It's a Lot, Like Life

In the days of Hellenistic old, we find astrologers using an astrological indicator known as a “Lot”. In the English translations from the later Latin literature, they were designated “Parts”. But they’re the same indicators just rebranded. There are many Parts. But, by far, the most extensively used Part is called the “Part of Fortune”. We’re going to take a deep dive into the Parts and what they are meant to indicate in the chart. But, in order to do this, I need to first explain a larger concept -- of which the Lots are but one example --  called an aspect arc.

Aspect Arcs

An aspect arc is, simply put, the name that we use in our school to designate the distance, in degrees of arc, between two meaningful Zodiacal points in the chart. This might be the angle between two planets or between a planet and a point (known simply as an “aspect”); or the angle between a domicile (or other) ruler and its domicile; or the angle between two planets projected outward from the Ascendant, which is how the aspect arcs of Parts are typically constructed. So a Part is an angle between two planets relocated as a distance from the rising degree of the natal chart. In the later tradition, it was also possible to relocate, from the rising degree, angles between a planet and a point -- such as the cusp of a house -- or the location of another Part.

If there is anything that astrologers are, it’s inventive. Nothing wrong with that. But how do we determine what is meaningful? The problem is that it has been customary for astrologers to invent new techniques by extending ONLY the mechanical pattern observed in older ones, without also developing the interpretative framework to accompany their application. Without that interpretative framework, the chart just becomes cluttered with more noise. Over the years, many new Parts, with arbitrary names, have been invented and used with very little attention paid to why they have those names. Astrologers simply take them to indicate something to do with the name that they have. In particular, the meaning of the Part of Fortune has degenerated into a vague notion that it has something to do with “good fortune”, simply because the word “Fortuna” was used in its Latin sources.  But how many other indicators have we said are indicators of “good fortune” or good outcomes?

Let’s get back to this idea of aspect arcs. If you go into a professional astrology program (there are many on the market that calculate the Lots) you will find that many of them will indicate the formulas used to calculate the Lots. For example, Solar Fire includes a file containing the calculations of the Lots used by the Islamic astrologer, Al Biruni. And if you have access to the Hellenistic formulas used by Vettius Valens (which are readily available online) you can even program them into Solar Fire yourselves. If you examine these formulas, you’ll discover a rather revealing fact: many identical formulas have different names.

Let’s take, as an example, the arc from Jupiter to Venus projected from (that means "added to") the Ascendant. It’s written as this formula: ASC + VE – JU . In Valens, this formula is listed as the “Lot of Friends”. However, the same exact formula is also listed in Valens as “the Lot of Desire”, the “Lot of Children” AND the “Lot of Marriage”. Valens actually has several different formula arcs to indicate the “Lot of Children”. We also find the identical formulas indicating different Lots in different authors, suggesting that they do not agree with each other on what they indicate. For example, Al Biruni has the projected arc from Jupiter to Saturn (ASC + SA - JU) indicating the Lot for the “Death of Parents”, while Valens has the same formula indicating the “Lot of Siblings”.  So a Lot is not one thing, but a group of things that presumably have something in common, since they are indicated by the same formula.

The formulas are reversed for nighttime charts, but we don’t need to deal with that for the moment; the daytime formulas are sufficient to illustrate my point: that the name of the Lot doesn’t actually mean a whole Lot (pun intended). The names of the Parts, as I said above, may be incidentally chosen to coincide with an array of expressions that were observed when those Lots were activated in the chart. And, in fact, the aspect arc from the same two planets can express as a cluster of different events that may have little to do with its chosen name. What ties these events together is not the name of the Lot, but rather the nature of the planets involved in its construction and their placement and rulerships in the particular chart. So, any event that activates the location of the Lot can be ascertained from the natures of the two planets involved in its construction.  

Let me show you with an example from my chart using this same VE - JU aspect arc. In my chart, VE is in the 9^th of astrology, foreign lands, education, etc, and JU is in the 11^th of groups, friends and affiliations. Through the Cancer sign, it bridges into the 12^th place of online or remote activities. Already by its placement, JU has something to do with remote friends and affiliations, even without having to invoke its nomenclature as the Lot of Friends.

Jupiter and Venus are both planets. As we teach, planets indicate not earthly objects, but dynamic functions -- that is, actions that nevertheless, generate earthly objects through their roles as domicile lords. Some of Jupiter’s actions are to teach, legalize and reveal truths, in this case, to friends and groups that are remote or online (11-12^th). Venus’s action is to acquire and unite with people and things. In the 9^th, Venus would acquire higher education, spirituality, and astrology, and be able to form relationships with foreigners and people far way, or in astrology, just to name a few that apply.  

When the aspect arc between these two planets is calculated and projected from the Ascendant, it places the Lot at 3 Gemini, which is indicated by the red arrow in the 10^th house, close to the Sun. We can check the actual manifestation of this Lot by just noting what happened when that point became activated. Abu Mashar specifically uses Lots with Hellenistic Directions (you may know them as “Circumambulations”). After years of testing them, I agree with Abu Mashar that the Hellenistic Directions are particularly responsive to the activations of ALL aspect arcs, particularly the Lots. To test the activation of this Lot, I directed the most sensitive point in the chart – the Ascendant – to the date of the square with 3 Gemini. This occurred in 1992, the year of my marriage. “Marriage” is but one of the names given to this Lot in Valens’ work. And we can easily see why, since all marriages involve the act of uniting (VE) and of legalizing (JU) such a union, often amongst friends and family. But if we read the placement of the two planets in the arc more specifically, the legalization of my marriage occurred not in my place of residence, but far away, back in the state where my family and friends were, that is, the place of remote friends and affiliations (Jupiter in Cancer in the 11-12^th). This is because we started living together in a different state so that my partner could attend graduate school. Furthermore, my union was with someone not only in school, but also in a foreign land, since he had come to the US to study when we began dating. We had recently begun a new life together when he started graduate school (Venus in Aries in the 9^th ).

But while the activation of this Lot coincided with a marriage in 1992, it has since been activated at other times for events that have little to do with marriage, but which nevertheless, do fit the parameters stipulated by the planets involved in the aspect arc. For example, Saturn formed a conjunction to this Lot in 2011 and expressed as a work proposal, offered to my husband to instruct new, foreign members of his team, which involved a relocation of the family to Romania for a year. As ruler of the 7^th, Saturn is significator of my husband in my chart. In that case, JU indicated the legalizations and instruction of the remote working and living affiliations that had to take place, while Venus provided the new friendships formed in the foreign country. Saturn in the 10^th activated both of those expressions through his commitment to his employer. Thus, none of the names given by Valens to the Lot really fit its expression in 2011. But the meaning provided by reading its formula did fit the expression quite literally. If you aren’t convinced and think I’m forcing this relocation event to the Lot, consider that this 2011 Lot activation of Saturn also formed a 6^th place quincunx aspect to the exact placement of the asteroid named Transylvania in my natal chart. Our work relocation was to Cluj, the capital of Transylvania!

The Projection from the Ascendant

The Lot at 3 Gemini is the projection of that VE - JU aspect arc from the Ascendant. But how does the activation of that Lot point actually relate to, and differ from, the aspect situation itself? To answer this, we have to understand the theoretical difference between a planet and a point. The aspect arc is derived from the placement of two planets. Arcs are just distances. So, they represent trajectories covered. Planets are the actors who cover those trajectories. They do so, in order “to place themselves” where they need to be to be able to act. In the above example, Venus originally started out in its cycle with Jupiter at the conjunction. But in order to be able to position itself to be able to bring about Jupiter’s revelation/legalization situation, Venus needed to move to the 9^th, where it is located. In other words, I needed to start a new attached relationship with someone in school and far from home, before I could legalize that affiliation. The aspect arc between two planets denotes a set of dependent conditions: the faster planet acting because of the slower planet, and in order to make the slower planet’s action possible.

Points in the sky are different. They DO NOT indicate actions. Because they are composed of Zodiac signs, they represent ideals that are desired because of a perceived lack of something. With Gemini, the perceived need is for learning, but it also implies a dual existence. The 10-11^th indicates a place of joint affiliation and the Sun there indicates a decision to be made. Getting married not only provided us with a legalized dual existence but also allowed me to finish my own schooling, after his was completed. In essence, the need for learning belonged to both of us jointly at that time.

But what about the house of the Lot? Any point projected from the Ascendant is a point of terrestrial manifestation. It is no different from any other point in a house or on a house cusp. But a Lot is a more specific version of that. It’s a Zodiacal point of terrestrial manifestation that is specifically accomplished through the actions of the planets that make up its arc construction. So the need for learning and communication (Gemini) within the status of that affiliation (10-11^th ) became terrestrially manifested through the VE - JU actions of the Lot of Marriage. 

But why does the expression between two planets need a Lot to manifest? Can’t it just manifest through the aspect itself? Well, contrary to popular astrological belief, no, it can’t. An aspect arc does not, and cannot, manifest as an external terrestrial event except through the action of the planets involved. Every planet acts upon the object of the house where it’s placed. That is the only way it creates accidental change. Two planets in an aspect arc represent two dependent actions happening at different times, upon different objects. Therefore, the arc distance between them can never express as a single action. Even when those two planets in arc are in the exact same degree, they are still in different signs and houses. Therefore, they represent two different actions, even if they are activated by the same situation, such as a marriage or a move. The exception are planets in co-presence (that is, in the same signs and houses); they DO act upon the same objects for the same reasons. And if they're in the exact same degree, they do so simultaneously in time. This is why a conjunction is not technically considered "an aspect".

The Lot that combines two planets in arc shows the impetus that motivates them into action. But since the Lot is not an active point, it itself needs to be activated by a moving planet in order for its situation to come into awareness and action. In the case of Saturn, it was the commitment to work that set the relocation into motion. In the case of the directed Ascendant, it was the move to a new living environment after graduation that set the marriage into motion. The misperception that an aspect expresses as a single event, comes from inner-world astrology where all astrological indicators are internalized and interpreted as emotions or psychological themes. But outer-world astrology must be analyzed differently.

The Lot of Fortune

Having gone through that example, we can now examine more deeply the ubiquitous Lot of Fortune. Let’s first deal with the diurnal formula before we get into the issue of reversals for the nocturnal charts.

The diurnal formula for the Lot of Fortune is ASC + MO – SU.  In other words, it’s the arc from the Sun to the Moon (in green) projected from the Ascendant (not shown here, but somewhere in the 4^th place in this chart). Because it involves the distance that the Moon has moved from the Sun, it’s considered a lunar dominant Lot. This is in contrast with the Lot of Spirit, which in the Hellenistic literature, has the reverse formula for diurnal births: ASC + SU – MO, and is considered a solar dominant Lot, because it looks at the arc distance that the Sun makes from the Moon (in blue; that distance, when projected from the ASC, falls somewhere in the 10^th place, but is not shown.)  

A luminary is a very special kind of being. It’s a source of light. All light represents consciousness, among other things (see my video and articles on Light in the chart for more on this topic). So, whenever any luminary (either Sun or Moon) is involved in an aspect arc, conscious awareness is always present and active. (Robert Zoller’s contention that the Lot of Fortune is unconscious, because it involves the Moon, is not supported by empirical evidence). When an arc involving two luminaries is projected from the ASC, the ability to consciously manifest occurs. The Sun represents our soul, the animating spirit that has the ability to decide and select the direction we want to move in life. Think of it as a focused headlight that you carry on your forehead between your eyes. The Moon is the lit up Earth that captures the emanated solar light and shapes it into a path that you can see and safely follow. Both are lights, so we are conscious of either.

The Lot of Fortune represents what I call the “inhale opening arc” between the Moon and the Sun, in the aspect arc theory that we cover in our Syntax course. As a projected arc from the Ascendant, it therefore represents the terrestrial manifestation of what the Moon has given shape to in response to the Sun’s indicated starting situation. Because it’s a product of the soul’s desire for a given external situation, the Lot of Fortune often appears to us as a wish-fulfillment.

When so many of us spend so much of our conscious waking life preoccupied with the economics of life, it’s not uncommon for us to manifest the natal Lot of Fortune as a financial or material gain. This is one reason why Fortune has been popularly associated with money and assets. The other has to do with its name. But Fortuna in Latin does not mean “fortune” in English. It means “fate”, which is a more appropriate translation. The fate associated with the Lot of Fortune is often a fortunate one because it’s tied to Light, not because it’s tied to money. However, it’s also the case that if a person spends a lot of conscious awareness and energy fearing negative events and outcomes, one can also end up manifesting anxieties and fears through this Lot. The luminaries create and the Lot manifests, whatever those creations happen to be in the consciousness. These more anxious expressions of Fortune are detected in timing charts, where we can for example, see it expressing the conscious concern that clients have with anticipated layoffs or an expected death in the family. In cases such as these, the light involved produces clarity in the mind and soul to come to terms with the anticipated challenging event.

Reversing by Night?

In Hellenistic astrology, the practice of reversing the Lot formulas is based on a "sect" consideration, that is, whether a birth is diurnal or nocturnal. This practice appears in some, but not all, of the Hellenistic tradition. However, none of the ancient sources actually contains any good rationale for why this is done. They simply do it! It’s been speculated by modern commentators, that because the Sun is the dominant light in a diurnal chart, that the arc for Fortune should be from the Sun to the Moon. And if the Moon is the dominant luminary of the nighttime chart, then one should measure Fortune from the Moon to the Sun. This merely restates the mechanics; it doesn’t really explain them. The reversal also begs the question as to why Fortune’s arc alone -- and not any other Lot -- should start with the dominant light.  For example, why would the Lot of Spirit begin the arc from the Sun in a nocturnal chart, if we’re using the sect argument? And for that matter, what would be the rationale for reversing all of the other lot formulas at night, even those which do not involve luminaries?

One Hellenistic astrologer who dissented from this practice was Claudius Ptolemy. In his astrological treatise, Tetrabiblos, he argued that the Lot of Fortune should always be calculated using the day formula (ASC+ Moon - Sun) regardless of whether the birth was diurnal or nocturnal. Ptolemy correctly viewed the Lot of Fortune as a "lunar" point—a representation of the Moon's relationship to the Sun, projected from the Ascendant. He believed that, since the Lot itself is lunar in nature, its relationship to the Sun should remain constant, to preserve the Moon's phase relationship. Because Ptolemy became the most accessible source for European astrology during the Renaissance, many later astrologers (including William Lilly) followed his lead. Thus, centuries of charts have subsequently been calculated without the Lot reversals.

Ptolemy’s rationale is consistent with the logic of our teachings on aspect arcs. If you reverse the Fortune formula at night, you are no longer projecting the opening arc of the lunar phase. Instead, you are projecting a "mirror" of that phase, which is its closing arc. Other modern critics of the reversal argue that, if the Lot of Fortune is meant to represent the "physicality" or "fate" of the Moon’s cycle, changing the math based on the horizon line, breaks the mathematical continuity of the lunation. While there are important sect-based techniques that do require a consideration of how light affects the condition of the planets, it is unclear that ANY aspect arc technique should be among them.

Testing it Out

There is a fairly simple and reliable way to empirically test whether the reversal of the daytime formula for Fortune works better in nocturnal charts. This involves having a few clearly defined denotations that distinguish the Lot of Fortune from the Lot of Spirit, since they are reversals of each other. Below are interpretative characteristics of each one that clearly differentiate one from the other. These characteristics were refined over the years by heuristically observing their activations in charts.

If you have a nighttime chart note where your Part of Fortune and Part of Spirit are located by sign. (A program report that uses the reversed formulas for these two Lots will tell you where both are located). Look also at the rulers of those Lots, to get an idea of how their needs will be fulfilled. Compare the two chart scenarios and note which one fits best with the traits outlined in the following table.  I’ll illustrate this assessment with an example from an anonymous nocturnal chart.

Lot of Fortune	Because of its emphasis on the Moon, Fortune has a distinctly nurturing and concrete quality to it. Whatever comes from it tends to be something we spend some time developing or nurturing into the external world.
Lot of Spirit	Because of its emphasis on the Sun, Spirit has a distinctly selective and inspiring quality to it.  Whatever comes from it, tends to be a direction we ponder and choose because we are inspired by it.

Now let’s look at this nocturnal chart: The red arrows point to each of the two Lots in question, although I have not labeled which is which. One of them is Spirit and one of them is Fortune. I’m going to interpret each one separately to find out which scenario of the life each one relates to. Then we’ll see which -- if any --  fits the above descriptions for the two Lots.

Starting at the top, the anonymous Lot shown with a red question mark is in Gemini, which is the 10^th sign, but in the 9^th house. This bridges the two houses. So the point refers to something having to do with one’s education and occupational status. The sign tells us that there is a need for learning and communication. Now, looking at Mercury, it’ll tell us how the fulfillment of this Lot’s need will be accomplished. Mercury is in the 3^rd, co-present with the Sun and with Neptune in Scorpio, bridged into the 2^nd . Focusing just on Mercury in the 3^rd, that tells us that it’s about a familiar direction in one’s learning. But when we also take the Sun and Neptune in Scorpio into consideration, it speaks of deciding to surrender, with some difficulty (Scorpio purging is always forced upon us through unsustainable circumstance), a  familiar path of learning. From knowing the subject’s history, I can recognize right away what situation this is referring to. When this person was in college, he let his grades plummet through neglect and a lack of interest in the subject matter. To address the threat of failing most of his courses, he decided to leave his degree program and transfer to another major and a new school, and start all over. His decision, and its communication, involved a considerable expense and tension with his parents. But he ended up going into a more inspiring career direction.

The anonymous Lot shown by the blue question mark at the bottom of the chart is at almost 3 degrees of Capricorn in the 4^th, bridging with the 5^th. Capricorn indicates that the need being addressed is a need for accomplishment and legacy. Let’s ignore the bridging for the moment, if we aren’t yet sure how they combine. We can return to it once we have other clues figured out. Since this is an earth sign, let’s say the legacy or accomplishment has to do with property (4th house)… Perhaps this person wants to own a home that he can leave to for his children (4-5th)? Let’s see how this might be accomplished: Saturn is in the 6^th, bridging into the 7^th by sign. Saturn is a planet of long-term commitment and it’s combining work with, or involving, a partner. I now wonder if the 5^th in that 4-5 combination might be a derived combination involving property worth (5^th = 2^nd from 4^th) rather than children. I ask if his partner works in real estate. Yes, indeed his partner invested the family savings into real estate to fulfill a need for accomplishment and legacy. Over time, this resulted in a large financial gain for the couple. As an important side note, notice that the need of the sign is NOT the native’s own need for legacy and accomplishment. It actually refers to the partner’s need. This is just one of many instances in which we see evidence that the planets in “our charts” can be embodied by others in our life. The chart doesn’t really “belong to us”.

Having identified both scenarios, we can now assess which scenario best fits each Lot. Looking at the table, it’s quite easy to see a clear fit. The Lot of Spirit is definitely the Gemini Lot, since it involved a pondered decision about leaving one's educational path and starting a new, more inspiring one! The Lot of Fortune fits easily with the Capricorn Lot, since it involved the nurturing and development over time of a material accomplishment in the external world. It isn’t always the case that the Lot of Fortune results in financial gain. But as I said, it’s a point of earthly conscious manifestation. If the native spends lunar mental energy in an area that can translate into financial gain, then Fortune can literally end up being financially fortunate.

This last chart was created in Solar Fire using a programmed version of Valens’ Lots. Thus, both of these Lots were originally reversed, incorrectly placing Fortune in Gemini and Spirit in Capricorn. However, as this exercise demonstrates, reversing the Lots does not fit well with this particular nocturnal chart. Additionally, this is not an isolated incident. It's one of many nocturnal charts where the reversed formulas have failed. Therefore, I think we’re on empirically solid ground rejecting the practice of reversing Lot formulas for nocturnal charts.