The edges of a sign: sandhi and gandanta
A graha on the join between two signs is unsettled; where water meets fire the join is a knot.
- 6-minute lesson
- Basic course: Jyotish Shishya
- Vedic astrology
- The join between two signs
- The knot: gandanta
A first look at the lesson
In the first or last degree of a sign a graha stands on the join (sandhi) between two signs. It belongs fully to neither, and the texts count it as weak and its results as mixed or unsteady.
Three joins are special. Where a water sign ends and a fire sign begins, a nakshatra ends at the same point: Cancer and Ashlesha into Leo and Magha, Scorpio and Jyeshtha into Sagittarius and Mula, Pisces and Revati into Aries and Ashwini. This knot is gandanta.
More lessons on this subject
- Reading a graha's degreeEvery graha sits at a degree of its sign, 0° to 30°, and that one number says a great deal.
- Five ages in a sign (Baladi)By its degree a graha is an infant, a youth, an adult, old or dead; even signs run the other way.
- How close: degrees between grahasGrahas in one sign work together; the fewer degrees between them, the more they blend.
- Vargottama: the same sign twiceWhen the degree puts a graha in the navamsha of its own sign, it is vargottama and strong.
Your first lesson takes about five minutes
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