The Four Elements of Astrology – A Modern Interpretation

Throughout ancient and medieval times, astrology was considered more of a natural science than it is today. Back then the leading scientific theories were developed by the Greek philosophers and tended to be rather simplistic compared to modern theories. Among these theories explaining the structure of the universe and the one that came to dominate the explanation of matter in the Hellenistic world was the four elements.

These elements are earth, water, air, and fire. Each of the elements became associated with 3 different signs of zodiac. Each of the three signs are located 120 degrees apart from one another. This is called triplicity and form the foundation of one of the five essential dignities in Hellenistic and Medieval astrology.

The four elements were not only incorporated in the astrology, but also into Hermeticism, alchemy, and medicine. In medicine they were associated with the four humors, yellow bile (fire), black bile (earth), blood (air), and phlegm (water). It was through this association that medicinal astrology was developed.

Aristotle, in his treatise On Generation and Corruption, relates each element to four sensible qualities. These are hot, dry, cold, and wet. Each element is composed of these two qualities. In the Same treatise Aristotle also introduces the four causes, matter, form, agent, and end. These are also called the material cause, the formal cause, the moving , and the final cause. As one can see the dominant world view of the ancients held the basics parts of the universe can be divided up in to division of four. This was accepted science for nearly 2,000 years.

Everything changed with the scientific advances of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Age. This time period saw the development of chemistry and a new definition of what an element is and how many there are. In astronomy, the heliocentric model of the universe replaced the geocentric model astrology previously used. It was during this time, the 17^th and 18^th century that astrology stopped being taught at European universities because it was no longer “science based”.

This triggered the second dark age for astrology in Western Civilization. When astrology was revived in the 20^th century in Western Civilization, it was mainly though the efforts of linking the signs and planets to the base archetypes in human psychology along with a general revival in the quest for spiritual and mystical knowledge. This also included the four elements as they can be thought of as an archetype.

Modern Western Astrology has keep the old triplicity system intact, but it is no longer thought to be representative of the physical world. But what if I told you that modern physics actually has a very similar analog to the ancient four element system? What if there was more than one? Most people and scientist probably won’t believe it. However, there is a very good analog to the ancient four element system in modern physics. And a few others that are close.

The best modern analog is the four phases of matter. Solid (earth), liquid (water), gas (air), and plasma (fire). A majority of these phases are self explanatory. Only with plasma may one not be familiar with. So I will briefly define it here.

Plasma is ionized gas that is stripped of electrons orbiting from the atomic nuclei. This creates both positively and negatively charge matter that is electrically conductive and generates magnetic fields. Because of this it has unique properties that gases do not have. Examples of it in nature are lightning and the sun which is thought to be mostly made of plasma.

The main point here is that have four “elements” is not such a outdated concept. This can be further shown in other areas of physics too. This example is immediately useful in the context of astrology since the four phases of matter so closely resemble the original for elements. Let’s go through some other examples

Next are four fundamental forces (sometimes called interactions) throughout the universe. Electromagnetism, the weak force, the strong force, and gravity. Gravity and electromagnetism are self explanatory. Most are probably not familiar with what weak and strong forces are, but these are simple to describe. The strong force is the force that holds matter together. It is responsible for the formation of neutrons and protons, the building blocks of atomic nuclei. The weak force is a force that causes radioactive decay. It is why nuclear fission exist.

If I had to correspond these forces to the traditional elements I would use the following: electromagnetism is fire, the weak force is air, the strong force is water and gravity would be the earth. I am not sure this the perfect analogy for astrology though. When you get into theoretical physics some of the concepts can be a little abstract and don’t translate well into everyday life.

For the better analogy to the classical astrological elements I would probably use the four passive two terminal non linear circuit elements. These are the resistor, the capacitor, the inductor, and the memristor. Not withstanding the color scheme in the picture I would probably assign the resistor to earth, the capacitor to water, the inductor to air, and the memristor to fire.

The interesting thing about this example is that it has something equivalent to the four sensible qualities too. Voltage, current, charge (electric charge), and flux (magnetic flux). Each circuit element has a non-linear equation describing the relationship between two of the qualities. This is very similar to the Aristotelian four element and quality system.

The only downside to this is that you practically have to be an electrical engineer to understand it. Especially since even most electrical engineers have never heard of memristors. They were only invented a few years ago. But they were theorized to exist since the early 1970s.

At this point you should realize that even though modern physics is more complex, some of the most basic theories boil down to a combination of four different elements. It is also like this is inscribed in the basic mathematical structure of the universe… Yes I even found a math example for this!

The four fundamental subspaces in linear algebra. This represents a fundamental theory of linear algebra. The spaces are defined in mathematical terms below. There is no simple way to explain this unless you already know linear algebra. For those who this and understand this, it is also apparent that this concept is too abstract to correspond to the classical four elements.

Taken together these various theories in math and modern physics seem to indicated the universe operates based on a division of four in many cases. In Heremetic lore this is represented by the saying “As above, so below”. This essential means that the structure of heaven is shown on earth. In the modern sense these would be the the structure of universe reveals itself to be fundamental on all levels, from the galaxy all the way down to the human mind.

Perhaps this is all in the human mind anyway. Some scientists would suggest that as an explanation. However even this if is the case, what does it say about us, as humans, if our minds keep on seeing the universe divided into four “elements”? I would say this must be a kernel of truth to the way the universe operates.

So in conclusion, I would say the four elements are not an outdated scientific concept, but one that is applicable even today. In astrological practice representing these elements as different phases of matter makes the most sense. And in the modern world where our science has advanced and grown more complex it would make sense to use this in our chart interpretations.

edit 6/17/2019: spelling & grammar