The invention of "nativity". On the systemising of birth astrology in late Ptolemaic Egypt

这个项目的工作假设是，所谓的genethlialogy（即占星术或出生占星术）是历史上创造反思性和个性化身份的重要基石。但是，占星术是否可以被称为一种客观化身份的工具，从而被视为古代人们反思自己身份的证据？提出这个问题意味着一种前现代文化的自觉身份，特别是作为一个个体存在的身份。这种假设有一些困难。首先：“身份”和“个性”是有争议的概念;我必须定义我对它们的意思。- 第二，也是更严肃的反对意见：个性是每一种现代化理论的中心议题。个性化是现代性的标志，更是“西方”现代性的标志。声称古代，至少从后来的托勒密埃及时代以来，已经发展出一种相当奇特的个人身份的系统“心理学”，意味着挑战与现代性的时代性有关的集体自我主张，特别是对当前现代性概念至关重要的排他性的主张。我需要定义--现在哲学家恩诺·鲁道夫（Enno Rudolph）在一篇尚未发表的文章中（就像他以前一样）指出，“个性”和“主观性”这两个术语大多被当作同一个意思（“bedeutungsäequivalent”）来使用。- 但这些概念实际上是对立的。如果你把强调主体性和主体性心理学（弗洛伊德的精神分析似乎就是这样）视为现代的话，这种区分就可以暗示个体的前现代“心理学”。作为一个可行的假设，我认为占星术确实是为了使个性合理化，使其成为身份的一个重要组成部分。在这个前提下重读占星学资料时，我现在正在研究“目的论”或“事件论”心理学的概念，工作的最后一部分必须致力于这种身份概念的历史化“发明”的“环境”。在希腊化后期的埃及，某些圈子里出现了对相对绝对的同一性的明显的新需求，我们是否有可能解释这种新需求？在哪个圈子里？这种新的理论化（显然很快就在全球取得了成功）是否是一种症状，或者说它本身就是一种答案，一种身份危机，一种个体分化危机？是否存在一种看似致命的认同本质主义的合理的新需要？在关于“主体”、主体的身份和个性以及主体在现代性中的核心作用的深远辩论中，我需要额外的时间来获得自己的理论立场，这是相当可观的。因此，需要以不同的方式提出问题。这很容易证明有理由将项目期限再延长一年。

The working hypothesis of this project has been that so-called genethlialogy (that is, horoscope or birth astrology) was an important cornerstone in the historical creation of a reflective and individualized identity.But can horoscopic astrology be called an instrument of objectifying identity and thus be considered as evidence of people’s reflecting their own identity in antiquity? Asking this question implies a premodern culture of conscious identity, especially of an identity as an individual being.There are some difficulties with this kind of assumption.First: “identity” and also “individuality” are controversial concepts; I have to define what I mean with them. – Second, and more serious as an objection: individuality is a central topic in every theory of modernization. Individualization is a hallmark of modernity, and more so: of “western” modernity. To claim that antiquity, at least since the times of later Ptolemaic Egypt, has developed a rather exotic kind of systematic ‘psychology’ of individual identities, means to challenge the collective self-assertion connected with the epochality of being modern, and especially the claim to exclusiveness so essential for the current conceptions of modernity.Therefore, I needed definitions – now Philosopher Enno Rudolph argues in a still unpublished article (as he has before) that the terms “individuality” and “subjectivity” are mostly used as if they meant the same thing (“bedeutungsäquivalent”). – But these concepts are actually antagonistic. And this discrimination allows for suggesting a premodern ‘psychology’ of the individual, if you take as modern the emphasis on subjectivity and a psychology of subjectivity (as Freudian psychoanalysis seems to be). As a working hypothesis I suppose that horoscope astrology was indeed meant to rationalize individuality as an essential part of identity. In re-reading the astrological sources under that premise I am now working with concepts as “teleological” or “eventualist” psychology.The last part of the work will have to be devoted to the “milieu” of the historicized “invention” of this conception of identity. Is it possible to explain the apparently new need for a comparatively absolute identity in certain circles of late Hellenistic Egypt? And in which circles? Could the new theorization (which apparently soon became a global success) be a symptom of, or itself an answer to, a crisis of identity as of individual differentiation? Was there a plausible new need for an apparently fatal essentialism of identity?The extra time needed for getting a theoretical position of my own in the far reaching debate on the “subject”, its identity and individuality and its central role in modernity, was substantial. And so was the need of asking questions differently. This can easily justify an extension of the projects duration of one more year.