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Astrology / Vedic Jyotish
Maya in
the Horoscope
The Glue That Keeps Us Earth Bound
Some years ago, I read about what was described as ‘maya-pada’ in writer
astrologer Sanjay Rath’s postings made on one of the jyotish list.
Thereafter, I read about it again in articles written by his student
Narasimha Rao and it reappeared also in the latter’s textbook, which by
the way, is a very well organized presentation for students of jyotish.
Getting back to the issue at hand, in this article the concept and
associated technical items will be briefly described for those who are not
familiar with these.
Maya or illusion is really more of a delusion than an illusion! A delusion
is a thought or idea which is not based on observed or perceived reality
(e.g., the ghost that lives on the peepul tree in a village – never
actually seen by anyone, but of course everyone ‘knows’ it is up there).
On the other hand, an illusion is the misperception of an ‘object’
(mistaking a rope for a snake, for instance). Spiritualists of ancient and
modern times have stated that as we live through our earthly human
existence, each of us acquires a personal view of reality. There is often
a discrepancy between the absolute reality and what we perceive it to be.
This leads to a subjective mis-interpretation of the universe, resulting
in our giving more importance to things which obviously are evanescent and
impermanent. We chase after those things throughout our life, which we are
certainly forced to leave behind when we die and can never bring back with
us when we are reborn. We fall in love and become attached to objects,
ideas and persons, a liaison based on whims and fancies, to be frustrated
and saddened when things do not work out and that leads to disillusionment
when glimpses of reality finally dawn upon us. Maya also leads to
generation of actions that are also known as ‘karma’ and which then take
over the reins of our destiny, thus, becoming the charioteer of our
spiritual vehicle on this path of spiritual progress that is our soul-goal
and the sole reason for our being in this earthly reality.
We often run into individuals who have led quite accomplished lives in our
eyes but when they confide in someone, those confidantes would tell us a
different story. The individual may actually think of himself as an utter
failure! Between the admired role model and us the follower, at least one
of us is obviously not tapped into ‘reality’ and hence we see the duality
which is a consequence of maya. We might judge someone as very brave or
very pious, but in reality, they might be very ordinary and quite petty
actually.
If our horoscopes are to reflect the different facets of the human
experience, then there should be a clear way of discerning the fact that
the subjective perceptions of the nativity do not (or do) match the
observed reality (which may in turn be different from absolute reality
which one can figure out only through the knowledge of things that
transcend earthly knowledge!).
In a horoscope, we have twelve houses and nine planetary indicators (5
planets, 2 lights and 2 nodes). These obviously are not adequate for
covering all facets of modern human life. Jyotish, therefore, must use a
variety of indicators known as karakas or executors. There are three types
of karakas described by Parashara: inherent (naisargika) karakas, fixed
(sthira) and transitional (chara) karakas. The latter are also utilized
extensively in the Jaimini ‘system’ which some individuals insist is a
separate system and must not be mixed with the mainstream Parashari
system. Despite the strength of expression in these statements, such a
tight water-tight compartmentation has not been adequately demonstrated
and remains a subjective opinion, like many such others that abound in
Jyotish. I find it difficult to visualize that the same planet puts on its
Parashari cap when looking at (aspecting) another planet, but would then
take it off to put on its Jaimini cap to indicate its chara dasha
influence or chara karaka role!
There are also several secondary houses described in jyotish. There is the
‘bhavat-bhavam’ concept, a term which a sanskritologist claimed to be
grammatically incorrect. The concept, regardless of its linguistic
accuracy or purity, is what I have called ‘the Vedic hopscotch’. The
secondary house is located as many houses from the house under
consideration, as the house is away from lagna or first house. So, 3rd
house is the bhavat-bhavam house for 2nd, 7th is bhavat-bhavam for 4th,
7th is bhavat-bhavam for 10th, etc. So, if the lord of first house is in
the 2nd house then the house secondarily describing the 2nd house
attributes will be the third house.
– Continued
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