← Encyclopedia of Astrology · lesson 230/235
Electional astrology
What it is
Electional astrology is the art of choosing a moment to begin something. Where horary astrology takes the moment a question is asked and reads it, electional astrology looks ahead through the coming days and hours and elects — picks out — the moment whose chart best suits an undertaking: a wedding, opening a business, signing a contract, launching a book, setting out on a journey, moving house.
The idea behind it is that a beginning has a chart just as a birth does. The chart of the moment a venture starts is read as its natal chart, and its character is thought to follow from it. The Greek writers called this katarchic astrology, from katarchē, "a beginning".
What electional astrologers look for
No chart is perfect, so an election is always a matter of priorities. The classical order of importance runs roughly like this.
- The Moon first. As the fastest body and the great timer of everything, the Moon gets the most attention. It should not be void of course — the tradition's warning is that nothing comes of a matter begun then. For anything meant to grow, astrologers prefer a waxing Moon; a waning Moon is kept for things meant to lessen, such as ending a habit. The Moon should be well placed, applying to a benefic by a kind aspect rather than to a malefic by a hard one, and out of the Via Combusta (15° Libra to 15° Scorpio).
- The angles. Venus and Jupiter near the angles, especially the Ascendant and Midheaven, are read as blessing the start; Mars and Saturn on the angles as straining it.
- The ruler of the matter. The house that governs the undertaking — the Seventh House for a marriage or partnership, the Tenth House for a career move, the Third House for a short journey or a contract in some schools — should have its ruler strong by essential dignity, direct, and free of combustion and hard aspects from the malefics. The planet that naturally signifies the matter (Venus for love, Mercury for writing and contracts) is checked too.
- The hour. Many astrologers also prefer a planetary hour whose ruler suits the deed — a Venus hour for a wedding, a Mercury hour for a signature.
- Retrogrades. A retrograde ruler of the matter, or a retrograde Mercury for contracts, is usually avoided, since retrogradation is read as delay and going back over things.
Rooting the election
Most electional astrologers hold that a good election should also agree with the natal chart of the person beginning the venture — a chosen Ascendant or Moon that falls well in their own chart, and no difficult transit to its key points. A chart that looks splendid in the abstract can sit badly with a particular person. How much weight to give this, compared with the election's own merits, varies from one astrologer to the next.
In the tradition
Elections are among the oldest uses of astrology. Dorotheus of Sidon gave a whole book of his poem to beginnings in the first century; Persian and Arabic astrologers wrote whole treatises on them; Guido Bonatti set out long lists of rules for medieval Europe. Wedding dates, coronations and the laying of foundation stones were all elected. So were humbler things: William Ramesey's book of 1653 gives elections for sowing, planting trees, cutting hair and nails, bathing, surgery and bloodletting — the last two with the old rule, from the zodiac man, that the part of the body ruled by the Moon's sign should be left alone. The garden rules survive as planting by the Moon. Later practice, such as Vivian Robson's twentieth-century manual, carries the same rules with modern planets added.
How to read it
An election gives an undertaking a fair wind; it cannot make a poor plan a good one, and it leaves the sailing to the people involved. The practical limits matter too: a perfect sky at four in the morning is no use for a wedding, so the elected moment is the best one available, not the best one possible. Read an electional result as a set of good windows, with their strengths and weaknesses, rather than the one moment that decides everything.
In a reading here
An electional reading here asks what is being begun, the window of dates and the place. It screens each day in the window, then walks the actual planetary hours of the most promising days, scoring each moment on the Moon's condition, the benefics and malefics on the angles, the strength of the ruler of the matter and the fit of the hour. The best moment is cast in full and read, alongside a few runners-up with what each has for and against it, so a moment that fits real life can be chosen.