The Astrology Book

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 interpre-

tive 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 uni-

verse 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 exam-

ple, 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

Gurdjieff, George Ivanovitch

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