The belief in a connection between the cosmos and terrestrial matters has played an important part in human history.
The history of astrology in Europe and the Middle East are inextricably linked, with each region contributing to astrological theories and continually influencing each other. Bouché-Leclercq, Cumont and Boll hold that the middle of the 4th century BC is when Babylonian astrology began to firmly enter western culture.
This spread of astrology was coincident with the rise of a scientific phase of astronomy in Babylonia. This may have weakened to some extent the hold that astrology had on the priests and the people]. Another factor leading to the decline of the old faith in the Euphrates Valley may have been the advent of the Persians, who brought with them a religion which differed markedly from the Babylonian-Assyrian polytheism .
Just as the sacrificial method of divination rested on a well-defined theory – to wit, that the liver was the seat of the soul of the animal and that the deity in accepting the sacrifice identified himself with the animal, whose "soul" was thus placed in complete accord with that of the god and therefore reflected the mind and will of the god – so astrology is sometimes purported to be based on a theory of divine government of the world.
Starting with the view that man's life and happiness are largely dependent upon phenomena in the heavens, that the fertility of the soil is dependent upon the sun shining in the heavens as well as upon the rains that come from heaven; and that, on the other hand, the mischief and damage done by storms and floods (both of which the Euphratean Valley was almost regularly subject to), were to be traced likewise to the heavens – the conclusion was drawn that all the great gods had their seats in the heavens.
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