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Il6 . OUR ANCESTORS CAME FROM OUTER SPACE
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If astrology is a science, it is a very complicated one. It intertwines
the objective information about the movements of the celestial
bodies with the subjective projections of supposed
influences that these configurations of stars wiU have in the lives
of men and human destiny on earth. But the foundations for
such speculations are very shaky.
First of all, astrologers have not up to this day figured out
which is the most important moment when the stars cast their
spell—is it the moment of birth or the moment of conception?
Similarly, they have no final and clear definition of what is
meant by an astrological conjunction of two planets. Is it the moment
when they are at the same point in longitude as calculated
by their cycles, which we will call the "theoretical conjunction,"
or is it the geocentric conjunction when we see it from the earth,
or, finally, is it the hehocentric conjunction, the instant when
these planets are in line with the sun?
On top of that, the second case of astrological planet conjunctions,
the geocentric one, is totally confusing, because over a period
of six months the variable angular velocities of Jupiter, Saturn,
and earth can create as many as three such conjunctions
and nobody can decide which is the right one.
The most famous of these triple conjunctions happened in
7 B.C., the year when Christ was bom, in the sign of Pisces. If we
can believe the latest tables of planetary conjunctions established
by our best computers in 1962—and who else can we trust?—
three different alignments in the same area of the skies took
place that year between Jupiter and Saturn: first on May 14, lasting
to June 3, with a maximum on May 24; the second on October
1, lasting to October 21, with a maximum on October 11; and
the third on December 5, lasting to December 15, with a maximum
on December 10.
This triple conjunction between the two planets so excited the
astrologers of that time that the legend about the star of
Bethlehem was bom and with it the beginning of a new era in
human history.
Triple conjunctions are very rare and seem to come only once
every 973 years. The first one of our era arrived in a.d. 967 in the
sign of Aries, on June 5, October 13, and December 12. Again in
1940, in the sign of Taurus, we had triple conjunctions on July