This is the first English translation of Book III of Hephaistion of Thebes' Apotelesmatics, which focuses on inceptions or elections, event charts, thought-interpretation, and inquiries of many types. This 5th Century AD work explores everything from general principles of elections, to finding and identifying thieves, predicting the course of illness, analyzing general thoughts and plans, consecrating statues, and more. Throughout, Hephaistion includes lengthy and valuable quotations from Dorotheus of Sidon, one of our only ancient sources for these authentic Greek verses. Translated by Eduardo J. Gramaglia, and edited and introduced by Dr. Benjamin N. Dykes, it serves practicing astrologers and scholars of the Hellenistic, medieval, and modern traditions in astrology.

Alphabetically arranged entries cover the history of astrology from ancient Mesopotamia to the 21st century. In addition to surveying the Western tradition, the book explores Islamic, Indian, East Asian, and Mesoamerican astrology. The field of astrology is growing rapidly, as historians recognize its centrality to the intellectual life of the past and sociologists and anthropologists treat its importance in a number of modern cultures. Despite the historical and cultural significance of the subject, most reference works on astrology focus on instructional techniques and are written by astrologers with little or no interest in the history of the topic. This book instead offers an objective treatment of astrology across world history from ancient Mesopotamia to the present. The book provides alphabetically arranged entries by expert contributors writing on such topics as horoscopes, court astrologers, Renaissance astrology, and comets. While it considers the Western tradition, it also treats Islamic, Indian, East Asian, and Mesoamerican astrology. In doing so, it explores the role of astrology in shaping science, literature, religion, art, and other defining cultural traditions. Sidebars offer excerpts from various historical texts, while entries provide suggestions for further reading.

The astrological poem of Dorotheus of Sidon (1st Century AD) played a key role in later Western astrology. This new English translation explains many special features of Dorotheus's work, and supersedes the 1976 edition by Pingree. This essential work for traditional astrologers and will repay close study.

This book contains the Astrological Compendium of the late Classical astrologer Rhetorius the Egyptian. It contains his Explanation and Narration of The Whole Art of Astrology, and was translated from the Greek by James Herschel Holden, M.A., Research Director of the American Federation of Astrologers. Also included are the treatises by Teucer of Babylon on the Nature of the Signs of the Zodiac and the Nature of the Seven planets. Rhetorius was the last major astrological writer of the Classical period of Greek Astrology.

Choosing auspicious times to act was an important branch of traditional astrology. Choices & Inceptions is the largest modern-language collection of traditional works in electional astrology to date. Translated from the medieval Latin by Dr. Benjamin Dykes, this volume contains instructions on lunar mansions, several types of planetary hours, and three of the most important traditional works on "complete" elections: Sahl's On Elections, al-'Imrani's The Book of Choices, and al-Rijal's The Book of the Skilled VII. With a lengthy Introduction that analyzes various ethical and philosophical issues in elections, it is essential for contemporary astrologers.

This thoroughly researched book is a history of the development of Western horoscopic astrology from its origin among the Babylonians and its subsequent creation in its present form by the Alexandrians down to modern times. Special attention is given to background history and to the working conditions and techniques used by astrologers during the last two thousand years. Numerous footnotes provide additional information and bibliographic references. A separate bibliography lists reference sources of particular importance. Two comprehensive indices containing more than 2,800 individual entries enable the reader to locate persons, publishers, topics, and book and periodical titles that are mentioned in the history. The book also contains discussions of several questions and topics relating to astrology. James Herschel Holden is Research Director of the American Federation of Astrologers and has been especially interested in the history of astrology.

The title reflects the grave responsibility of every chosen leader, both ministerial and lay, to uphold the faith that was once delivered to the saints.

Dr. Benjamin Dykes produces essential new translations of traditional astrology texts for modern students. Persian Nativities I contains the first English translation of Masha'allah's natal work, The Book of Aristotle, and a new translation of his student Abu 'Ali al-Khayyat's influential On the Judgments of Nativities.

Written by two veteran ritualists with 20 years of experience apiece, this text describes magic in terms of spiritual healing, and is especially written for contemporary astrologers who want a more hands-on, ritualized, and astrologically based spirituality to complement their chart-reading practices.

In The Daimon in Hellenistic Astrology: Origins and Influence, Dorian Gieseler Greenbaum investigates for the first time the concept of the daimon (daemon, demon), normally confined to religion and philosophy, within the theory and practice of ancient western astrology (2nd century BCE – 7th century CE). This multi-disciplinary study covers the daimon within astrology proper as well as the daimon and astrology in wider cultural practices including divination, Gnosticism, Mithraism and Neo-Platonism. It explores relationships between the daimon and fate and Daimon and Tyche (fortune or chance), and the doctrine of lots as exemplified in Plato’s Myth of Er. In finding the impact of Egyptian and Mesopotamian ideas of fate on Hellenistic astrology, it critically examines astrology’s perception as propounding an unalterable destiny.