Article text is currently English only. The calculation below and the rest of the interface follow your chosen language.
In short
A shubha graha is a natural benefic. BPHS counts Jupiter and Venus as benefics, with the Moon and Mercury depending on their condition. This app uses a fixed list of four, Jupiter, Venus, Mercury and the Moon, in every chart, and uses it to score aspects and to test yogas such as Gaj Kesari, Adhi and Maala.
What the term means
Shubha means "auspicious". A shubha graha, or natural benefic, is a graha whose own nature is classed as favourable, independent of the houses it rules in a particular chart. The counterpart is the papa graha, or natural malefic. A separate, chart-dependent classification by lordship, functional benefic or malefic, also exists, and the two are easy to confuse.
Where the term comes from
BPHS Ch. 3 Sl. 11 names the malefics, the Sun, Saturn, Mars, the decreasing Moon, Rahu and Ketu, and calls the rest benefics, adding that Mercury turns malefic when it joins a malefic. Ch. 34 Sl. 8-10 restates it with grades: Jupiter and Venus benefics, the Moon "mediocre in benefice", Mercury neutral and taking the nature of its company. The lordship lists in Ch. 34 Sl. 19-44, which name the "auspicious" grahas for each rising sign, are the functional version.
How this app uses it
- The engine's list is fixed: Jupiter, Venus, Mercury and the Moon. It does not check the Moon's phase or Mercury's company, so the Moon counts as a benefic waxing or waning and Mercury in any company.
- Aspect strength in the app's Shad Bala is 3 when only benefics aspect a planet, 0 when only malefics do, 1.5 for both or neither. In a 1985-06-05, 02:29 IST New Delhi chart the Moon is 203 degrees past the Sun, a waning Moon that BPHS would class as a malefic, yet its aspect on Mars counts as benefic and gives Mars the full 3.
- Yoga tests read the same list: Gaj Kesari needs a benefic joined to or aspecting Jupiter; Adhi Yoga needs Mercury, Venus or Jupiter in the 6th, 7th or 8th from the Moon; Maala Yoga needs benefics alone in three Kendras.
- The Ch. 34 functional lists are stored with the Yoga Karaka analysis but are not shown.
Pages that use this term
- Gaj Kesari Yoga - needs a benefic's support.
- Adhi Yoga - benefics around the Moon.
- Maala Yoga - benefics in three angles.
- Ishta Devata and the Karakamsa - benefics in the 12th from the Karakamsa.
- Jupiter in Vedic astrology - the first of the benefics.
- Shad Bala calculator - shows who aspects each planet.
- Yogas calculator - runs the benefic-based yoga tests.
Related terms
- Papa graha (malefic) - the other list.
- Yogakaraka - a lordship role, not a nature.
- Drishti - the aspects the benefic test scores.
- Paksha - the Moon's phase, which BPHS uses and the engine does not.
Shad Bala calculator
Six components, one simplified score out of 20 for each of the seven grahas.
What it needs
Date, time and place
That is more than this article asks for - it only ever takes a date, and sometimes a time, and never a name or a birth place. So this one runs on its own page, which asks for exactly what it needs and stores none of it.
Run it on its own page