The nature of Venus
The reasonings behind the temperaments of the planets
My boyfriend had an epiphany about Venus's temperament and he gave me permission to write about it as he doesn't intend to. He's not an astrologer, he learns a lot of astrology from me and as a Venusian he was baffled to know that some astrologers understood Venus as a sanguine planet. This is at least what Ptolemy says and he is just the most influential astrologer in history. This got personal when we did his own temperament calculations and learned that he can be either phlegmatic or sanguine depending on what you consider Venus to be (he's clearly very phlegmatic). As a Libra, the ambiguity was torturous. My boyfriend is convinced that Venus is phlegmatic and not even Ptolemy's authority will convince him otherwise. I don't know if traditional astrologers think about this or are aware of what I'm about to explain, but I myself have never seen any astrologer talking about that and pointing out the pattern he saw, so I think it's worth sharing.
He was just learning about the temperaments of the planets and he was questioning why Jupiter, for example, has domicile in Sagittarius and Pisces, which are choleric and phlegmatic respectively, if Jupiter is a sanguine planet? And why does Mars have a domicile that corresponds to his choleric temperament and then another in a phlegmatic sign? It didn't make sense to him, since the Hellenistics seem to love symmetry very much. The sudden lack of symmetry was unacceptable. To him, everything had to have a pattern and logic, and I think he found them and was able to make a very good defense of the phlegmatic Venus, and I made some developments to it.
The Thema Mundi
For credibility in hellenistic astrology you have to justify things using the Thema Mundi, so if you're not familiar with what that is, this other post by @saturniandevil will help. When we study the Thema Mundi, we say we put the Sun in Leo first, because that's the height of the mythic summer, the Moon stays behind it in Cancer, because things have to start with the luminaries and the Moon is best represented in its phlegmatic phase when it's waning, when it's behind the Sun. The Sun has to see the other planets on its right, while the Moon sees them on its left, of course. And then the planets are arranged in Chaldean order from fastest, Mercury, sitting next to the lights in his role of assisting power, to slowest, Saturn, opposing them.
If you notice you'll see that the Sun and the Moon have temperaments that correspond to their domicile signs. The Sun is hot and dry, as is Leo, the Moon is cold and humid, as is Cancer. Next comes Mercury, the dual planet that is either melancholic or sanguine depending on its phase, cold and dry when it's after the Sun, and hot and humid when it's before the Sun, as illustrated below. It has domicile in Virgo and Gemini, which are melancholic and sanguine. If it stopped here everything would be already perfect, the Sun, the Moon, Mercury number one and Mercury number two cover all 4 temperaments and make sense in their domiciles.
But things have to change when we get to the malefics and benefics, because they don't work in the same way, because they're not supposed to. They're also 4 planets and in their scheme we have to consider that malefics are malefics because they're considered to be extreme, and benefics are benefics because they're considered moderate; this is one of the few consensus in astrology. Mars is considered mostly too hot and it has one domicile with the same temperament, Aries. And Saturn, considered mostly too dry, has one domicile in Capricorn. Because they're extreme, naturally they should have domicile signs compatible with their natures and other ones that are of the complete opposite nature as theirs. Choleric (hot and dry) is the antithesis of phlegmatic (cold and humid), and melancholic (cold and dry) is the antithesis of sanguine (hot and humid). The fixed water sign is considered the main house of Mars traditionally, while the fixed air sign is considered the main house of Saturn, signs where their natures are alien. This highlights even more their extreme natures, they're either here or way over there.
But benefics are considered moderate, temperate, so it makes sense that their houses correspond to only one of their lords' primary qualities individually. They are always in the same quality of either temperature or humidity when in domicile, never both and never neither. Jupiter as a hot and humid planet has domicile in Sagittarius because that's a hot sign that isn't humid, and in Pisces because it's humid without being hot. They don't need to be in domicile in a place that is of the same nature as them, just one that has one of their primary qualities.
This scheme is also more interesting, because it makes the malefic and benefic of the same sect have opposing natures. Jupiter is hot and humid, contrasting the malefic cold and dry nature of Saturn. Venus is cold and humid, contrasting Mars' hotness and dryness. If Venus is considered sanguine the entire scheme collapses. This is why Venus is phlegmatic in our opinion.
The Ptolemaic view
But why does Ptolemy say Venus is sanguine? Or what do I think is his reason? As we all know, Ptolemy created the geocentric system that defined astrology for centuries and continues to be a reference. Here's what he says about Venus's nature:
Venus has the same powers and tempered nature as Jupiter, but acts in the opposite way; for she warms moderately because of her nearness to the sun, but chiefly humidifies, like the moon, because of the amount of her own light and because she appropriates the exhalations from the moist atmosphere surrounding the earth. (Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos Book I chapter 4)
He gave astronomical rationales for everything, including for the primary qualities of the planets, using his own cosmogony. He's giving his astronomical reasons based on his geocentric system he's created, he's not the one worried about symmetry in this. He gives the nature of the planets based on their distance from the Sun, or from the Earth or Saturn, or based on them being in between two specific other planets etc. And there's nothing wrong with that, of course. He implies he's taking from "the ancients" the idea that Jupiter and Venus are both sanguine (Tetrabiblos, Book I chapter 5), he's following his teachers, he's not building everything from the ground up, obviously, so Ptolemy himself might not have even noticed how a sanguine Venus is the only loose end breaking a pattern. I'm not all against breaking rules, but if we use the Thema Mundi as a reference for everything in Hellenistic astrology, and we use it to justify criticism of modern rulerships, with the argument that those who use them don't know the rules to be breaking them, then I think we could see sanguine Venus in the same light.
part II - More on the temperament of the planets
