Jataka Parijata uses a person's own ashtakavarga to mark months in their year. If a sign has no bindu in the Sun's chart or in the Moon's chart, the solar month when the Sun passes through that sign is set aside for auspicious undertakings. For study, the book takes the sign with the most bindus in Mercury's chart and begins study in the solar month when the Sun is there. The rule marks months for one chart, not a day for everyone.
☕ Two months from your own charts
In the ashtakavarga each planet has its own chart: for every sign, the number of bindus that planet receives there from the eight contributors. Most muhurtha rules pick a day for everyone. This one is personal: it reads months from one person's own charts. The Nava app does not compute this. This page explains the rule only.
The empty month. Look at the Sun's own chart and the Moon's own chart. If a sign holds no bindu in one of them, or in both, the book sets aside the solar month when the Sun passes through that sign for every auspicious undertaking (Jataka Parijata (tr. Subramanya Sastri), ch. X, v. 16, p. 670; the first half of the verse). If Mesha (Aries) is such a sign, the month is Chithirai, when the Sun is in Mesha (Aries). The Sun passes each sign once a year, so the same month comes round every year. A chart may have no such sign, and then nothing is set aside.
The study month. Look at Mercury's own chart and find the sign with the most bindus. The book begins serious study in the solar month when the Sun is in that sign (Jataka Parijata (tr. Subramanya Sastri), ch. X, v. 22, p. 674; again the first half of the verse), in the card “The rules in brief” below.
The translator adds a passage he attributes to Parashara, which carries the same idea down to the stars: when the Moon passes through a sign that has no bindu in her own chart, the stars of that sign are left out for auspicious acts (Jataka Parijata (tr. Subramanya Sastri), ch. X, p. 671). It is the translator's addition, not the verse.
None of this says what will happen in a month. It is the way the tradition holds a month to be chosen or set aside, read from the same charts the transit rules use.
Set aside, and begun
- Take the Sun's own chart and the Moon's own chart.
- Find any sign with no bindu in one of the two charts, or in both.
- Set aside the solar month when the Sun passes through that sign, every year.
- Take Mercury's own chart and find the sign with the most bindus.
- Begin serious study in the solar month when the Sun is in that sign.
- The translator's added passage: when the Moon passes a sign with no bindu in her own chart, that sign's stars are left out.
- Mix-up: the empty month is the month the transiting Sun has few bindus. It is fixed by the birth charts: the sign with no bindu, read once, gives the same month every year.
- Mix-up: the rule uses the total of all charts. It uses the Sun's and the Moon's own charts for the empty month, and Mercury's own chart for study.
- Mix-up: the rule picks a day. It marks a whole solar month; a day inside it is still chosen by the ordinary muhurtha rules.
Frequently asked questions
Why does the empty month come back every year?
Because it is fixed by the birth charts, not by the sky this year. The Sun passes through each sign once a year, so the solar month of the empty sign comes round every year.
What if my Sun and Moon charts have no empty sign?
Then the rule sets no month aside. It only applies to a sign that holds no bindu at all.
Which solar month goes with which sign?
The Tamil solar month is named for the sign the Sun is in: Chithirai for Mesha (Aries), Vaikasi for Vrishabha (Taurus), and so on in order round the twelve signs.
Deep dive: a month, then a day
How the month rules sit with the day rules, and what this builds on.
📅 A month, then a day
These rules work at the scale of a month. Inside a month, a day is still weighed by the ordinary rules, such as the Moon's house from the birth sign, explained on chandra bala. The stars left out by the translator's added passage are a step between the two: a few days in each month, read from the Moon's own chart.
🧭 What this builds on
What a planet's own chart is, and how a transit is read on its bindus down to the eighth of a sign, is on ashtakavarga transits and kakshya. The bindus themselves are introduced on ashtakavarga basics.