The Craft of Chart Rectification by Steven Forrest, copyright 2000. This article first appeared in The Mountain Astrologer
PLEASE NOTE: STEVEN NO LONGER DOES RECTIFICATIONS. Contact Braden Diotte to
have your birth time
rectified. "I don't no! the time of my birth." ny !oring astrologer hears that line a fe! times a month. In rectification#the craft of discovering the true scendent of a birthchart#the first rule is never accept an "I don't no!" statement on face value$ l!ays, !ithout fail, mae a strenuous attempt to discover the recorded birth time...!hich is often actually available, many times %uite easily. &on't let a client's hesitation to search compromise your !or$ The technical procedures of rectification are valid and useful, but they are not foolproof, especially !hen the birth time is completely unno!n and the !indo! of possibility is t!entyfour hours !ide. Since a !rong birthchart is every astrologer's nightmare, it is both !ise and ethical first to e(haust all the timesleuthing possibilities availab le. ny information helps. s !e !ill be discovering, discovering, even narro!ing do!n the birth moment moment to something as vague as as "in the morning" or "it !as still dar" can be immensely helpful. )ncourage your clie nt to press information from his or her parents, older siblings or anyone !ho might have been around at the critical event. *ften they'll give you invaluable clues, especially !hen encouraged to relive the event in their memories. In merica, generally your best bet for finding actual records of the birth time, assuming that there are no immediate family records or memories, is at the state level. +ospitals aren't often much help, but each state has a &epartment of ital Statistics or something similar !here birth certificates are stored. *ften these official birth certificates contain more information than the ones issued to the parents, especially for births dating to the time before (ero(ing. For a complete listing of all the relevant state offices, !ith their addresses and phone numbers, for all fifty -.S. states, clic here . y the !ay, if you find something inaccurate there, please let us no!$ The information changes periodically and !e're dependent on people around the country eeping us current, as they often do. /e're maintaining this as a ind of public service to the astrological community, and !e rely on your help. *nce you've e(hausted all these possibilities and you've still come up empty, it's time to start the actual technical procedures of rectification. The process !ill drive you halfcray, but mastering it !ill mae you a better astrologer# and not 1ust because you've absorbed a ne! technical sill. ectification also brings you right into the heart of the !ay transits, progressions, and solar arcs actually operate. I3 3-TS+)44... In a nutshell, !hat you are doing in rectification is !oring bac!ards through astrology's predictive techni%ues. 3ormally, !e have an accurate birth time and !e use transits, progressions, and solar arcs to predict the timing of events or developments in a person's life. In rectification, !e do it the other !ay around5 !e use the timing of events that have already happened to "postdict" the time of birth#in other !ords, !e come up !ith a chart that !ould have
predicted the timing of ma1or developments in the client's life, developments !hich have already occurred an d !hose times are no!n. T+) 64I)3T'S TS7 The client's tas is to provide you !ith a list of the dates of ma1or events spread out through the length of his or her life, !ith very brief descriptions of them. For e(ample, "I got married on 8anuary 9, :;<=" or "my first child !as born on 8une 29, :;9<." )mphasie that there's no need for long confessional biography here> all you need is a phrase and a date. I find it helpful not to be too directive. Seeing ho! the client defines "ma1or events" is often illuminating. If it's all professional developments, that suggests the possibility of a big Tenth +ouse focus, and that can be a helpful clue, corroborating the results of all the technical procedures !e're about to learn. I as my clients for a list of about ten such events, but the number isn't really critical. The only constraint here is that the events must be spread over a !ide period of time. 3ine events !ithin a si( month period !ill foul up the rectificational process for reasons !e'll soon e(plore in detail. It's better that no t!o events are closer than !ithin a couple years of each other at a minimum. !ider spread is even more helpful. The more accurate the date of the event, the better. Thus, births, marriages, and significant deaths tend to play a big role#people usually remember those dates e(actly. Sometimes a client !ill say "I moved to Seattle in ?ay :;;@, but I can't remember the date." See if they can remember if it !as the first or second half of the month#anything to focus it a bit. "&ates" vaguer than about a month are not really useful, unless you restrict yourself to progressions or solar arcs, !hich move relatively slo!ly. )ven there, a year or t!o is about the outer limit of usefulness. T+) A*6)&-) *nce you have the list of dates, the real !or begins. The fist step is to set up a hypothetical birth chart as a starting point. &on't mae any guesses here. If you have ero idea !hat time the person !as born, erect it for noon. If you have a range of times Be.g., "bet!een C500 pm and dinner"D, split the difference#say =5C0. emember that this is 1ust an appro(imate chart> mae a real effort not to become enamored of it$ The ne(t step is to run transits, progressions, and solar arcs based on that chart, for the dates the client has supplied. 3o! I recommend a cup of coffee. In essence, here's the idea5 you no! that big changes tend to happen for people !hen there are ma1or transits, progressions, and arcs to the four ngles of the chart#the scendent, the &escendent, the ?idheaven, and the astrological 3adir. If you see that there !as a tendency for planets to be in the middle of 6apricorn !hen big changes !ere happening for the client, then it's a good bet that mid6apricorn might be one of those four ngles...assuming you can't e(plain that mid6apricorn sensitivity any other !ay. Thus, the cru( of the rectification process5
. )liminate all the sensitive areas in the hypothetical birthchart !hich you can e(plain a!ay through natal planetary contacts... . Then assume that any other sensitive areas are related to the Four ngles...remembering that if you no! the ngles, you no! the birth time. 3o!, if the client has a natal planet in that mid6apricorn hot spot, then !e really haven't l earned very much> !e already no! people's lives change !hen a natal planet is heavily aspected by transits, arcs, or progressions. So, to repeat the core principle, !hat you are seeing is a set of points to !hich the client is astrologically reactive that can't be e(plained through passing aspects to an y natal planet. The foundation of the !hole rectification process lies in the fact that +ouse cusps are timesensitive, !hereas planets !ill generally move relatively slightly in odiacal terms during the da y. )very four minutes, the ?idheaven moves through about one degree. The numbers vary a bit for the other cusps, but they're all in that range. /hat about transits, arcs, and progressions to the Succedent and 6adent +ousesE In practice I'd suggest focussing strictly on hits to the ultrasensitive ngular cusps and ignoring the intervening ones. * ne benefit of this approach is that it neatly bypasses all arguments about !hich system of +ouse division is best#!ith only a fe! minor e(ceptions, all of them agree on the ngles and disagree o nly on the cusps of the other +ouses. T+) T**4S In !oring !ith secondary progressions for rectification purposes, use the Sun, ?ercury, enus, and ?ars. The ?oon is a little dicey because, u nless the birth time is reasonably accurate for starters, lie !ithin a couple of hours or so, the initial position of the ?oon is too uncertain for us to trust it. -sing the progressed scendent or ?idheaven !ould be a ma1or blunder, since the absolute uncertainty of their initial positions is the cru( of the problem !e are addressing. 3ever use the progressed scendent or ?idheaven in rectification$ /ith solar arcs, use everything e(cept the scendent, ?idheaven and ?oon. /ith transits the situation is a little bit tricier. ou can al!ays use 8upiter, Saturn, -ranus, 3eptune, Aluto, and the 4unar 3odes. /hen the dates that the client has provided are accurate !ithin on e day, add the Sun, ?ercury, enus, and ?ars. /hen the dates are not that accurate, then those faster planets have blurry positions due to their rapid motions# !hile Aluto !ill move only a fraction of a degree in a month, ?ercury can cover a !ide arc in that length of time. The faster transiting planets lose their usefulness unless the dates of the critical events are no!n accurately. ou may have to mae some 1udgment calls. If, for e(ample, your client moved to 3e! or "during the first !ee of February :;;9" !hile transiting ?ars, enus, or ?ercury !as maing a Station, you may have detected something useful. That !ould be a particularly po!erful inner planet event, and more i mportantly !e !ould no! its position pretty accurately for that !ee, since a Stationary planet !on't shift far !ithin that short timeframe. I never use the transiting ?oon in rectification.
Fourth harmonic aspects#the con1unction, s%uare, and opposition#are very dynamic and reliable. They correlate po!erfully !ith biographical events. I'd suggest using them e(clusively for rectification !or, forgetting all other aspects, at least initially. Thus, !e are looing strictly for s%uares, con1unctions, and oppositions to the scendentG&escendent a(is, and ditto for the ?eridianG3adir a(is. In practice, !hat this means is that you'll be noticing a pattern lie this5 "there's a tendency for things to happen in this person's life !hen planets get to the fifteenth or si(teenth degree of ?utable signs." The ey is that the four ?utable Signs form a cross#a fourth harmonic structure. Bnd of course it's the same for the other t!o ?odes, 6ardinal and Fi(ed.D If you have :@ Hemini rising, then activity around :@ degrees of any one of the ?utable signs !ill trigger events since :@ Sagittarius !ould be an opposition and :@ of Aisces or irgo !ould be s%uares. nd if there are no natal planets in any of those degrees, you've probably found a ma1or clue about the position of the scendent, &escendent, ?idheaven or 3adir. This "fourth harmonic" thining is a very practical, effective approach#for me, it preserves 1ust enough essential data. 4ooing for con1unctions alone !ouldn't do that. ?ean!hile it eliminates 1ust enough lessimportant data, such as the milder effects of the trines, se(tiles, and minor aspects, for clarity#and perhaps your sanity#to be maintained. 3 6) I3 T+) +*4) *n a given date at a given birth place, a specific ?idheaven !ill dictate a specific scendent. If, say, the ?idheaven is ; 6ancer at a given moment, then the scendent must be, say, :9 4ibra at that latitude. In other !ords, a specific ?idheaven degree a nd a specific scendent degree are lined at each latitude. ou can't fudge that scendent bac five degrees and still maintain the same ?idheaven, even if the rectification data seems to be begging for it. 3ature constrains us here, and that's actually helpful in practice because it narro!s our range of possibilities and helps us out of a variety of 1ams, as !e !ill soon be seeing. Say ; 6ancer happens to be the ?idheaven of our hypothetical chart. /e have no real reason to believe it's accurate#!e came up !ith it simply by splitting the difference bet!een the earliest and latest possible birth times, !hich !ere a couple of hours apart. 3o!, through transits, arcs and progressions !e observe that both eleven degrees and nineteen degrees of the 6ardinal signs are really hot#things happen in our client's life !hen planets arrive in those degrees. /e've probably hit paydirt....1ust assume an :: degree 6ancer ?idheaven and a :; degree 4ibra scendent, and it all !ors out neatly. 3ature "permits" that chart, and it no! fits the actual timing of events in the client's life. /e 1ust assume that our client !as born about eight minutes later than our startingpoint chart, advancing its ?idheaven and scendent by about t!o degrees. Sometimes rectification is that easy, and !e're done. *S +o! close does a planet have to be to an e(act aspect for it to "!orE" /e no! from more general astrological practice that the ans!er varies !ith the speed and nature of the planet as !ell as its innate strength in the chart. Arogressions and rcs generally operate in tighter aspectual orbs than do transits, but none of them re%uire
e(actitude to be effective. ?ight someone get a big professional promotion !ith solararc 8upiter one degree off their true ?idheavenE Sure. This inherent "slush" fues the rectification process some!hat. The immediate effect is that someone !hose true ?idheaven is :24eo:9 !ill sho! an array of significant transits, arcs, and progressions !ithin a couple of degrees on either side of that point#and pr obably a fe! outlying Saturn or 8upiter transits as !ell. s common sense !ould dictate, you are basically splitting the differences among the positions of these hits, determining a point that see ms to be nearest the center of the activity. Hradually the various traces of evidence !ill converge on a single degree. Some practitioners claim a level of accuracy beyond that. Aerhaps they're right, but I personally suspect there's often an el ement of !ishful fantasy in such claims. *rbs are an astrological reality> there can be no doubt about that. nd logically they constrain the accuracy of the rectification process, although if !e push it far enough, averaging out the errors that orbs create, !e can get e(tremely close to the true moment of birth. nd of course, for the lion's share of practical astrological !or, if the +ouse cusps of a chart are accurate !ithin a degree, you're in good shape. +I&&)3 3H4)S In an accurate natal chart, a planet might very !ell happen to be con1unct an ngle, or in a fourth harmonic aspect to an ngle. This is of course a common occurrence, and it threatens the rectification process !ith a serious pitfall. The planet can effectively hide the ngle. +ere's ho!5 From routine astrological practice, !e no! that arcs, progressions and transits to the planets themselves are e(tremely energetic events. In rectification, !e ignore all passing aspects to natal planets because !e are only interested in locating the unno!n, timesensitive points5 the ngles themselves. If someone's Sun lies in 6ancer, !hen !e chec out our "hit lists" around those sensitive dates the client supplied, !e no! !e'll very liely see a lot of events connected by fourth harmonic aspects to 6ancer...a moving planet con1uncts, s%uares, or opposes her n atal Sun and her life gets colorful. Initially, !e ignore that data because it isn't telling us anything !e're seeing to no!#!e already ne! !here her Sun !as and that it !ould be sensitive to getting clobbered b y a Aluto s%uare$ ut if her true scendent happens to fall in degrees of a 6ardinal sign, then those aspects to her Sun !ould be effectively hiding it$ n scendent in ries, or 4ibra, or 6apricorn, or even con1unct the Sun in 6ancer !ould basically disappear, hiding "behind the Sun." /e'd be looing right at it, but !e !ouldn't see it. /e'd thin !e !ere 1ust seeing arcs, progressions, and transits triggering her natal Sun. +o! do !e sort that one outE /ell, !e no! that her scendent and ?idheaven are some!here, and that the y are liely to be implicated in ma1or lifeevents for her. If, after a close analysis of several events, !e seem to be getting no!here, there's an e(cellent chance that !e're in a "hidden ngle" situation. *ur confusion becomes useful information, in other !ords. If nothing is !oring, probabl y the ngles are hiding. That little insight !ill save you a lot of headaches. Ho a little further. &ue to astronomical realities, especially outside the tropics, it's relatively unusual in practice to see the ?idheaven actually s%uare the scendent. This helps us as !ell because if one ngle is hidden, it's less liely that the other one is hidden too. /e'll see a big une(plained spie in only one ?odal area#and immediately suspect that the other ngle is hiding behind a planet. Aursuing our e(ample, maybe there's an une(plained cluster
around :2 degrees of the 6ardinals. /e give her a :2 ries ?idheaven, and then the scendent happens to fall in 6ancer, con1unct her Sun. /e've got a good candidate chart. T+) I3646-44) -S)F-43)SS *F H-) +I3TS /ay bac in the first paragraph of this article, I rhapsodied about the incredible helpfulness of even a vague hint as to the time of birth. /ring the client for anything and everything in that department. ?aybe he or she tells you, "I can't find my time of birth....but mom says it !as definitely in the !ee hours." *ne learns to tae everything !ith a grain of salt, but that provides a really useful head start. Set up a chart for :500? and another one for 500?, and you've got a strictly limited arc of possibilities for all four ngles. The right chart is going to be in bet!een those e(tremes. That's only a four hour spread#already si( times more precise than starting !ith 1ust the birth date. Some!here in there is the right chart, and you're si( times closer to a right ans!er than you !ould be if you only ne! the birth date. It's even better than that. 6ontinuing !ith this e(ample, maybe you've got an une(plained cluster of events around :0 degrees of the Fi(ed Signs. our assumption is that it must correspond to either the +orion or the ?eridian a(es of the chart. et!een :500? and 500? on that day, there !as probably only one possibility for a Fi(ed sign on the ?idheaven#say, arbitrarily, 4eo. There !as also only one possibility for a Fi(ed sign on the scendent#say Scorpio. *ne of those is probably your ans!er...but !hich oneE Is it :0 Scorpio risingE *r is it :0 4eo on the ?idheavenE It could be either, and those are t!o different charts. ut, there's good ne!s5 unless !e're dealing !ith an scendent?idheaven s%uare, it !on't be hard to sort it out. +ere's ho!5 4oo at the :0 4eo ?idheaven chart. It !ill dictate a specific scendent, depending on the latitude of the b irthplace. ?aybe it's :; Scorpio. 3o!, the critical %uestion#does that scendent also correspond to a "hot spot" for the clientE If it does, get o ut the champagne. ou've found the ?idheaven#and an scendent that agreed !ith it$ That's the +oly Hrail. If it doesn't agree, then e(periment !ith that :0 Scorpio scendent. It too !ill dictate only one possible ?idheaven# is that a hot spotE esE 6hampagne$ 3oE /ell, don't despair. ead on. y the !ay, !e made this e(ample a little easier than some real!orld situations in that !e assumed !e ne! something about the time of birth#that it occurred during the !ee hours. If !e hadn't had that helpful clarification, !e !ould have had to try out :0 degrees of every F i(ed Sign on both scendent and ?idheaven...!hich is e(actly !hat you do if you are rectifying !ithin a 2= hour range. That represents a lot more possibilities, !hich maes it a lot more challenging in practice. The techni%ues remain the same, though. Hradually, the erroneous charts are eliminated and the truth emerges. ou sometimes get into confusions generated by polarities#is that :0 Taurus or :0 Scorpio on the scendentE -nless you are dealing !ith an scendent?idheaven s%uare, then the ?idheaven3adir hitclusters !ill usuall y clear that up#they'll support one scendent and preclude the other. 6*??*3 S)3S) 3& ST*4*HI64 )JA)I)36) void 'em both as long as possible. "This person really loos lie he's got 4eo rising #chec out that hair$" In the end, impressions and intuitions lie that may cast tiebreaing votes, but be!are$ "/hat a careerdriven person$
She's got to have a big Tenth +ouse$" There is a real place for these inds of 1udgements in rectification, but that place is at the end of the long, hard process of actually looing at the data. &eeper astrological e(perience reminds us that Aluto in the First house can effectively mas%uerade as Scorpio rising. enus con1unct the scendent can be mistaen for 4ibra rising. nd mature common sense tells us that neurotic insecurity and a controlling, materialistic early family life can correlate !ith tremendous career dr ive, even !ith nothing in the Tenth +ouse. ut transits, arcs, and progressions to ngles never lie. 64*S)4 SA6)& &T)S *r almost never lie. In one situation, transits, and especially arcs and progressions, can lie to you !ith great authority, and that is !hen you are !oring !ith events that are closely spaced in time. +ere's a cardinal rule of rectification5 3ever do that$ If your client gives you ten dates that all fall !ithin a five year period, you'll get guaranteed false results. /hyE ecause in five years, none of the progressions or arcs !ill have moved very far. ou'll see "clustering" all right, but it !on't have anything to do !ith the scendent or ?idheaven$ *f course everything is clustered#nothing had enough time to move any!here$$$ ou'll imagine you've found this incredible hot spot !hen all you are seeing is a tric you've played on yourself !ith the numbers. I generally as my clients to give me around ten dates, none of them closer than t!o years to any other. I encourage them to include events from their childhoods, if p ossible#big family moves, parental divorce, births of siblings, and so on. That spreads it out. Ideally, I'd get something from every chapter of their lives. *ne obvious corollary is that it's easier and more accurate to do rectifications for people over, say, thirty years of age. -nder age five or ten, the process !ould be %uite dubious. In bet!een, it's !orth a shot, but it !ould be foolish to tae any result as final. ST-67E Sometimes a rectification 1ust falls neatly into place. /hen that doesn't happen, 1ust setting it aside for a couple of days can !or !onders. Failing that, then the ne(t step is to go bac to the client and get another set of dates. y random illfortune, the first list might have neatly demonstrated the p ositions of the client's Sun, ?oon, enus, and so on, but simply not involved a nything that revealed the ngles#big events can happen in a person's li fe !ithout ma1or ngular influences. The odds are long against that, but it does happen. 3othing for it e(cept a fresh start !ith a ne! set of events. ?any times, despite your admonitions, a client !ill have given you a longer list of events than you re%uested, or one that you had to !eed out because of too many closelyspaced events. In that case, !or !ith the une(plored events #but, if you are using those closelyspaced events, mae it a fresh start$ &on't add the ne! ones to the previous events, or you'll get those "instant amaing results"...!hich are totally !rong for reasons !e discussed a couple paragraphs bac. F)/ A6TI64 /I374)S 4et's say you are torn bet!een a Taurus and a Scorpio scendent. ?aybe the ?eridian a(is is s%uare to the +orion, and you're 1ust tearing out your hair trying to decide !hich scendent is right. t this point, common sense
and astrological e(perience can legitimately enter the e%uations. &oes the person have that penetrating intensity !e associate !ith ScorpioE &oes his or her professional life corroborate that BpresumedD 4eo ?idheavenE /hat about the placement of planets in +ousesE / hich arrangement best fits e(istential, observed realityE s !e said earlier, this ind of thining does have a place in rectification#and !e 1ust defined it specifically. That much is fairly obvious and intuitive, but !e have another technical ace in the hole here. If Scorpio is rising, then Aluto and ?ars are the coulers of the scendent. /e no! that the planetary ruler of the scendent is al!ays a very sensitive point. /hen !e !ere compiling our hit lists for the big events in the person's life, did !e notice that Aluto andGor ?ars really stood outE &id anything contacting either of them virtually al!ays correlate !ith ma1or fire!orsE &o they seem more reactive than the rest of the planetsE That !ould argue po!erfully for Scorpio rising in this scenario. *r !as it enus that seemed to be at the center of every hurricaneE ?aybe !e should consider that Taurean ascendent after all.... +ere's another tric. ?ost astrologers have observed family patterns in charts#you got your father's nose and your mother's ?oon. /e are not taling simply about Sign positions here#it's generally do!n to areas t!o or three degrees !ide. It might not al!ays be the same planet in the particular degree area> very commonly, for e(ample, a child's scendent !ill be the ?oon or Sun position of on e of the parents, or vice versa. If your client has children !hose birth times are no!n, set up those charts. &itto if parental birth times are no!n. re there degree areas that leap out as a family patternE re they close to any of our suspected nglesE )ven if the birth times are unno!n, !e can almost al!ays at least get their birthdays, !hich gives us the position of the Sun and planets to !ithin about a degree of accuracy, and a good guess about the ?oon. ery similar patterns apply to the charts of people outside our families !ith !hom !e have serious or pivotal relationships. Hetting the charts of "significant others" can often help us build confidence and precision in our rectified chart#"her lover's ?oon is smac on the scendent I've come up !ith$" I emphasie that none of these trics is a substitute for the more technical procedures !e've outlined. ut after you've done the technical !or, you might still be torn bet!een a couple of possibilities...or 1ust need some e(tra confidence in a chart you're thining is probably right. That's !here these pieces fit into the pule. Transits, solar arcs, and secondary progressions provide a lot of data. Arobably the y are enough. ut you can also !or !ith converse solar arcs and converse progressions, !hich are surprisingly active and effective. *ne can e(tend out into the realm of ?inor and Tertiary progressions as !ell. ll these are po!erful techni%ues, and arguably they are underused in modern astrological practice. In my interpretive, counselling !or !ith clients I prefer a simpler approach, but I've commonly used all of the above techni%ues in particularly teethgnashing rectificational procedures. *ne insight that !ill be brought home to you in this !or is that it is very hard to no! from a biographical event !hich planet !as the trigger. *ver and over again, you'll see deaths connected !ith 8upiter or enus, promotions connected !ith Saturn, humiliations connected !ith the Sun, and successes lined to 3eptune. This is a good reminder that !e should never be too literal about the out!ard, concrete "predictive" meanings of the planets. /hat they really do is tell us !hat the event meant to the clie nt. If you're interested in going more dee ply into that idea, I'd
recommend you have a loo at my boo, The 6hanging Sy. B6S Aublications, San &iego.D The bottom line here is that any planet's passages can coincide !ith almost anything in our out!ard lives, but !hen any of them hit ngles, things do happen. It's the timing of the event more than the nature of the event that helps us in rectification. T+) *4) *F 6*?A-T)S computer definitely maes rectification easier. )ven the crudest of programs allo! one easily to set up an array of possible charts and "hit lists" for the relevant biographical dates. ?ost of the ma1or programs also support some ind of "rectification" subroutine. Henerally, they enable the ad1ustment of a chart through altering the birth time and either the scendent or the ?idheaven. In practice, I usually !ind up !ith a big pile of paper charts and lots of pages of scribbled notes. Still, the computer, !hile not strictly necessary, is as useful in this branch of astrology as it is in any other. .I.. Soft!are B:: 6aya ve, /.+artford 6T 0@::0, B<@0D2C2@2:D, in its old &*Sbased Star Tra( program, offered a !onderfully simple rectification module !hich I love very much#in fact 8odie and I maintain an ancient laptop simply because it holds that program. ou enter the appro(imate chart and the critical dates the client provided, select transits, progressions, and arcs, punch a button, and the positions of the moving planets are instantly "binned" by fourth harmonic degree, 1ust as I've been describing in this article. arious parameters can be ad1usted, and the !hole program is a very helpful ad1unct to the processes !e're e(ploring. If you can find a copy of that older program, grab it. .I..'s fearless leader, lphee 4avoie, in the / indo!s versions of their Star Tra( programs, has replaced that rectification module !ith a ne!er, more comple( and po!erful one. I'm not a computer guy, and I have to say it's too complicated for me, even though lphee has e(plained it to me. If you are computer friendly, I'd heartily recommend trying it#I no! the program !ors incredibly !ell, because lphee sat in front of me and used it very convincingly to ad1ust my o!n earlier rectification of my o!n chart, and 8odie's rectifcation of her chart, by a fe! minutes. lphee is a pal an d he'll probably murder me for saying this in print, but I really !ish he !ould include the older, simpler rectification subroutine as an optional module for the cyberchallenged in any ne! updates of his e(cellent ne! ?illenium Star Tra( For /indo!s . There may be other good rectification programs out there> please forgive me if I've not mentioned them. s I said, even though I use computers, I'd serve pretty !ell as a !orstcase customer scenario for any soft!are company. If you are computerless or computerphobic, you can do everything in this article, to a high degree of professional precision, !ith nothing but an ephemeris, a Table of +ouses, some time, and plenty of coffee. STI44 ST-67EEE ll these procedures are laborious, but they !or. If you are still stuc after a long effort, you can repeat the above procedures as long as you and the client both have the patience a nd interest. If you pursue them diligently, you !on't hit the !all often. /hen you do, remember !hat the Father of ?edicine said5 "First do no harm." t some point, frustration sets in, and that can lead to "settling" for a chart in !hich you don't really have much faith. This is the moment for some reflection on the terrible responsibilities being an astrologer entails. If you d on't feel good about the chart you've created, it's probably best simply to say that straightfor!ardly to yourself and to the client,
and put the !hole pro1ect aside at least for a fe! months. It's smart, of course, to have alerted the client to that possible outcome right from the start. T+) T)* *F +I3H T/* /T6+)S Someone very !ise once observed, " man !ith a !atch no!s !hat time it is, but a man !ith t!o !atches is never sure." s you get into rectification, inevitably you'll be dra!n to chec out your o!n chart, even if your birth time is allegedly "accurate." It's usually disconcertingly eyeopening. )ven a birth time given to an odd minute, !hich sounds so convincing, can be off by surprising margins. ?y o!n birth !as listed on my hospital birth certificate as C5C0 ?. -sing the procedures I've described in this article, I rectified it to C52:, and lphee 4avoie convinced me it !as C5:;52. 6locs are simply !rong sometimes. Aediatricians and nurses have more pressing tass than recording birth times accurately. *utside astrology, nobody thins accuracy here is very important. strologers themselves don't even really agree on e(actly !hat !e mean by "the moment of birth." )rrors in this absolute bedroc of our craft are far more common than !e lie to believe. In the best of !orlds !e !ould rectify every chart. Hiven the paramount importance of an accurate chart to the accuracy of any subse%uent interpretation, I suspect our astrological descendants !ill loo at us the !ay !e no! loo at medieval doctors doing surgery !ith dirty hands. In closing, I'd lie to mae it clear that I basically no lo nger do rectifications. The process is en1oyable in the same !ay that doing a cross!ord pule is en1oyable, but it's timeconsuming. I'm over!helmed !ith the rest of my !or and, sadly, I've had to set a limit in this department. 8odie does do rectifications if the time limit is sufficiently narro!. I hope that someone out there !ith a taste for this ind of procedure !ill soon place an advertisement for a rectification service in the ?ountain strologer classifieds. It could be a good basis for a profitable professional astrological business, and it !ould certainly provide an e(cellent support to the community. ?ean!hile, let's all dare to trust a pee at that confusing "second !atch" !e're carrying5 the actual evidence of planetary motions as they impact the birthchart. It's a lot more reliable than the cloc on the hospital !all, and not that hard to read !ith a little perspiration and patience. copyright 2000 Steven Forrest.
