Advanced Astrology Class - Kabbalah, Astrology, and Character Traits

The Gaon of Vilna said that the reason each person is born in this world is to change their character and/or personality traits. In other words, why do you want to change the character traits? Because all of the sins that someone does, the root of where they come from are these bad character traits. In other words, if a person had all good character traits he would be a much freer type of person. And the Gaon of Vilna says “if he didn’t come in to change his character traits, why did he come into the world?”

Hebrew Astrology teaches us about ourselves. It is actually who we are at the moment of our birth. As we take the first breath we begin to make Tikune/Correction. We came into the world to overcome our mazal and that starts with the first breath we take and continues until the last breath we take in this lifetime. The mazal at the moment of birth is who the person is, if you look at the Horoscope, you can see what their character tendencies are all about. It is not who they will become it is who they are in the potential And that is what they came to work on in the world. Everybody has different problems; there is nobody who came into the world who did not come into the world with things they have to work on. If not, they have no reason to come into the world. This world is to fix. You came into this world to fix yourself.

The material in this Class and the additional classes that may be developed from this information comes from four primary texts: 1) An old Jewish ethical text called “Or HaTzadikim” – The Way of the Righteous, written about 450 years ago by an anonymous author. 2) “Sha'ar Kedushah” – the Gates of Holiness, written by Rabbi Chaim Vital, the great Kabbalist from Tsfat, in the middle to late 1500s. 3) “Archot Yosher” - Straight paths, written by a contemporary Rabbi of our time, Rabbi Chaim Konefsky. 4.) An ebook by Yaakov Kronenberg - a Jerusalem Kabbalistic Astrologer.

These books make a link between the Rising sign and the character traits that need to be cleansed through active and conscious change.

A character trait is a habit that becomes ingrained in the nature of the person. Habits are not good nor are they bad. Habits can be good for a person or destructive to a person. Yet habits that are destructive sometimes are good.

An example of a habit is a tendency to be cautious. When that tendency becomes set into the nature of a person in such a way that he is always cautious in his actions it is said he has the character trait of being cautious. Some people will say being cautious is good and others will say that there are times that being cautious has been harmful.

Each character trait has some degree of strength with respect to a person. some people will lie sometimes. Some people will lie all the time. The tendency to lie is relative to this idea of degree. Some character traits apply to every person in a generation since it is a Tikune of that generation. Some character traits apply to only a few people since these people have this character trait to change in order to achieve their Tikune.

Hebrew Astrology relates each rising sign with a tendency to a strong medium or weak inclination towards a character trait. The chart below shows which rising signs have a strong inclination; medium inclination; or weak inclination to impact each character trait.

Here is a basic summary of the material which we may be able to develop into additional information if there is interest.

Please note that some of these character traits appear positive. An example is Joy. Yet joy is a trait that needs to be enhanced and expanded constantly. Compassion is another trait that people misunderstand. Too much Compassion leaves a child unable to participate in the world in a healthy balanced manner. Please keep in mind that there are always times when a character trait should be used and other times when it should not be used. HaShem creates all things in pairs and HaShem creates This against that . These metaphors need to be utilized in your life.

I will add to these 11 traits as time permits. There are 42 known traits and actually many more than that. If you want another trait listed please send me an email and i will add that trait.