Love in Vedic astrology

Another zodiac, and the Moon before the Sun

Indian astrology, jyotish, shares the twelve signs and the planets with Western astrology, but it measures the sky differently. Its zodiac is sidereal: it follows the fixed stars, whereas the Western zodiac is anchored to the seasons. The two have drifted apart slowly since antiquity, by about 24 degrees today (the ayanamsa), so that someone who is Aries in the West is most often Pisces (Meena) in India. Above all, the sign that counts is not the Sun’s but the Moon’s, the rashi, and more finely still the nakshatra: the sky is divided into 27 “lunar mansions” of 13°20’ each, each with a name, a deity, a symbolic animal and a temperament. The Moon crosses one nakshatra a day; two people born a day apart therefore do not have the same Vedic “sign”.

The page Other astrologies calculates your rashi and your nakshatra from your date, time and place of birth. This page explains what tradition does with them for couples.

Kundali milan: matching two charts before marriage

In India and Nepal, in Hindu families, comparing the birth charts of the two future spouses — kundali milan, “matching of horoscopes” — has for centuries been an ordinary step in preparing a marriage, arranged or not. The natal chart, the janam kundali, is drawn up at birth and kept by the family; when the time comes to look for a spouse, it is handed to an astrologer or, nowadays, to a matrimonial website that does the calculation automatically. The most widespread method in northern India is ashta koota, “the eight factors”, which awards up to 36 points — the gunas — to the pair.

The eight kutas and their points

• Varna (1 point) — the match of spiritual temperaments, from the Moon sign, ranked in four classes. The point is gained if the man’s “rank” is not below the woman’s; modern readings keep the better of the two orders.
• Vashya (2 points) — mutual attraction and influence, from five categories of Moon signs: quadrupeds, humans, aquatic, wild, insects. Two signs of the same category get the maximum.
• Tara (3 points) — the “good star”: the distance between the two nakshatras is counted, in both directions, in groups of nine; positions 3, 5 and 7 are unfavourable.
• Yoni (4 points) — physical and sexual harmony, from the fourteen animals associated with the nakshatras (horse, elephant, sheep, serpent, dog, cat, rat, cow, buffalo, tiger, deer, monkey, mongoose, lion). Same animal: 4; friendly animals: 2 or 3; enemy animals, such as cat and rat or serpent and mongoose: 0.
• Graha Maitri (5 points) — the friendship between the ruling planets of the two Moon signs, that is, intellectual harmony and the way of thinking as a pair.
• Gana (6 points) — temperament, in three families of nakshatras: deva (divine), manushya (human) and rakshasa (demonic, in the sense of intense and untamed). Two deva, two manushya or deva–manushya agree; deva–rakshasa is considered the roughest combination.
• Bhakoot (7 points) — the distance between the two Moon signs. Gaps of 2 and 12, 5 and 9, 6 and 8 signs form the bhakoot dosha and score 0; all others score 7. It is the factor of prosperity and long-term affection.
• Nadi (8 points) — the “constitution”, in three nadis (adi, madhya, antya) spread over the 27 nakshatras. Two different nadis: 8; the same nadi: 0, and that is the nadi dosha, the most dreaded flaw, associated in tradition with health and offspring.

The scale

Fewer than 18 points out of 36: tradition advises against the union. 18 to 24: acceptable. 25 to 32: good. 33 to 36: excellent — and rare. Nadi dosha and bhakoot dosha can on their own sink an otherwise good score; that is why the texts provide many cases of cancellation (dosha parihara): same rashi but different nakshatras, same nakshatra but different rashis, friendly sign rulers, or nakshatras falling in different quarters (padas). An astrologer spends part of his time looking for these cancellations when two families are set on a marriage.

Mangal dosha: Mars in the wrong place

Independently of the 36 points, the position of Mars is checked in each chart. Mars in the first, second, fourth, seventh, eighth or twelfth house — counted from the ascendant, and for some schools also from the Moon and from Venus — makes the person a manglik, reputed to bring discord, even widowhood, into the couple. The simplest remedy is to unite two mangliks, whose flaws cancel out. The most picturesque is kumbh vivah: a prior symbolic marriage to a pot, a banana tree or a sacred fig tree, which “uses up” the flaw before the real wedding. Well-known personalities have resorted to it, which keeps the custom alive.

The dashakoot of the South

In southern India, the method counts ten factors (dashakoot), some of which overlap with the North’s eight and others of which are its own: rajju, the “rope”, which divides the nakshatras into five groups corresponding to parts of the body, is considered the most important, two partners of the same rajju being strongly discouraged; vedha, “obstruction”, rules out certain pairs of nakshatras; mahendra and stree-dirgha look at the longevity of the bond and the protection of the woman.

How it is used today

Kundali milan has survived urbanisation, love marriages and the Internet — it has even settled in. The big Indian matrimonial websites offer a 36-guna calculation in one click and a “manglik / non-manglik” filter among the search criteria, next to religion, caste, diet and salary. In many families a low score no longer breaks off a match, but it opens a negotiation: a second astrologer is consulted, cancellations are sought, a remedial ritual is planned. The same astrologer will then fix the muhurta, the auspicious date and time of the ceremony, which explains the peaks of weddings on a few days of the year and the total absence of ceremonies during certain periods.

For a mixed couple, or one living outside India, the question often arises when meeting the family: a future father-in-law may ask for the suitor’s date, time and place of birth without further explanation. Knowing what it is about, and being able to discuss it without mockery, is the best preparation. The rules of marriage itself — age, formalities, recognition abroad — are in the marriage pages and the country pages of this site, including the page on India.

What it is worth

Like all astrology, kundali milan has no demonstrated predictive value: scores correlate neither with the length of marriages nor with their quality, and the country that practises it most has one of the lowest divorce rates in the world for social and legal reasons that have nothing to do with the Moon. What is real is the method’s social weight: it can legitimise a refusal by the families, delay or prevent a wanted marriage, and place on the “manglik girl” a stigma that has been challenged as far as the Indian courts. What is useful, on the other hand, is the vocabulary: the eight kutas name dimensions of a couple — attraction, temperament, way of thinking, health, long-term affection — that two people can discuss very concretely, score or no score.

This site’s Love compatibility page calculates the 36 gunas for two dates of birth, with the detail of the eight factors, and sets them beside the other readings — Western signs, Chinese signs, biorhythms, first names.

Frequently asked questions

Is the time of birth needed?

Ideally, yes: the Moon changes nakshatra about every day and sign every two and a half days. Without the time the calculation is still right most of the time, but it can pick the wrong nakshatra if you were born near a change; the site’s calculator flags this case.

Nadi dosha: is marriage impossible?

No. It is the heaviest flaw of the scale, but also the one for which the texts provide the most cancellations, and many astrologers find one when the families wish it. Two people of the same nakshatra, for instance, have the same nadi but escape the dosha in most schools.

What about a non-Hindu couple?

Nothing prevents you from doing the calculation out of curiosity: the sidereal zodiac and the nakshatras can be computed for any birth. The social weight, however, exists only where the tradition is alive.

How does it differ from Western couple astrology?

Western synastry compares the planetary positions of the two charts, above all the Moon, Venus and Mars, and interprets their aspects; kundali milan is a fixed scale, based almost entirely on the Moon, which yields a score. The first is a commentary, the second a mark.