For thousands of years man lived largely in harmony with the manifold rhythms of nature in order to ensure his survival. He observed with eyes wide open and bowed to necessity, at first without even asking about its causes. Eskimos, for example, live under the severest environmental conditions imaginable, in the midst of eternal ice. Their language contains many different words for snow and ice, because they have learned to distinguish many different states of “frozen water”. The inhospitable climatic conditions compelled them to do so.
Only two of these many varieties of ice and snow are suitable for building the igloos they live in.

It was not just the state of things that human beings observed closely, but also the interrelationship between that state and the actual moment of observation—the time of day, month, and year, the position of the sun, moon, and stars. Many archaeologically significant buildings from ancient times testify to the important status that our forefathers attached to the precise observation of heavenly bodies and the calculation of their paths. Nor was this just out of a dispassionate scientific curiosity, but instead because by these means they were able to derive the greatest possible benefits. The calendars that they worked out according to the course of the moon and the sun served to predict certain forces—impulses that have an effect on nature, man, and beast only at certain times and that recur at regular intervals. In particular they were able to predict those forces that, keeping pace with the course of the moon, exert an influence on all living things, and that contribute to the success and failure of hunt and harvest, storage, and healing.

Thus it was that the naturalist Charles Darwin in his classic work The Descent of Man only reported one of the discoveries that had been vouchsafed to countless generations before him and that had been of great benefit to them: “Man is subject, like other mammals, birds, and even insects, to that mysterious law, which causes certain normal processes, such as gestation, as well as the maturation and duration of various diseases, to follow lunar periods.” Sharpened senses, alertness, perceptive- ness, and exact observation of nature made of our forefathers “masters of the art of lunar timing.”

They discovered:

• that numerous natural phenomena—the tides, birth, meteorological events, women’s menstrual cycle, and much more—are related to the movements of the moon

• that the behavior of many animals depends on the position of the moon; that birds, for example, always gather their

nest material at particular times, so that the nests dry out rapidly after a fall of rain

• that the effect and success of countless activities—such as cutting wood, cooking, eating, cutting hair, gardening, put- ting down fertilizer, doing laundry, using medicines, surgical operations—are subject to rhythms in nature

• that sometimes operations and doses of medicine administered on certain days can be helpful, while on other days they can be useless or even harmful—often regardless of the medication’s amount and quality or the skill of the doctor

• that plants and their components are exposed to different energies from day to day—a knowledge of which is crucial for successful cultivation, tending, and harvesting of the crops—and that herbs gathered at certain times contain incomparably more active agents than at others.

In a word: the success of an endeavor depends not only on the availability of the necessary skills and resources, but also decisively on the timing of the action.

Of course our ancestors desired to pass on their knowledge and experience to their children. To do this it was necessary to give the observed influences handy, easily understandable names and to frame them in a plausible system that would describe the forces and predict future influences. A very special clock had to be invented.

The sun, moon, and stars naturally suggested themselves as an external framework, as the “hands and dial” of this clock, for a very simple reason: the essence of rhythm is repetition. If, for example, one observes that the most favorable time for sowing a particular plant lasts for exactly two to three days each month, and that the moon is always passing through the same stars at the time, then the idea occurs to group these stars into a “picture” and give the constellation a plausible name that typifies the quality of the influence in question. This constellation then becomes a figure on the clock-face of the firmament.

In broad terms, our forefathers isolated twelve impulses, each possessing a different quality and coloring. To the stars through which the sun passes (in the course of a year)—and the moon (in the course of a month)—they gave twelve different names.

Thus the twelve constellations of the zodiac came into being:

Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces.

Man had created a “star clock,” from which he could read the prevailing influences, and through which he could work out what helpful and hindering influences the future held in store for his intentions. Many calendars in the past were based on the course of the moon because the forces indicated by the position of the moon in the zodiac are of far greater importance in our daily lives than the position of the sun. You are no doubt aware that even today many of our holidays depend on the position of the moon. Easter, for instance, since about the end of the 2nd century AD has been celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon of spring.

Toward the end of the nineteenth century the knowledge of nature’s special rhythms lapsed into oblivion almost over- night—perhaps because any kind of systematization contains within it a sort of soporific drug. If my watch tells me it’s twelve o’clock, there’s no longer any need for me to observe the sun. If my car is being led along by a GPS, the terms “North” and “South” lose their meaning. When the direct perception of the impulses and forces governing a day is no longer taken into consideration, then the rules and laws rooted within them rap- idly lose their force.

However, the main reason why this knowledge was abandoned is because modern technology and medicine promised us “faster” solutions for all the problems of daily life. In a very short time they managed to create in us the illusion that they were actually able to fulfill this promise. Almost at a stroke, the observation of and respect for natural rhythms seemed to have become superfluous. Ultimately the knowledge lived on only in a few isolated areas and only in bits and pieces, as we were able to learn from tens of thousands of letters.

The young farmers, foresters, and gardeners of modern times laughed at their parents and grandparents, spoke of superstition and began to rely almost entirely on the extravagant use of machines and instruments, fertilizers and pesticides. They believed they could ignore their parents’ knowledge of correct timing, and for a long while mounting yields seemed to justify this belief. Thus they lost their contact with nature and began, at first unconsciously, to contribute to the destruction of the environment, always supported by an industry that understood how to maintain their confidence in its ability to solve every problem. Today there is hardly anyone left who can close his eyes to the high price that we have had to pay for disregarding the rhythms and laws of nature: yields are sinking and pests are having a field day, because the soil is being exploited without being allowed to protect and regenerate itself; the use of pesticides has increased many times within a few decades without any appreciable success. The quality and health value of the harvested produce convey a very plain message.

The progress of the chemical and pharmaceutical industry has seduced the medical profession into the firm belief that they can disregard with impunity the cyclic flow and wholeness of life.

The rapid removal of pain and other symptoms was enough to count as “successful therapy;” research into causes and preventive measures, and the patience and willingness for a true eye-to- eye relationship with the patient receded into the background. Moreover, using modern scientific methods, the knowledge of lunar rhythms may indeed be susceptible to proof, but scarcely to explanation; the question as to “why” must remain unanswered for the time being: in the linear thinking of most scientists this is a legitimate reason to ignore it altogether.

And all of us who so lightly turn our backs on the knowledge of these rhythms do so because on the one hand we have elevated short-term comfort to the highest good, at the expense of rea- son and moderation. We believe we can outstrip everything, including nature, and in the process we outstrip ourselves. In the infernal tempo of our age we rush frantically from past to future. The present moment, the only point at which life actually occurs, is utterly lost.

“The citizen is increasingly dependent on services over which he is unable to exert any influence and on experts who advise and prescribe how he is to live. His normal, inborn faculties are smothered in this welter of instructions and advice; he remains as sub- ordinate and bereft of autonomy as a child, and is permitted— is expected—to remain so. He has no confidence in himself,  in  the future or in the self-regulating power of life.”
—Ricarda Winterswyl, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Munich, April 20th, 1991

On the other hand, we ignore these rhythms for the simplest of possible reasons: we don’t know about them. Perhaps you are one of the pioneers who are trying to reconquer this knowledge, slowly, unhurriedly, little by little. For it is by no means too late to revive this ancient art. It is merely waiting for people who don’t make excuses that “on your own you can’t achieve

anything.” Even if at the present time there are so many indications that the individual can have no influence on the recovery of our environment, every single action counts, no matter how small. Sometimes it can count for much more than grand gestures and grand words.

All the rules and laws presented in our books have their roots exclusively in personal experience. There is nothing that derives from hearsay, nothing based on assumptions or convictions. There are certainly many other rhythms and influencing factors in nature, such as those relating to human biorhythms, to sunspot activity, to cosmic and earth radiations and so on. However, our books restrict themselves mainly to five different “states” of the moon:

 New Moon Waxing Moon Full Moon Waning Moon

Position of the Moon in a Sign of the Zodiac



Whether the moon and the constellation it occupies in the heavens exercise a direct influence, or whether, as previously suggested, the current positions of the moon and stars merely function like the hands of a clock, is a question that has yet to be answered conclusively.

The forces and their effects on humans, animals, and plants— completely irrespective of what causes them—can be proven any time through experience. Research into causes will have to content itself with speculation, opinion, and conviction for the time being. A certain terminology has gained acceptance, such as: “The sign Capricorn affects the knee” or “The full moon influences the psyche.” For the sake of simplicity we have adhered to such forms of expression in our work.