The Moon in the Twelve Signs

Chapter 17 · Part of our series on the Brihat Jataka of Varahamihira

The sign in which the Moon stood at birth is what most Indian families mean by a person's rāśi, their "sign". The previous chapter sketched a person by the Moon's nakshatra. This one sketches them by the Moon's sign, in twelve vivid portraits of body, temperament and fortune.

The Moon at home: Cancer

One portrait shows the method well. Cancer is the Moon's own sign, and the portrait of a person born with the Moon there is full of the Moon's own nature (17.4):

आवक्रद्रुतगः समुन्नतकटिः स्त्रीनिर्जितः सत्सुहृद्दैवज्ञः प्रचुरालयः क्षयधनैः संयुज्यते चन्द्रवत् । ह्रस्वः पीनगलः समेति च वशं साम्ना सुहृद्वत्सलस्तोयोद्यानरतः स्ववेश्मसहिते जातः शशाङ्के नरः ॥

āvakradrutagaḥ samunnatakaṭiḥ strīnirjitaḥ satsuhṛd daivajñaḥ pracurālayaḥ kṣayadhanaiḥ saṃyujyate candravat | hrasvaḥ pīnagalaḥ sameti ca vaśaṃ sāmnā suhṛdvatsalas toyodyānarataḥ svaveśmasahite jātaḥ śaśāṅke naraḥ ||

One born with the Moon in her own sign walks quickly, slightly bent, with a prominent waist. Guided by the spouse, with good friends, a knower of the stars, owning many homes, their wealth waxes and wanes like the Moon herself. Short, with a full neck, they are won over by kindness, devoted to friends, and love water and gardens.

The Moon is everywhere in this portrait. The person's wealth grows and shrinks "like the Moon", in phases. They love water, the Moon's element. They are won over by gentleness, not force, and their home and friends matter deeply. Even their interest in the stars fits the Moon, the fastest and most closely watched of the lights.

The twelve portraits

Each portrait in the text is long and detailed, covering the body, the temperament and the fortune of the person. Here they are condensed to their main traits.

Reading the portraits

The portraits are not random. Each one carries the nature of the sign and of the planet that rules it.

• The signs of Jupiter (Sagittarius and Pisces) give learning, generosity and wealth.
• The signs of Mercury (Gemini and Virgo) give wit, speech, learning and skill in the arts.
• The signs of Venus (Taurus and Libra) give good looks, grace, fortune and trade.
• Leo, the Sun's sign, gives pride, generosity and courage, and a strong tie to the mother.
• The signs of Saturn (Capricorn and Aquarius) give endurance and a tireless capacity for work, but also a harder, more grasping side.
• The signs of Mars (Aries and Scorpio) give courage and energy, but also restlessness and hidden harshness.

The ruling planet's nature, which we met in the second chapter, colours the Moon's sign in a way that is easy to see once one looks for it.

When the portrait holds true

The last verse gives the rule for how fully these portraits apply (17.13):

बलवति राशौ तदधिपतौ च स्वबलयुतः स्याद्यदि तुहिनांशुः । कथितफलानामविकलदाता शशिवदतोऽन्येऽप्यनुपरिचिन्त्याः ॥

balavati rāśau tadadhipatau ca svabalayutaḥ syād yadi tuhināṃśuḥ | kathitaphalānām avikaladātā śaśivad ato 'nye 'py anuparicintyāḥ ||

When the sign is strong, and its lord is strong, and the cool-rayed Moon herself is strong, she gives the results described in full. The other planets are to be judged in the same way as the Moon.

Three things must be strong for a portrait to come true in full: the sign, its ruling planet, and the Moon herself. If only some of them are strong, the portrait applies only in part.

The last line looks ahead. The same rule applies to every other planet in every sign: the strength of the planet, the sign and the sign's lord together decide how fully its results unfold.

Verses are from Varahamihira's Brihat Jataka, chapter 17. English renderings are our own, made from the Sanskrit and checked against the public-domain translation by N. Chidambaram Aiyar (1885; second edition 1905) and against the word-by-word analysis in Michael D. Neely's edition.