5. Sahamas of Signs, Planets, and Family Members

[Sanskrit text for this chapter is available]

The calculation (ānayana) of the sahamas of signs (bha) and planets (graha) is described by Tuka Jyotirvid in his commentary on [the Tājikaśāstra by] Samarasiṃha:

Subtracting a planet from [the beginning of] the following domicile,^[1] the ascendant should be added: [this] becomes the sahama of the planet. Similarly, by adding the sign of the munthahā, the sahama of the munthahā comes about.

And it is said:

And by adding the sign of the munthahā, that is the sahama of the munthahā.^[2]

Next, the calculation of the sahamas of houses is described by Romaka:

If [the revolution of ] the year [or] the nativity is by day, the ascendant should always be made less by the ruler; at night, likewise, [the ruler should be made] less by the house and the ascendant added: [this] will be the true [sahama].^[3]

Concerning this, it should be understood that if the sahama and the ruler of the sahama are strong, the good or evil results of the planets are unimpaired; if they are weak, [the results] are less. Now, here is one particular consideration: these sahamas have been set forth for the sake of finding out the good and evil results [due to occur] to anyone.^[4] Thus, if someone has a birth horoscope, then his sahamas can be considered. Now then, if his brother should lack a birth horoscope, then it is desirable to establish his sahamas of wife, fortune, acquisition or dominion [from the horoscope at hand]. Likewise, it is desirable to establish the sahamas of brothers and so forth of the [native’s] wife and other [relations]. If [it should be asked] how these are derived, [in reply] it is said: that house for which one wants to find out the good and evil results should be imagined to be the ascendant, while the sun and other planets are considered as remaining in their places. Then, the sahamas of fortune and so on should be established by the method described [in Saṃjñātantra 3.5] with the words ‘By day, [the longitude of] the ascendant added to [that of ] the moon less by [that of ] the sun’ and so on. Further, when one wants to add the sixth house and so on for calculating the sahama of birth for the brother and others, one should add that house which is the sixth and so on from the house of brothers or other [relations].^[5] But others [say that] the sahama of brothers and so on should be added to the ascendant, and when the sixth house and so on is [to be] added, five signs should be added to the sum of that sahama.

This is clearly described in Tājika-muktāvali 33:

The wise [astrologer] should establish the lots sought for [finding out] good and evil [events] for the father and others by adding their own lots like an ascendant by the methods described: this is the opinion of my teacher.

So too, the sahama of death should be found for this or that house of the father and other [relations], as in [the statement from Saṃjñātantra 3.14]: ‘Death [is produced by] subtracting the moon from the eighth house in the manner stated and adding it to Saturn.’43 Here, considering this or that house, or this or that sahama, to be the ascendant, and calculating the houses from it as before, and then subtracting the moon from the eighth house [thus] calculated, will give, when Saturn is added, the sahama of death of the father and so on.

This, too, is stated in the same place Tājikamuktāvali 34:

The fatal sahama for the father and others [is derived] from the eighth house from those.

Thus, from just a single horoscope of the year, a multitude of sahamas arise. But enough of digression.

Footnotes and references:

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[1]:

Or possibly ‘from the following planet’, should gṛhāt be a mistake for grahāt. The two words are frequently confused, and I am not aware of other texts describing either procedure.

[2]:

This formula is obviously incomplete. The phrasing (in śloka metre) is almost identical to the end of the foregoing prose quotation from Tuka; possibly this second quotation forms part of the first.

[3]:

Something is clearly wrong with this formula, with regard to both the content and the grammatical construction; but all text witnesses agree, and there is little on which to base an emendation.

[4]:

Literally, ‘to Devadatta’, the Sanskrit equivalent of Everyman.

[5]:

There seems to be a mistake here: the sahama of birth (no. 33 in sections 4.¹ and 4.3) does not involve the sixth house, but the sahama of affliction (no. 34) does.