Renaissance Magic and Active Astrology: From Medieval Fatalism to Individual Agency

The magician uses to concentrate his attention, mind, will and faith: in the passage read previously we have read what Agrippa says about faith - it is a firm attachment, a fixed intention and a strong application of the operator to the cooperator. The meaning of all these things is therefore this: to concentrate, to be a support and aid to focus all the senses on a single object or subject so as to project oneself beyond oneself and identify with the very object of meditation. This, even if in different forms without perhaps all those aids, those symbols, we can still do today, even if in another way. But the idea was the same. The Kabbalah is useful because Abbot Tritemius said if I can name a thing I can obtain it. Conclusion: With the focus on the individual and the centrality of the individual, fatalistic astrology that is passive is no longer good, but a type of astrology that becomes an instrument for human action makes its way: that is, in which it is man who changes his own situation and uses all means available to him, including celestial influences to obtain what he wants. Conceptually, this is an astrology that is antipodal to the fatalistic and superstitious astrology of the Middle Ages.