Skyscript Astrology Forum

Posted: **Fri Dec 26, 2014 1:23 pm**

Levente Laszlo wrote:I think the other important question is which the earliest Indian source for this idea is. I've checked the Yavanaj?taka and Var?hamihira's B?hajj?taka, but I don't see it there. Do you have any ideas?

I had the same idea, but haven't got further than checking the Yavanaj?taka. I agree that it's a very important question.

Posted: **Fri Dec 26, 2014 2:19 pm**

I found that events concerning my father were utterly to do with my natal Sun. The transits were lasered on my Sun. And it is nowhere near the ninth house, or its "lord".

I try to keep an open mind, but haven't been convinced so far of any relevancy of planetary rulers of houses, lords or whatever, and also find that planets are far more significant than houses anyway.

Posted: **Fri Dec 26, 2014 4:08 pm**

Fleur wrote:I found that events concerning my father were utterly to do with my natal Sun. The transits were lasered on my Sun. And it is nowhere near the ninth house, or its "lord".

I try to keep an open mind, but haven't been convinced so far of any relevancy of planetary rulers of houses, lords or whatever, and also find that planets are far more significant than houses anyway.

Brihat jataka- does not allot a house to mother or father.It gives 9th to Guru(perceptor).

From what I can read Yavanjataka too does not allot a specific house to mother/father. It does it by planets:

35. The Sun is father by day, Saturn at night; the authorities say that Venus is mother by day, and the Moon is considered to be mother at night. This is always (true) ? at conception, during pregnancy, and at birth.

36. One knows the characteristics belonging to the mother and father by means of such things as the good or bad places and aspects (of these planets), by means of the strength or weakness of their mutual configurations, and by means of their conditions, ages, complexions, and qualities.

37. One finds the distinguishing features of the father made clear in the odd signs, that of the mother in the even signs; the guru (of the native), with his caste and his family (jati), is to be established, night and day, from the position and configuration of Jupiter.

121. Father, mother, brother, wife, relative, son, and slave of the natives; such are the natures (respectively) of the Sun, the Moon, Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, and Saturn.

Were there any Greek texts which did not give a house to any of the parents with native's relations being judged just by planets.

PD

Posted: **Sat Dec 27, 2014 6:16 pm**

Martin wrote

Valens (II.16 in Pingree?s edition, transl. Riley p. 30) gives these significations for six of the places or houses [...]:
The God (9th house): the father
The Goddess (3rd house): the mother
These are obviously related to the joys of the lights, the benefics and the malefics, respectively, and at least one of them ? that of the 9th house for the father ? seems to have survived the transmission into India.

The 3rd seems also to have survived transmission (or been independently arrived at), in the ashtakavarga system taught by Krushna Jugalkani, learned, according to Krushna, from his guru Brij Gopal Shastri of Amravati. In Krushna's lesson on houses:

NOTE: In standard Vedic, the mother is represented by the 4th house while in this system, the mother is represented by the 3rd house.

In this system, father and guru are both read from the 9th.
(see http://www.kas-astrology.com )
Graham

Posted: **Sat Dec 27, 2014 6:49 pm**

Hello everyone,

In terms of Jyotish, here is what James Braha says in his book: "The Art and Practice of Ancient Hindu Astrology", page 3:

"For example, being from North India, Padia had never even heard of the concept that the 9th house represents the father. He had not lived in Southern India where astrologers take the 9th house as the father, because in South India fathers act as gurus to their children and gurus are governed by the 9th house. Padia was taught that the 10th house represents the father".

Padia was one of James Braha's Jyoitsh teachers.

This principle of the corresponding significations of a house is present in Ancient Western Astrology. For instance, I can't remember in which audio lecture/interview of Ben Dykes, but I heard him say that Al Kindi in his book "40 chapters" says that the 3rd shows not only siblings but people who are like our brothers or sisters. Likewise for the 4th and the father and fatherly figures. Therefore the father being shown by the 9th, at least in South India, makes perfect sense to me, because it is reflected in the local culture.

Other than that, in regards to the father, I can't imagine using anything but the 4th or better the Lot of the Father.

Posted: **Sun Dec 28, 2014 4:46 am**

The talk about Indian astrology leads to the complicated issue of transmission and that too one way transmission.So let us just leave it aside.

The question is if the greek texts have always allotted a house to the parents .

Posted: **Wed Dec 31, 2014 12:45 am**

Martin Gansten wrote:

An independent Indian development is of course possible, but offhand I can't think of any other instance of Indian authors reassigning a signification to a different place/house -- and the father is a major signification. The Indians typically stay quite close to the standard lists of correspondences that we know from Greek sources, although they naturally adapt them to the Indian cultural context.

While such examples may not be common there do seem to be some differences from standard hellenistic house meanings in Indian house meanings. For example:

Second House

Uniquely, in Indian astrology this is considered a killing place. We could use Valens logic and argue that the house opposing the other takes on qualities of that house ie the 8th. However, the Indians dont rationalise this house association in that way and give an idiosyncratic understanding of the logic of the 2nd house link to death.

Varahamihira also associates this house with family.

Fifth House

From an early stage this house is linked to intelligence, and wisdom in Indian astrology. For example Varahamihira cites 'intelligence' as an association of the 5th in a very short list of house meanings in the Brihat Jataka. In contemporary Indian astrology this often extends to further education.

I am not familiar with such associations in hellenistic astrology. However, this isn't that different from the notion in modern western astrology that the 5th relates to the capacity to be creative on the mental as well as physical level. Indian astrologers today often link the term Buddhi to the 5th. There is emphasis on the 5th for things like writing , books, libraries etc rather than the 3rd of modern astrology.

To be fair the Indians dont seem to have exactly 'reassigned' hellenistic associations any more than the Perso-Arabs did. Rather they seem to have applied a different astrological solution to fit such mercurial type associations to particular houses since these were often unclear or missing in the earlier tradition. The Perso-Arabic and later western medieval tradition seems to have applied such gaps in hellenistic astrology increasingly to the 3rd house while the Indians seem to put more emphasis on the 5th house.

Actually, Varahamihira links education to the 4th house but I am not clear if many Indian astrologers followed that idea.

Mark

Posted: **Wed Dec 31, 2014 1:24 am**

i love it when different people come to different conclusions and it is captured in the history.. makes a mockery of those purists who would like everything nailed down definitively.

Posted: **Wed Dec 31, 2014 1:09 pm**

Mark wrote:

Uniquely, in Indian astrology [the 2nd] is considered a killing place. We could use Valens logic and argue that the house opposing the other takes on qualities of that house ie the 8th. However, the Indians dont rationalise this house association in that way and give an idiosyncratic understanding of the logic of the 2nd house link to death.

I think this is because the 3rd is considered to represent longevity and vigour, having somewhat martial qualities (amongst other things). So the 2nd is the 12th from the 3rd.
I wonder (this is just me, unsupported) if there could be some association with the "last part of the night", when more deaths do occur, statistically.
Richard Houck (coming to Indian from Western) claimed that, empirically, the 2nd and its ruler were the most reliable indicators of death (The Astrology of Death).
Graham

Posted: **Wed Dec 31, 2014 5:22 pm**

Graham wrote:

I wonder (this is just me, unsupported) if there could be some association with the "last part of the night", when more deaths do occur, statistically.

Certainly this is the 'last part of the night' before sunrise. In hellenistic astrology the second house is known as the 'Idle place' or ''The Gate of Hades''. This could very well be a reflection of the fact that this house is the exit point for the Sun on its way out of the underworld that begins when the Sun enters the setting place.

Curtis Manwaring explores this and a few other ideas in this piece comparing the hellenistic and Indian understanding of the 2nd house:

http://wwwastrology-x-files.com/houses/ ... hades.html

Posted: **Thu Jan 01, 2015 9:42 am**

Thanks for link, which was missing a dot
http://www.astrology-x-files.com/houses ... hades.html
Graham

Posted: **Thu Jan 01, 2015 12:53 pm**

Just an addendum that my earlier references to Varahamihira on the house meanings were inaccurate. I had been relying on an electronic version of the Brihat Jataka translated by N.C.Aiyar (1905). Its quite a pig of a translation to follow at times and I seem to have confused Aiyar's notes for the body of the text. Having cross referenced the text with another translation I see Varahmihira's discussion of house meanings is exceptionally terse and limited to one word descriptions.

Its obviously a much later text than the Brihat Jataka but I thought I would quote the house meanings from the the Phaladeepika of Mantreswara which seems to date from around the 16th century.

In a birth chart there are twelve houses. Each house has been given several names indicating the various subjects it deals with.] The names by which the first house or the Ascendant is known are Lagna, Hora, Kalya, Deha, Udaya, Rupa, Seersha, Vartmana (present) and Janma.

The second house deals with Vitta (wealth), Vidya (learning). Swa, Annapana (riches, food and drinks), Bhukti (eating), the right eye, face (Asya), letter or document (Patrika), Speech (Vak) and Kutumba (family) and thus adopts these appellations.

The names given (or the subjects allotted) to third house are Duschikya, Uras (breast), the right ear, army valour, prowess and brother.

The subjects or designations for the fourth house are house, land, maternal uncle, a sister's son, a relation, a friend, conveyance, mother, kingdom, cow, buffalo, perfume, clothes, ornaments, the nadir, hibuka, sukha (happiness), water, bridge and river.

The fifth house deals with (and has designations accordingly) the mark of the sovereign, taxes, soul, intelligence, knowledge of the future, life, progeny, belly, Vedic knowledge and other religious scriptures.

The sixth house deals with debts, arms, thieves, wounds, diseases, enemies, paternal relations, battle, wicked acts, sins, fear and humilialtion.

The subjects dealt with by the seventh house are desire, passion, setting, sexual desire, a way, people, husband road and wife.

For the eighth house subjects allotted are Mangalya (the living of the husband during the life time of the wife), Randhra, filthiness, mental pain, defeat or humiliation, longevity, sorrow, blame, death, impurity impediments and slavery.

The ninth house deals with preceptor (guru), deity (devta), father,auspiciousness, poorvabhagya (previous luck), worship, penance, virtuous act or virtue, grand son, and noble family.

Translator note: Some of the learneds in the North are of the view that all about father should be examined from the 10th house, because 10th is 7th to the 4th house dealing with the father. The view of Phaladeepika seems to be based on the logic that the 9th being 5th to 5th house (dealing with progeny) should be the most appropriate house to be connected with father).

The subjects (names) designated for the 10th house are business or trade, ranker position, honour, occupation, profession, sky or zenith, conduct, quality, inclination, gait, command and Meshurana (to give orders).

The matters to be considered from the eleventh house are gains, income, acquisition, receipt of wealth, accomplishment, splendor and prosperity, profits, veneration, elder brother or sister, left ear, anything juicy, delightful news.

The expressions used for the twelfth house are misery, leg, left eye, loss, spy, last rites, poverty, sins, bad expenditure and imprisonment or confinement.

The PHALADEEPIKA by MANTRESWARA, Chapter 1, sections 10-16
English Translation, Commentary and annotation by Dr. G. S. Kapoor

As Mantreswara seems to have been based in south India could linkage of the 9th with father represent the survival of an older tradition in that part of India? Clearly, north India came under much more influence from Perso-Arabic ideas from the middle ages.

The problem as has already pointed out by others here is that the most ancient texts available to us such as the The Yavanajataka of Sphujidhvaja Varahamihira's Brihat Jataka dont really substantiate this view. Its interesting that both these texts rely heavily on natural planetary significators for both parents. This tradition never dies out in Indian astrology.

So the question remains, is the designation of the 9th for Father an indigenous development in India that occurred quite separately from what Valens appears to suggest?

I guess we need to check out more texts!

Mark

Skyscript Astrology Forum

The 9th house and the father, etc.