In addition to this, it should be remembered that, right up to the 17th century, the mathematicians-astronomers were called on to teach astrology in the medical faculties of the universities.
References
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Kramrisch, S.: Il Tempio Indù. Milano–Trento, Luni Editrice (1999)
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Dallaporta, A., Marcato, L. (2017). The Figure of the Astrologer in Ancient India: A Practice Verging on the Sacred. In: Orlando, A. (eds) The Light, The Stones and The Sacred. Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, vol 48. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-54487-8_12
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