The reservoir of knowledge of Indian Astrology is made up of contribution from innumerable sources over many centuries. Let us not forget that each such source is nothing but an effort to decode the unknown future. Every author tried to record his own observations and inferences based upon what was available to him from the ancestors with fine tuning necessary to make sense in the society he lived.

This reservoir has some core characteristics :

• The sources lack the chronological order - we are not able to decide what is the evolved version and to be considered authentic source. Because of this disordered mass, we are liable to come across any source not knowing that it was later modified by another Seer.

• We do not know if the later publication supersedes earlier work.

• Due to social value of respecting elders, no seer has ever tried to show limitations of earlier work or to override earlier methods.

• Rather than giving exclusive valid rules, the sources continued providing parallel views, methods and rules. This has resulted in a huge accumulation of not only stereotyped and repetitive books but at times confusing and conflicting things.

While, dealing with the classical methods, what is the one thing that we have to always keep in our mind?

This is, undoubtedly, the fact that these are all efforts in trying to know the unknown. There are no ultimate last words.

Some people, due to their outstanding reverence to the old, try to justify their claims by quoting slokas from the classical books. They try to validate what has been mentioned in such books with an argument that, the validity lies in its continued use. However, they forget that it is the eternal quest of human beings to know the unknown that they keep on explore the old books . And they have to keep exploring one after another to find the distinction.. Had there been valid rules, the latest book should have been enough.

Now let us discuss about Navamsa.

To begin with, the question itself is an indication that there are many confusions and ambiguities about use of Varga Charts. Let us see some of the constraints about Varga Charts :

• Varga charts are unique tools of Indian Astrology.

• They are unique because we do not find similar concepts in western astrology. Due to this, we have to rely on limited research, if any.

• The astrology classic books were originally written in Sanskrit Slokas and condensed Sutras. This way, we have to depend upon Translation. We know that Translation depends upon translator’s

  • knowledge of the subject

  • width of their thinking horizons

  • vocabulary of both the languages

  • a single mistake of either ‘or’ or ‘and’ can make a great diversion.

We see that the Varga charts are referred to either confirm or reject or modify what is observed from the basic natal horoscope : D(1). Now, we must have questions like :

• If Navamsa modifies what is observed from D(1) why not to do away with the D(1) chart, altogether?

• How can one use Trisamsa Chart to validate D(1)? This is important because in Trisamsa, the Moon and the Sun have no lordship.

• As far as Navamsa is calculated on the basis of time of birth, the planets will show ‘Prarabdha’ - the circumstances that may surface due to past life karma of the native. At the most, being more microscopic view compared to Rasi, it can give finer aspects of circumstances.

• It cannot show the ‘Free-will’ that the native may exercise. If this can be done, alas.. how can we call it ‘Free-will’?

• If Navamsa can give some idea about what way the native will behave, it would open another gateway of discussion :

  • That means life is pre-determined which will defy the core property of the universe being dynamic.

  • The persons seeking astrological guidance are fickle minded or gullible - the strong minded will be a non-believer of astrology and what happens in their case, can never come to purview of astrological analysis.

  • If this is so, will it not be prudent to check first about the degree of self-deterministic traits of the native from the basic horoscope before going to assess the Navamsa?

These are some of my personal views for open minded astrologers for their personal quest into unknown. For those, who want to find gratification in presenting selectively picked up Slokas from the classics, nothing can be said.

If, our approach to classics is honest, we also need to present what the seers have mentioned in the initial part of the classics like Satya Jataka

• “2. The science of Astrology is a great secret. It should be guarded with care. It should never be revealed to people who have no faith in God, who are skeptics by nature and to those who do not show reverence to their Guru.

• 3. This sacred science of Astrology should never be taught to bad people. Nor should it be revealed to too many people and very frequently. It should be taught only to a few chosen disciples who really deserve and have the necessary qualifications. “

We can safely say, Navamsa is one more effort to reach out to the unknown..