7th lord in the 2nd house: BPHS Ch. 24 Sl. 74, the partner's lord in the house of wealth

What the placement means

The 7th house lord rules the sign opposite the Ascendant. Placed in the 2nd sign, it takes the 7th's matters - the spouse, partners, contracts, trade - into the house of family, speech, food and accumulated wealth.

Counted from the 7th, the 2nd is the 8th house. Counted from the Ascendant, the planet moves from an angle into a house that is neither angle nor trine but carries the household's resources. The pairing is also distinctive in BPHS's longevity scheme: the 2nd and 7th are the two maraka houses, so this placement puts one maraka lord into the other maraka house.

The two houses involved

The 7th house (Yuvati Bhava) is a kendra: marriage, partnership and dealings with others.

The 2nd house (Dhana Bhava) covers family, speech, food and wealth. BPHS Ch. 44 calls it the stronger of the two maraka houses.

What BPHS says: Ch. 24 Sl. 74

Sl. 74 reads: "If Yuvati's Lord is in Dhan Bhava, the native will have many wives, will gain wealth through his wife and be procrastinating in nature." It is short and mixed - one clear gain, one statement about marriage, one trait.

"Wealth through his wife" is the clearest piece of house logic in the Yuvati series: the spouse's lord sits in the house of wealth. "Many wives" is a formula BPHS uses for several placements touching the 7th or the self, and is the text's statement in the idiom of its time; this app does not predict marriages. "Procrastinating" is stated without a reason. The verse, like the whole chapter, is addressed to a male native; in neutral terms it speaks of resources coming through the partner.

The reverse, Sl. 19 (Dhan's lord in Yuvati), is less flattering: the native is drawn to others' spouses and "will be a doctor", and if a malefic joins or aspects that lord, the spouse's character is called into question. The 2nd-7th link reads more favourably in the direction of Sl. 74 than in that of Sl. 19.

Kendra lordship and the maraka houses

BPHS Ch. 34 Sl. 2-7 say benefics owning angles lose benefic force and malefics owning angles lose malefic force, and that the 7th is one of the angles "specially for happiness". Ch. 44 Sl. 2-5 then name the 2nd and 7th as the maraka houses and their lords as marakas, which is a classification used to time the end of life within an already-estimated span. A 7th lord in the 2nd is squarely inside that scheme. It is reported here because the text says it; this app does not make longevity predictions, and Ch. 24 Sl. 74 itself says nothing about longevity. Sl. 145-148 scale the verse by strength and combine both lordships. The Saravali and the Bhrigu Sutras in this corpus have no verse for this placement.

Which planet it is, Ascendant by Ascendant

From the engine's lordship table, with the engine's dignity for the planet in the 2nd sign without a chart, and the planet's other house.

For Aries and Libra rising, one planet owns both the 2nd and the 7th (Venus, Mars), so the placement is that planet in its own 2nd-house sign - the lord of both maraka houses in one of them. Gemini rising gives Jupiter, lord of the 7th and 10th, exalted in Cancer - two angles' lord at full dignity. Taurus, Cancer and Virgo rising put the lord in an enemy sign. No row is debilitated.

The second lordship brings a second Ch. 24 verse, and in this placement several of them reinforce Sl. 74 rather than cancel it. For Aries and Libra rising the planet is also the 2nd lord in its own house, which Sl. 14 reads as wealthy and proud, with "two, or more wives" and few children; the marriage clause of Sl. 74 is repeated rather than contradicted, so by Sl. 145-148 the two stack. For Gemini and Sagittarius rising the planet is also the 10th lord in the 2nd, which Sl. 110 reads as wealthy, virtuous, honoured by the king, charitable and happy through the father. For Taurus and Scorpio rising it is also the 12th lord in the 2nd, and Sl. 134 adds spending on inauspicious deeds alongside sweet speech and virtue. Each Ascendant therefore reads this placement through two verses, not one.

Strength changes the reading

• Dignity: the engine's dignity label sets the Sl. 145-148 share.
• Nature: Ch. 34's Kendra-lord rule modifies a benefic 7th lord (Jupiter, Venus, Mercury) and a malefic one (Mars, Saturn, the Sun) in opposite directions.
• The other house: the 2nd itself (Aries, Libra), the 10th (Gemini, Sagittarius), the 4th (Virgo, Pisces), the 12th (Taurus, Scorpio), the 8th (Cancer) or the 6th (Leo).
• Association: the 2nd is aspected from the 8th, and specially by Mars (11th, 7th), Jupiter (10th, 6th) and Saturn (12th, 5th) - see drishti.

BPHS reads the spouse from a second chart as well: Ch. 7 Sl. 1-8 assign the spouse to the Navamsa. Readers who weigh a 7th-lord placement usually check the same planet's Navamsa sign in the Navamsa calculator. The planet-level pages, such as Venus in the 2nd, describe the planet in the house without any lordship.

Worked example: Aquarius rising, the Sun in Pisces

The engine's deterministic search produced this chart; re-enter it in the birth chart calculator: 24 March 1985, 05:33 IST, New Delhi. The Ascendant is Aquarius 21.28.

• With Aquarius rising, the 7th house is Leo, ruled by the Sun, which rules nothing else. The 2nd is Pisces.
• The Sun is in Pisces at 9.65 degrees, Uttara Bhadrapada pada 2, in the 2nd. The engine marks it Friendly sign.
• Mercury (Pisces 24.97, Debilitated; ruler of the 5th and 8th) and Venus (Pisces 26.51, Exalted, retrograde; ruler of the 4th and 9th) share the 2nd.
• The 2nd lord, Jupiter, is in Capricorn in the 12th, Debilitated.

The Sun carries only Sl. 74 here, at friendly strength. Ch. 34 Sl. 41-42 (Kumbh Lagn) name Venus and Saturn as auspicious, call Venus the one planet that causes Raj Yog, and list the Sun among the "killers" - the maraka sense, which sits naturally with a 7th lord in the 2nd. The 2nd is crowded with good lordships: the engine's yoga detector reports the 5th-9th Raja Yoga (Mercury and Venus together) and a Kendra-Kona Raj Yoga that includes Venus, Mercury and the Sun. Those flags come from the planets' meeting, not from the 7th lord's placement alone; and the house's own lord is debilitated in the 12th.

Neighbouring placements

The reverse, the 2nd lord in the 7th (Sl. 19), is summarised above; both together exchange the two maraka lords (parivartana). One house back, the 7th lord in the 1st (Sl. 73) is adverse; one house on, the 7th lord in the 3rd (Sl. 75) turns to children. The 7th lord in the 11th (Sl. 83) repeats "wealth through his wife".

1. 1.Find your rising sign with the Lagna calculator.
2. 2.Read off the 7th lord and check the birth chart for it in the 2nd sign.
3. 3.Note its nature, dignity and other house, and compare its Navamsa sign.

Questions about the 7th lord in the 2nd

What does BPHS say about the 7th lord in the 2nd house?

Ch. 24 Sl. 74: more than one marriage, wealth through the spouse, and a procrastinating nature. Sl. 145-148 scale it by strength.

Is this placement a maraka combination?

BPHS Ch. 44 names the 2nd and 7th as maraka houses and their lords as marakas, for longevity timing. This app does not make longevity predictions, and Sl. 74 itself says nothing about longevity.

Does it mean wealth through marriage?

Sl. 74 lists gain of wealth through the spouse among its results. It is the text's statement about a combination, not a forecast.

Which Ascendants make the 7th lord also the 2nd lord?

Aries (Venus) and Libra (Mars). The placement is then that planet in its own 2nd-house sign.

Does "many wives" mean more than one marriage?

It is the text's formula, written for its own time and repeated in several verses. This app does not predict the number or timing of marriages from a placement.

How common is it?

243 of 3,000 sampled birth moments 1985-2060, 8.1%. That counts moments, not people.