a technical guide to the sidereal stations
reference guides & tutorials for working the manāzil
One of the most challenging elements of engaging with the stations seems to be that they require some serious technical considerations to even be observed.
There are many approaches, these are mine.
In my work, I led with a few theoretical foundations, then let those points ground the rest of the work. I explained them briefly in the introduction, but I’d like to elaborate them further here.
These points are the product of my own experience living and working with the organic and messy systems of the Moon and stars.
foundational theoretical principles
I use the equal-sized sidereal boundaries for the stations. While I use the sidereal measurements of the manāzil, I do use the tropical zodiac otherwise. This is the place I’ve chosen to ground my work but I definitely believe in the value of all of these perspectives.
If you use the sidereal zodiac, you must pick an ayanamsa.
I prefer to use Fagan-Allen (also called Fagan-Bradley, same thing different name) myself because, of the commonly available options in most apps, it is the closest to the one the Babylonians would have used. It is fixed on the star Spica (the indicator of 14 Simāk). I think the Indo-Persian (or Sassanian) ayanamsa, which is fixed on the star Zeta Piscium (an indicator of 28 Rishā’) is also a good option because it’s what would have been used by the astrologers who first integrated Arab star lore with the Indian 28-fold pattern. It just isn’t available on most apps (and I find that Fagan-Allen does a slightly better job of getting all the indicators into their respective stations). Lahiri is also fine (and less than a degree off of Fagan-Allen).
In the end it’s not really that big of a deal; the differences between all of the ayanamsas are relatively minor (most of them fall within 5º of each other). This lunar stuff is always a little wibbly-wobbly anyway.
You will find that even when using the sidereal zodiac, some stations’ indicators still don’t fall within their equal sized station. I just follow the star and extend their border a degree or so informally—I think of it like the rule that a planet approaching a house cusp within 3º is already in that house.
This is what I mean by “returning to the indicator stars as a principle.” I know this is a little annoying for people who like things to be orderly. Sorry! Maybe precision isn’t a lunar virtue?
When using the equal sized boundaries and the Fagan-Bradley ayanamsa, there are three stations who need this treatment:
2 Buṭain and 20 Na’a’im both end about a degree after their technical boundary because that’s where their indicator stars fall
13 ‘Awwā’ starts about a degree early.
Use divination to solve problems. Ambiguity is everywhere when trying to conform astronomical reality to these cultural systems, so it’s important to have divinatory tools to lean on in times of confusion. It’s okay to let go and let God sometimes.
Start by interpreting the Moon in her manzil, but all of the planets may find themselves in these way stations.
how do i find my natal station?
I’m going to walk you through the process of finding your natal lunar station using the free website astro-seek.com and the paid software Astro Gold. We’ll be using the chart of fellow lunar gnosis gatherer W.B. Yeats to illustrate our examples. A special shout out to תעלמות • Taalumot at https://taalumot.space for his help in teaching me how to use Astro Gold and how to customize the sidereal stations for my gnosis gathering project. I couldn’t have done it without him!
These are the two apps I use but if any of you have any great ideas and would like to share a tutorial for them, I would be happy to add them to this document and cite you!
Tutorial 1: Astro-Seek
Under Division select “28 Mansions (Western/Arabic Manzils)” and under Tropical/Sidereal select “Fagan-Bradley” (or whatever aynamasa you prefer). See example.
This will give you the station of your Moon in a box at the top and, if you look down at your chart, it will also give you the stations of the rest of your planets. Note that in this case, the entire chart will be cast with the sidereal zodiac (so if you want to use the blended tropical/sidereal approach, you’ll just need to cast two charts and compare them).
I love that astro-seek makes this so easy to access!
Each station is marked with a number that follows the numbering system used here on this site and most other places. You’ll see that the stations are labelled primarily with their Latin names from Picatrix, which takes some interpretation to understand. Be sure to consult the chart at the bottom of the page to see the correspondences between their Picatrix names and their Arabic names.
Astro-Seek only allows you to cast your chart in one zodiac at a time, so if you need to look at your tropical chart it’s best to cast it in another tab so that you can flip between the two as needed.
Tutorial 2: Astro Gold
(for macOS)
Download .wh1 file. This file contains my own personal wheel style settings I use for my own astrology work.
Go to Documents > Astro Gold > Wheel Designs
Put .wh1 file in the Wheel Designs folder
Open the Astro Gold app
Right click the chart > Wheel Style > Lunar stations.wh1
See first screenshot, to the right on desktop or below on mobile
Make sure the lunar mansions wheel is set to sidereal, not tropical. If you select sidereal here, it will override any other settings and present this circle only with the sidereal zodiac.
See second screenshot, to the right on desktop or below on mobile
Click Sheets in the bar at the top. Scroll down to 1 Chart > Traditional > Lunar Mansions. Click the ⚙️ in the upper right corner.
See third screenshot, to the right on desktop or below on mobile
Make sure your ayanamsa is set to Fagan-Allen. Of the options provided by Astro Gold, I like Fagan-Allen best for our work.
WB Yeats’ chart example shows you what it should look like.
Once you’ve downloaded it, customize it however you want!!
The Astro Gold tutorial is a fair bit more fiddly, but I think the set up is worth it in the end. This will allow you to cast a chart with the tropical zodiac in the center but a ring of sidereal lunar stations on the outside, as you can see for Yeats’s chart.
As far as I know, the lunar stations are only available for Astro Gold for macOS and I’m sorry to say that they do not have any plans to add a PC or mobile version.
some reference images for your study of the manāzil
to share and use to your heart’s content
two cheat sheets
The first is a list of the stations, their primary indicator stars, and the degrees where the equal-sized sidereal stations start and end in the tropical zodiac (using the Fagan-Allen ayanamsa).
Due to the effects of sidereal precession, these coordinates move a little bit every year, about 1º every 72 years. These are set for the year 2019, when the sidereal zodiac was offset exactly 25º00’ (in my preferred ayanamsa). I hope I’ve adequately explained above that exact precision is not a lunar virtue, so use these guidelines as a cheat sheet and don’t worry too much.
The second is my most used personal reference. It’s a list of the stations with their names listed in transliterated Latin characters and the Arabic alphabet. I cross-referenced my spelling of the Arabic names against as many sources as I could—as you can see several stations have variant names, each offset with a•center•dot. In all cases I have sought an exact correspondence between the Arabic and transliteration, intended to be used as a tool by Arabic students.
I have also given the letter most commonly attributed to each station (specifically quoting al-Buni) and all of the relevant indicator stars for each station. The indicators mostly follow al-Biruni, but do have some additions from my own research (especially in Allen’s Star Names) and my own gnosis. For details on how these stars work together to form the asterisms of the manāzil and the role of my experiential research, read their individual write ups as they become available.
some reference charts
Here I have a selection of reference charts I’ve generated using my custom layout on Astro Gold. I tried to come up with a few ideas for ways to visualize the stations and their boundaries that could be used by different kinds of learners in discussion with some of my friends and family. As people suggest or offer other ideas for reference charts, I’ll add them here!
If you wanted, perhaps you could print your favorite one out and/or save a copy and cast your chart onto it by hand to see where your placements fall among the manāzil?