The ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras famously said, "All things are number." By this he meant that everything in the universe is composed of the interaction between numbers, and that the better we understand the qualities and properties of numbers, the better we will understand ourselves and our place in the universe. Astrology at its core is also about numbers, most readily seen in the various aspects between planets. This branch of our celestial art is referred to as Harmonic Astrology.David Hamblin gives us a useful and in-depth narrative on this subject in Harmonic Astrology in Practice, a well-organized reference on the harmonics up to and including the thirty-first harmonic.The division of the 360 circle by various numbers produces specific, recognizable qualities that can be expressed by the astrologer as an interpretive technique. The traditional aspects are made from the first, second, third, fourth, and sixth harmonics and are respectively equivalent to the conjunction, opposition, trine, semisquare, and sextile. In this sense, astrologers are using harmonics whether they are aware of it or not.Hamblin refers to the qualities associated with a specific number by adding the suffix "-ness" to the number. So the opposition is "twoness" and the trine is associated with "threeness." But what about "fiveness" or "sevenness"? This is the subject of Hamblin's Harmonic Astrology in Practice as he presents his findings on all the harmonics up to "thirty-oneness." He presents many case studies to illustrate personalities colored by the various harmonics, and from this readers will readily grasp how the harmonics play out in real life.One of the basic principles of harmonic astrology is that each prime number introduces a new quality. From this basis, the fourth harmonic is closely related to the second harmonic, while the sixth harmonic is a combination of the second and third harmonics. Not until we get to the fifth harmonic is a new quality introduced. Some astrologers recognize the fifth harmonic as the quintile and bi-quintile aspects. It's associated with creativity and more specifically with the desire to create order out of chaos. Hamblin shows how this aspect works in the charts of several celebrities, including Nikola Tesla and Kurt Cobain.Another fundamental principle of Harmonic Astrology is that the greater the harmonic, the smaller the allowable orb. The formula is to divide the orb allowed for the conjunction by the number of the harmonic. If you allow a 10 orb for a conjunction, then by the time you get to the seventh harmonic, the allowable orb is less than 1 Degrees30'. And, of course, the tighter the orb, the more observable are the qualities associated with that harmonic. And although the author doesn't state it directly, readers might also notice that the higher the harmonic, the more specific are the correlated qualities. For example, thirteenness is about taking risks in the search for one's identity, seventeenness is about campaigning for a better world, and thirty-oneness is about delving into the unconscious mind. Perhaps it's not surprising that both Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung have horoscopes with strong thirty-oneness aspects.After the analysis of the individual harmonics, Hamblin presents several case studies that clarify how the number qualities work in practice. American readers will most identify with Whitney Houston's story. She has strong patterns of fiveness, sevenness, and fifteenness (threeness plus fiveness), but no twoness, which includes the squares and oppositions in traditional terms. The positive side of twoness is that it can spur us into taking action to resolve problems, and Whitney just didn't have this.Additional chapters on harmonics in mundane astrology, in synastry, and in transits and progressions round out the subjects covered in this exceptionally original and fascinating book.Chris Lorenz, Dell Horoscope magazine Nov/Dec 19
