Now for the stupid question (I'm not real with-it today, a vertebra in my neck has done something awful and I'm a little - medicated - on Baclofen and morphine, so forgive if this was covered and I missed it):

If you're using Whole Sign houses, would the 5 degree rule still apply?

Olivia wrote:Now for the stupid question (I'm not real with-it today, a vertebra in my neck has done something awful and I'm a little - medicated - on Baclofen and morphine, so forgive if this was covered and I missed it):

If you're using Whole Sign houses, would the 5 degree rule still apply?

I would say no, for two reasons:

1 - The 5? rule relates to the cusp, and the cusp as the most sensitive degree within the house would not be it's begining, hence the reason to use this rule at all. I'm of the opinion that the 5? shows a moment of transition as well, but that could lead to confusion if you take signs into consideration, so leave this way of thinking out for now.

2 - The Wholesigns system, in my opinion, reflects the notion that there is an alignment of the house with the sign into which the cusp falls. When you think about wide orbs aspects or reception by sign, if a planet in the 12th in a quadrant system is in the same sign of the AC, would it have more say to the 12th or to the 1st house? Explaining my point, think, if we have Libra Rising, at for example, 17?, Venus in Libra 5?, and Mars in Libra 23?, would Venus have anything to do with the 12th or more with the 1st? And it's relation to Mars in the 1st, what would it be, of a hidden enemy or the manifestation of the 1st house almuten (could be both, but which one is more important)? I'd say Venus in this case is more about 1st than 12th, despite being ruler of 1st. To make myself clearer, if you replace Venus with Mercury in this case, and other aspects concur, the person could very well be a psychatrist, a medical writer, a doctor at a hospital, a judge (someone that imprisons) and not always the victim of 12th house affairs, but instead and more often, the enforcer. If this mercury was in Virgo, and in aversion to, say, the Moon I'd guess it would not be so, the lack of aspect of it with Mars and Moon would somewhat change this delineation, making Mercury much less damaging to the native (after all Mercury in Virgo, even in 12th, is still strong and honoured) but also producing much less impact on the native's profession, physicall body and manners (since Mars and the AC would have little to do with this Mercury in a sign wich is averse to them).

In my concept, Whole Signs shows that sign boundary=house boundary reflects a relationship of Angles, Cusps and Planets that happen to fall within thoses signs, which the quadrant system does not show so openly. So I'd say that a house beggining=0? instead of it's most sensitive point is a reflection of the notion that what we are made of actually follows the zodiacal order (1st house=1st sign and so on, which I point, is different from the poor analogy modern astrology advocates sometimes). The 5? degree rule sort of acknowledges this, still it seems, it's not untill reaching the house cusp that a planet can manifest it's full strength and clearly meddle into that house affairs.

Am I advocating Wholesigns then? No. But the phylosophy of aspects by sign makes much more sense when you use it. Still, into horary astrology cusps and that blurred zone before the cusp is of utmost importance as well, so this is just another opinion on this matter.