Article April 25, 1970 Issue

The Age of Aquarius

[For young adults]

HENRY JOHN WEEKS

A popular rock song expresses the hope that the world, as heralded by the stars, is entering a new age of love and peace. It is called "The Age of Aquarius" and refers to the belief that astrology governs human lives. This looking out to the stars and planets for guidance or reassurance is a very ancient impulse on the part of mankind.

Throughout their struggle to reach the thought of the one God and His perfect justice men have found a sympathetic chord in the grand spectacle of the heavens. Reaching out from their limited, material experience, mortals historically misinterpreted the movements of the heavenly bodies and made gods of the stars and planets. There also grew up the belief that by understanding the paths of the heavens men would know the reasons for the vagaries of material existence.

This belief persists to the present day, but its history extends back into the dawn of time. The earliest and most systematic users were centered in Babylon, and Isaiah denies the powers of astrologers and stargazers in these words: "Behold, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them; they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame."^{Isa. 47:14;} And Daniel and his companions, through their reliance on the one God in counseling the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar, were accounted "ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers."^{Dan. 1:20;}