the-astrology-book

Gurdjieff, George Ivanovitch
high profile in Paris and the reputation of a “mage.” He took his dancers to America
in 1924, but a near-fatal car accident on his return caused him to reassess his mode of
teaching. Reducing the activity of the institute, he began to put his teaching into a
written form. He made eight further visits to America to establishing his teaching
there. Gurdjieff spent the World War II years teaching in Paris and died there in 1949.
The following is a discussion of some of the aspects of Gurdjieff’s teaching that
are related to zodiacal structure, number symbolism, and the multivalent and interpretive
mode of enquiry that is part of astrological thinking.
The Law of Seven and the
Seven Known Planets of the Ancient World
Gurdjieff applies a synthesis of ideas derived from Pythagoras’s relation of the
musical octave to the ratio of distances between the seven known planets of the
ancient world to his own Law of Seven, which is also known as the Law of Octaves.
For example, the law is expressed in his oral and written teaching in relation to the
colors of the light ray, the days of the week, the proportions of the human body, the
digestion of food, and as the Ray of Creation, which describes the creation of the universe
in the form of a descending octave, from the Absolute All to Absolute Nothing.
Many of Gurdjieff’s cosmological ideas are related to this fundamental law. For example,
Gurdjieff relates levels of the Ray of Creation with the physical, astral, mental, or
causal bodies of man, and each level has a specific density of matter and a specified
number of laws. Thus, man on earth, subject to 48 laws, is gnostically distant from the
Absolute towards which however, he can ascend through his own efforts and by so
doing he develops new bodies.
Ray of Creation Notes Number of Laws Subject to Bodies
The Absolute/All DO 1 -
All Worlds SI 3 -
All Suns LA 6; 3 from all worlds and 3 of its own Causal body
Our Sun SOL 12; 6 from all suns and 6 of its own Mental body
The Planets FA 24; 12 from our sun and 12 of their own Astral body
The Earth MI 48; 24 from the planets and 24 of the Earth Physical body
The Moon RE 96; 48 from the Earth and 48 of its own -
Absolute/Nothing DO - -
Gurdjieff connects the Law of Seven with number symbolism and stresses that
the Ray of Creation should not be taken literally.
The Law of Three and Astrological Modes
All events or actions throughout the universe are the result of the interaction
of three forces: the positive/active, the negative/passive, and the reconciling that may
be either active or passive. These forces can be equated in astrological terms with the
cardinal, fixed, and mutable modes. The Law of Three can also be seen operating in
the Ray of Creation (see previous chart) in the number of laws functioning at each
[284] THE ASTROLOGY BOOK