The Planets in the Signs

Chapter 18 · Part of our series on the Brihat Jataka of Varahamihira

The last article gave the portraits of the Moon in each of the twelve signs. This chapter does the same for the other six planets: the Sun, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn. For each, it describes the kind of person born when that planet stands in a given sign.

A key to reading the chapter: whose sign is it?

For the Sun, the chapter goes through all twelve signs one by one. For the other five planets, it does something more economical. It groups the signs by their ruling planet. Mars's results, for example, are given "in the signs of Venus", which means in Taurus and Libra together, since Venus rules both.

This makes an important principle visible. What a planet gives in a sign depends heavily on whose sign it is: its own, a friend's, or an enemy's. Where a sign is special for a planet, its exaltation or its fall, the chapter gives that sign separately.

The Sun in the signs

The Sun, the king, does best in signs where it can shine: in Aries, its exaltation, it gives fame; in Gemini and Virgo, Mercury's signs, it gives learning. In Libra, its fall, and in Saturn's signs, Capricorn and Aquarius, its light is dimmed and its results are poor.

A mark on the body

The Sun's verses end with a lovely link back to the very first article (18.4):

नीचो घटे तनयभाग्यपरिच्युतोऽस्वस्तोयोत्थपण्यविभवो वनितादृतोऽन्त्ये । नक्षत्रमानवतनुप्रतिमे विभागे लक्ष्मादिशेत्तुहिनरश्मिदिनेशयुक्ते ॥

nīco ghaṭe tanayabhāgyaparicyuto 'svas toyotthapaṇyavibhavo vanitādṛto 'ntye | nakṣatramānavatanupratime vibhāge lakṣmādiśet tuhinaraśmidineśayukte ||

In Aquarius, the person does humble work, loses children and fortune, and is poor. In the last sign, they gain wealth through the produce of the waters and are honoured by women. One should declare a mark on the body at the part matching, in the star-person, the sign that holds the Moon and the Sun.

The "star-person" is the Kalapurusha, Time pictured as a cosmic body, whose limbs are the twelve signs: Aries the head, Taurus the face, and so on down to Pisces the feet. If the Sun and Moon stand together in a sign, the person will carry a mark at the matching place on their own body.

The other planets

For the other planets, the results are given by sign groups. Each planet's own signs, and its signs of exaltation and fall, usually stand out.

Mars

Mercury

Jupiter

Venus

Saturn

The pattern behind the portraits

Across all these tables, one pattern stands out clearly. Each planet does best in its own signs, its exaltation, and the signs of its friends. It does worst in its fall and in the signs of its enemies.

• Jupiter, wise and generous, gives good results almost everywhere, and its best in Cancer, its exaltation, but falls into poverty in Capricorn, its fall.
• Venus is wealthy and honoured in its own signs and in Pisces, its exaltation, but brings trouble in the signs of Mars, and "very humble work" in Virgo, its fall.
• Saturn is honoured and wealthy in Libra, its exaltation, but foolish and friendless in Aries, its fall.
• Mercury is at its very best in Virgo, both its own sign and its exaltation.

This is the same idea of strength and dignity we met in the first chapters, now shown planet by planet in human terms.

The rising sign and the houses

The chapter ends with a short rule that ties it to everything else (18.20):

शिशिरकरसमागमेक्षणानां सदृशफलं प्रवदन्ति लग्नजातम् । फलमधिकमिदं यदत्र भावाद्भवनभनाथगुणैर्विचिन्तनीयम् ॥

śiśirakarasamāgamekṣaṇānāṃ sadṛśaphalaṃ pravadanti lagnajātam | phalam adhikam idaṃ yad atra bhāvād bhavanabhanāthaguṇair vicintanīyam ||

The results of the rising sign are said to be like those given for the Moon's sign, and for the planets joining or looking at her. Beyond that, the further results from each house should be judged by the qualities of the house, its sign and its lord.

So the twelve portraits of the Moon's sign also describe the person born with that sign rising. And every house of the chart, from the first to the twelfth, is judged in the same way: by the strength of the house, its sign and the planet that rules it.

Verses are from Varahamihira's Brihat Jataka, chapter 18. 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.