Impossible question - Astrology and the classical elements

[Infernal1]

Hi all. I read here about astrology and I'm very confused as to how or if the planets can be distinguished and reified by their predominant element. Scattered and fragmented purported conclusions over my search engine suggests to me that in Chinese astrology, Mercury is ruled by water whilst Vedic astrology appears to view earth as its ruling element, yet both Eastern and thereof Western astrology appear to have Mercury's ruling signs as Virgo (earth) and Capricorn (air) just as the sacred words written by Maxine articulate here: https://templeofzeus.org/Planetary_Rulerships.php

That said, Wikipedia within the context of Western astrology lists Mercury solely under air which thus causes myself overwhelming confusion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrology_and_the_classical_elements

Forgive my likely binary and ill-informed thought process yet I simply cannot help but exist as one that can only understand and cross-relate things exclusively out from their most basic components retroductively rather than deductively (i.e Occam's razor; bottom-up logic). If any one person could suggest any primer for me to better learn of the elements and/or of astrology I'd be most eternally grateful. Anything helps, truly.

Thanks for reading and most above all thank you for your time.

 

[Stormblood]

I believe there's is a typo in your post. You said one of Mercury's ruling sign is "Capricorn (air)". It would be Gemini (air), instead. Capricorn is a cardinal earth sign, not an air one. The exalted sign is Aquarius, perfectly in line with Uranus being the higher octave of Mercury.

Planets, elements, and signs are different from each other. They have correlations between each other, sure. Some qualities of Mercury are best expressed through Gemini, some through Virgo.

These are the purest expression for Mercury. Mercury in a sign represents how its energy is expressed.

You can see how Mercury expresses in water signs by reading the descriptions of Mercury in Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces. Notice, however, that Mercury struggles to express through the medium of water, especially through Pisces. That's why we say Mercury is in detriment when it travels through Pisces.

So, in the Western conception of elements (as well as in the Vedic and Japanese conceptions), water doesn't relate well to Mercury. (Fire even less but you didn't mention it).

The page you linked in Apollo's astrology shows perfectly why Air is the element that relates to Mercury the most. Read all the rulerships of Mercury. It's clear. Even its symbolism. They are all related to air.

It has been said before Chinese elements do not directly relate to Western elements. I don't know if there is such a thing as Chinese astrology with Mercury and our other planets, but that would be based on their folkish conception of elements.

For example, Wood has some overlaps with Akasha (and Chinese Earth has some overlaps too) but it's not strictly one-to-one for everything. There's no Air among the Chinese elements. They have Metal, which has overlaps mainly with Earth but also some with Fire. You should not look at it as a 1-on-1 equivalence.

If you're interested in our astrology, which is very effective, then you should read the whole Apollo's Astrology section, and then about the elements in our meditation section. Then I suggest meditating on what you learned and drawing parallels.

The more you meditate on your chakras, especially the bottom chakras and the middle chakra, the more your understanding of the elements will expand. For example, after breathing energy into them and vibrating your chosen mantra, you can focus on one at a time, and set the intent to observe how the element works within you. This is the quantum/microcosmic level.

Externally, when you reach a certain level of advancement, you can start meditating on the elements in nature, even breathe them in and analyse their properties.

If you're interested in Chinese elements, which are a completely distinct system, I suggest studying Traditional Chinese Medicine. A good book is Foundations of Chinese Medicine by Giovanni Maciocia.

Spiritual understanding is not a left-brain exercise. Instead of trying to categorise things a lot, it would be best to focus on integrating them. The spiritual part of the brain doesn't work by division and linearity.