Distractions Don’t Bother This Astrologer

To see things more clearly, French astrologer Andre Barbault says he often shuts himself away “in a remote, faraway place where you can’t guess what’s going on in the world around you.”

At these times his only connection to reality are the astronomical ephemerides he uses to track cyclical events.

“I had to rid myself of illusions,” the 93-year-old mundane astrologer explains in describing the ascetic regimen he follows when predicting worldly happenings years – and sometimes decades – in advance.

Mundane astrology deals with predicting worldly events based on planetary patterns. Ephemerides provide both past and future records for where planets have been and where they’re going to be in the future as their cyclical journeys through the astrological signs of the zodiac unfold.

Barbault acknowledges that his monastic methods and sole reliance on the celestial position of the planets at any given time is “the ultimate high-risk strategy.”

But it appears to work for him.

“Andre Barbault’s uncompromising rigor has revealed remarkable connections between planetary cycles and world events that he published years ahead of time for more than 40 years in L’astrologue magazine,” says Roy Gillett, president of The Astrological Association of Great Britain.

Gillett says several of the planetary configurations the French astrologer studied, alongside narratives of how the mundane events actually unfolded, can be read in English for the first time in “The Value of Astrology,” a new book published in 2014 by The Astrological Association.

Those looking for evidence of connections between astrological symbolism and earthly events will find in the book a number of convincing studies to consider, Gillett says.

For example, Barbault describes the remarkable frequency of armistice and peace negotiations occurring when Venus and Jupiter come together in the heavens to form the aspect astrologers call a conjunction. In this configuration, which marks the end of one cycle and beginning of the next, both planets appear to occupy the same degree of the astrological sign they are transiting or passing through.

Venus is well established in astrological lore as the planet of love, peace and harmony and Jupiter is identified with optimism and expansion. Traditionally, these planets are known as benefics. Together they would be expected to have a positive effect on efforts to resolve or settle issues contested by warring sides in a dispute.

It takes slightly more than a year for fast moving Venus to overtake and pass slow-moving Jupiter in the zodiac. However, because Venus travels so quickly through the astrological signs, the window of opportunity this conjunction creates doesn’t remain open very long.

The aspect is in play for only a few days in every calendar year. However, Barbault notes that an uncanny number of cease fires and armistice agreements have coincided with these dates in the past, far more than would be expected by chance.

Included in this group is the ceasefire that ended the 2014 Palestinian/Israeli conflict in Gaza.

Barbault was introduced to astrology by his elder brother Armand when he was 14 years old.   He founded “L’Astrologue” magazine in 1968 and is the author of 50 books.

More than a year before Stalin’s death in 1953 he used a study of the Saturn/Neptune cycle to predict a major transformation of the Soviet system. At the height of the Cold War he predicted that the Americans and Russians, representing capitalist and communist principles, are “two runners at the end of a race with its final destination in 1988-1989.”

At the end of the race Barbault predicted the world would renew itself and give birth to a new society. Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev did his part by introducing the twin policies of glasnost (openness and transparency) and perestroika (restructuring) in the late 1980s.

But even new societies can hit speed bumps along the way. Decades in advance, Barbault said he feared the possibility of a world financial crisis building to 2010.

More information about the book can be found on the www.astrologicalassociation.com website.