ABSTRACT
Philosophers of Late Antiquity were critical of the theory and practice of astrology. However, for Iamblichus, in his redefinition of this form of divination stripped of human error and the rationalism of dianoia, astrology was a perfect form of knowledge handed from the gods to humans (De mysteriis 9.4). The interest in astrology exhibited by Neoplatonist philosophers opens up the question about how astrology may have been considered in theurgical practices, which is addressed in this chapter. An answer can be arrived at by joining Proclus’ interpretation of the types of madness discussed by Plato (Phaedrus 244b–245b, 265b), along with his theory of the sublime in the symbolic reading of Homer, to his descriptions of the planetary gods in his Timaeus commentary. This hypothesis is bolstered by Platonic music theorist Aristides Quintilianus’ discussions of initiatory music as a preparation of the soul for the greater mysteries, and of the role of the music of the astral spheres in contributing to the ordering of the rational soul. While some aspects of technical astrology remained useful for theurgical Neoplatonist philosophers for understanding how the embodied soul is subject to necessity and fate at the preparatory level, astrology’s role in initiatory rites involved an aesthetic consideration of astral symbolism.
