There are 27 lunar Nakshatras, or lunar mansions, that describe the monthly
sidereal motion of the Moon. The Moon stays approximately one day in each Naksha-
tra. The birth Nakshatra of an individual is called his or her star and is the most
important planet in the Vedic horoscope. Nakshatras are used extensively in deter-
mining personality characteristics, as well as in horary and electional astrology.
Arabic astrologers also used a system of lunar mansions called manazil.The 28
manazil were initially used for navigation over the desert, and later took on predictive
qualities. The Chinese called their lunar mansions hsiu.The three difference sys-
tems—Nakshatra, manazil, and hsiu—share a few constellations, but there are signifi-
cant dissimilarities.
The cycles of the Moon have always been connected with germination and
fertility. Specific times during the lunation cycle were considered more supportive of
both human and animal conception. Sowing and reaping in farming were optimally
timed using the phases of the Moon. The Hellenistic Greeks considered the phases
before and after the birth of the child to indicate the general health of the child. A
new technique using the lunation cycle was introduced in the twentieth century by
Dane Rudhyar (1895–1985), the father of humanistic astrology. He applied the luna-
tion cycle to human psychology. He believed that the lunar cycle one is born under
determines the basic psychological outlook of the individual. Over the course of a life,
the development of the individual’s psychological outlook can be determined through
the lunation cycle of the secondary progressed Moon.
Rudhyar defined eight phases of the lunation cycle. The cycle describes the
spatial relationship between the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth. Because the cycle is
perceived from the Earth, the Moon phases are most easily defined as degrees of sepa-
ration between the Sun and the Moon as observed from the Earth. The phases accord-
ing to Rudhyar, the degrees of separation, and a few key words for the eight phases of
the lunation cycle are provided below:
New Moon(0–45° from Sun to Moon): birth, new beginnings, initia-
tive, creativity, emergence
Crescent Moon(45–90°): challenges, effort, change, activity, expansion
First Quarter Moon (90–135): breakthrough, crisis of action, separation
from past, action
Gibbous Moon(135–180°): development, evaluation, perfecting, over-
coming
Full Moon (180–225°): culmination, illumination, objectivity, vision;
fulfillment
Disseminating Moon(225–270°): teaching, reaping, maturity, commu-
nication, demonstration
Last Quarter Moon(270–315°): assimilation, crisis in consciousness,
harvest; reorientation
Balsamic Moon(315–0°): death, transition, prophetic or future orient-
ed, destiny, release
—Maire M. MascoTHEASTROLOGYBOOK [463]
The Moon