Theater and Television
The recent folk-rock musical production "Hair" is replete with astrological implications. An astrologer set the date for the Broadway premier.
One of the hit songs in "Hair" is "Aquarius." According to the song the world is moving into a better age, the Age of Aquarius, because of a slight shift in the position of the sun among the stars each spring.
Then there is the film "Rosemary's Baby." It is based upon a book of the same title. The plot is about a woman who believes her child was fathered by the devil. The film so far has grossed $40 million, putting it into the top 50 all-time box office hits.
Astrology and related mystic phenomena are having a growing influence on television and radio as well. It is not uncommon for clairvoyants to host their own "talk shows," offering predictions to famous guests. On the radio one can hear horoscopes read and discussed by well-known astrologers.
Some leading television personalities, reports TV Guide, of October 4, 1969, "will consult their favorite star-watcher before deciding when and where they will sign their contracts, what nights their shows should be aired, who their guests and co-workers should be, and what kind of shows they should do."
It's interesting to note there is three prime-time network shows in the United States that deal with either a ghost, a witch or a genie. These "other world" characters are presented, of course, in a light, "harmless" vein.
Why the Interest?
But why this sudden upsurge in astrology and the occult in the Western world during this apparently enlightened 20th century?
The biggest reasons are 1) a fear-ridden, uncertain age, and 2) the apparent failure of orthodox religion to give meaning and reason to today's world.
The world today is fraught with danger and uncertainty. Crime, riots, protests, nuclear proliferation, inflation and pollution — this is the stuff of which our newspaper headlines are made.
Meanwhile, organized religion in the eyes of many has lost meaning for a confused generation. Millions protest the "irrelevance" of traditional religious concepts and beliefs.
A Gallup poll revealed in early 1967 that the majority of Americans — 57 percent — say religion is losing its influence on American life. Ten years previously, the proportion holding this view was only one-fourth as large, 14 percent. "This represents," said poll-taker George Gallup, "one of the most dramatic shifts in surveys on American life."
According to a professor of Sociology at the University of Washington, "Sociologists argue that in a stable society religion provides the necessary answers to the great questions of life, death and man's fate. But when stability is upset, persons experience a sense of being lost, and, in a peculiar state of receptivity, they turn desperately about, looking for new answers.
"Some are looking for new answers within the framework of organized religion. Hence such trends as 'speaking in tongues, ' 'underground masses,' or the introduction of jazz and contemporary dancing into religious services."
But for the most part, the seeking of "new answers" is conducted outside the church, and has fueled the upsurge in interest in astrology and the occult.
It was this way in Rome, too, at the time when the mighty empire was crumbling.
Traditional Religion Didn't Satisfy
The native pantheistic Roman religion, while pagan, had espoused certain moral principles which helped bind Roman society together and promote Roman patriotism. But it's confusing, abstract religious concepts didn't fill the spiritual void in the Roman populace. This was especially true among the rapidly multiplying freed-slave class whose ancestral roots were in the Middle East rather than the Italian peninsula. These people felt right at home with the imported eastern sun-cults and mystery religions which began to stream into the empire.
Samuel Dill, in his work Roman Society in the Last Century of the Western Empire, wrote:
"In the fourth century [A.D.] the ancient religion of Latium [a region in Italy associated with the origin of Rome], while revered and defended as the symbol of national greatness by the conservative patriot, supplied little nutriment for the devotional cravings of the age. . .
"The paganism which was really living, which stirred devotion and influenced souls . . . came from the East — from Persia, Syria, Egypt . . . Foreign traders, foreign slaves, travelers, and soldiers returning from long campaigns in distant regions, were constantly introducing religious novelties which fascinated the lower class, always the most susceptible of religious excitement, and then penetrated to the classes of culture and privilege" (pp. 74-76, 78).
Another historian of the Roman world, Jerome Carcopino, also noted the decay of traditional Roman religion. Notice how parallel, in principle, was the great confusion over religion, morality, and mysticism in Rome to conditions existing today.
"One great spiritual fact dominates the history of the [Roman] empire: the advent of personal religion which followed on the conquest of Rome by the mysticism of the East.
"The Roman pantheon still persisted, apparently immutable. . . But the spirits of men had fled from the old religion; it still commanded their service but no longer their hearts or their belief.
". . . with its prayers formulated in the style of legal contracts and as dry as the procedure of a lawsuit; with its lack of metaphysical curiosity and indifference to moral values . . . Roman religion froze the impulses of faith by its coldness. . .
". . . in the motley Rome of the second century it had wholly lost its power over the human hearts" (Daily Life in Ancient Rome, by Jerome Carcopino, pp. 121, 122).
How similar to conditions today.
A Senior Editor of Look magazine wrote, several years ago, in an essay on America's then-emerging moral crisis:
"We are adrift without answers. We are witnessing the death of the old morality. . . No single authority rules our conduct. . . No church lays down the moral law for all. . ."
The Roman Catholic Church has been wracked with controversy up to its highest levels of authority. The hierarchy is deeply concerned over the increasing number of priests leaving the ministry.
Meanwhile, Protestantism — divided into hundreds of sects — is having its own "identity crisis."
"We Protestants are tired and confused," confessed Dr. Walter D. Wagoner, director of the Boston theological Institute. He was writing in a widely circulated nondenominational magazine. He criticized the trend toward theological "faddism" exemplified by the short-lived "death of God" movement, espoused by some Protestant theologians.
He complained of a widespread "spiritual malnutrition" among ministers and laymen alike. He concluded by saying that there is a growing awareness among Protestants that "we have no direction to go but up."
In the midst of this pervasive religious and moral confusion, many are turning to astrology and the occult in hopes of finding the answers to the big questions in life — "Who am I?" — "Where am I going?"
Astrology: The New Religion
Astrology seemingly offers the lost individual — the unknown face in a nameless crowd — a chance for self-recognition. "In astrology," says the president of a well-known astrological organization, "the earth is at the center of the universe and the individual is the center of attention. Everybody's favorite topic is himself."
Astrology seeks to provide individuals with what they have lost — a sense of personal identity and meaning. A 22 year-old Boston girl put her finger on this point when she said, "Astrology . . . is a very personal tying of the individual to the universe. Science led us away from God and now science [meaning astrology] will bring us back."
The astrologer holds out the vision of a world ruled by forces operating with clockwork regularity. These forces supposedly guide the individual to greater heights of achievement — they — help him succeed, attain, understand.
When things go wrong, one can blame the stars. When good things happen, you thank your lucky star.
Astrology claims it can provide answers to your individual problems. And to answer them in a way that will give you happiness and success! Of course, not every housewife who scans the astrology column believes the forecast, but that is why she's interested in her horoscope — to get some of these answers.