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 For
the 30th time, the annual congress of the Mouvement Astrologie Unifié (MAU),
founded in 1975 by Jacques Halbronn D.Litt., took place in Paris, on
November 12-13, 2004.
The theme of the congress was: astrology and the world - from the
astrological vision on the world and from the vision on the world on
astrology. The congress was also meant as a tribute to Jean-Charles
Pichon, French author, film director, poet and scholar.
The afternoon of November 12 was dedicated to Nostradamus. There were
presentations by Jean-Christophe Pichon, a son of Jean-Charles Pichon,
who described the decodation of the quatrains as developed by his father;
Roger Prevost, author of Nostradamus - la mythe et la réalité,
who discussed the way quatrains are related to events which occurred in
Nostradamus' era; Bernard Chevignard, author/compiler of Présages de
Nostradamus, who discussed his further research on De Chavigny;
Gérard Morisse, who illucidated the forthcoming publication of his
research on the Budapest-variant of the Du Rosne publication of the
Centuries, dated in 1557; Yves Lenoble, who discussed astrological
elements in the quatrains and the correspondences between on the one hand
the quatrains 01-16 and 01-54 and on the other hand some parts in
Roussat's Livre de l'estat et mutation des temps (1550 [1549]) and
Theo van Berkel, who presented four problems regarding authenticity.
According to the attendants that afternoon, the best presentation was
given by Lenoble.
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The
text of the contribution by Theo van Berkel
Ladies
and gentlemen,
Which
problems do I want to present and discuss? They are dealing with the
sources we use during our research, the intervention of others in the
process of writing or compiling a book, and the image of Nostradamus,
which seems to me decisive in the investigation of his person and
oeuvre. You will see that these problems are not isolated from each
other, but that there is a connection between them.
I
want to start with the image of Nostradamus. Almost all over the world,
he is known for the Centuries, but one does not remind enough that he
calculated birth charts, horary charts and practiced mundane astrology,
i.e. wrote predictions about events in the world, their fulfilment dates
and the place, region or country which is involved. In the Almanachs and
Pronostications, all these elements: the event, the fulfilment
chronology and the place of fulfilment, are present. It is exactly there
that they are basically different from the Centuries, because in the
Centuries the chronology of events is missing, next followed by the lack
of places of fulfilment.
The question is how to discover the sources of the Centuries, in order
to determine the origins of the predictions in the quatrains. How must
one determine if the sources are astrological or otherwise, such as
historical or prophetical? Like this, we also occupy ourselves with the
question of the astrological tools which are present in the Almanachs
and Pronostications are fit to compile the Centuries, if these tools are
adequate for such a project, a series of hundreds of predictions for
hundreds of years.
After
the decease of Nostradamus in 1566, it has been tried to attribute to
him important predictions regarding the circumstances in France during
the religious wars in the second half of the 16th century. According to
the "Recueil des Présages Prosaïques", these wars were
preluded by the decease in 1559 of Henry II, predicted in a.o. "Les Significations de l'Eclipse 1559",
known for the reply to contemporary critics of Nostradamus.
I have tried to make this clear by demonstrating that in "Les
Significations...", there are two non-identical horoscopes of the
September 1559 Lunar Eclipse. One of them contains an error: Mars in
Sagittarius conjunct Antares. In a clandestine English translation of
the "Almanach pour 1559", and in some parts of the "Recueil
des Présages Prosaïques", one can read that for the period of
September-October 1559, Mars is described as being located in Capricorn.
It is hard to imagine that an astrologer, two or three months after the
completion of an Álmanach, writes texts with contradictional data.
Neither in the English translation, nor in the "Recueil des
Présages Prosaïques" regarding 1559, there are traces of a
horoscope of this Lunar Eclipse and it is almost not imaginable that an
astrologer first calculates a horoscope and next replaces it by a
horoscope which is not identical to it.
The addition of text from "Eclipsium omnium..." by Leovitius
means that it has been tried to attribute to Nostradamus that he
predicted the decease of Henry II.
During a discussion of this matter on "Encyclopaedia Hermetica",
dr. Gruber, a German Century-scholar, supposed that such a contradiction is
characteristic for the nostradamian oeuvre. In other words: the presence
of such contradictions in publications, attributed to Nostradamus,
together with other factors, implies that Nostradamus is the author,
also because of his "prophetism".
The question is: how to analyse and interprete contradictional elements
in the nostradamian oeuvre in order to determine if a certain
publication is authentic or fake? [1]
Let
us also have a look to the Epistle to Henry II, as we know it from
several publications, such as the one by Le Pelletier. This Epistle is
dated on June 27, 1558, and does not contain one single prediction about
the decease of Henry II. Like this, the Epistle to Henry II corresponds
with the English translation of the "Almanach pour 1559",
compiled in March-May 1558, which also does not contain one single
prediction about the decease of Henry II.
The authenticity of "Les Significations..." can be contested,
especially because of its contents regarding the decease of a king. Does
this mean that the Epistle to Henry II is authentic, because this
Epistle corresponds with other predictions for 1557 in the sense that
there are no predictions about the decease on a certain moment of Henry
II?
The
last problem deals with the possibility that certain parts of the
nostradamian oeuvre are edited or revised by others, with or without
Nostradamus' permission.
Jean Brotot, a Lyonese publisher, wrote a letter to Nostradamus,
dated on September 20, 1557. The day before, he received two manuscripts
of Nostradamus with predictions for 1558. In his letter of September 20,
1557, Brotot wrote that the readers would not find the texts in these
manuscripts attractive and that he had decided to publish only one of
these manuscripts, adding elements of the other one. Next, he would add
lunar calendars and "philosophical lines".
The contents of this letter reveal one of the causes of the differences
between lunar phase data in the calendars and the text: the intervention
of a publisher. The contents also show that the sequence of the
predictions etc. in the book which finally was published, does not
correspond with the sequence in the manuscript.
What is most interesting, is the reference to the "philosophical
lines". Is this a reference to the short phrases in the lunar
calendars, or is this a reference to the quatrains for each month? In
other words: were these quatrains written by Nostradamus or added by
Brotot in order to beautify the edition and to make it attractive for
the readers?[2]
Paris,
France, November 12, 2004
T.W.M.
van Berkel
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Jacques
Halbronn D.Litt. and Theo van Berkel
Bibliotheca Astrologica, Paris, November 12, 2004
Notes
-
See
Les
Significations de l'Eclipse 1559 and Les
Significations de l'Eclipse 1559 and the Pronostication for the year
1559. [text]
-
See
Astrological
anomalies in Almanachs, Pronostications and correspondence.
[text]
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