Sula Yoga: seven grahas in three signs, the BPHS rule and a 1986 chart

Sula is the spear, and Sula Yoga is the name the classical texts give a chart whose seven grahas are grouped into three signs - three points, like the prongs of a trident. It is one of the seven Sankhya ("counting") members of the Nabhasa yogas, which judge a chart by how its planets are spread rather than by any one of them. Every chart has exactly one Sankhya yoga; three signs is uncommon but far from rare. This page states the rule exactly as the engine applies it, sets out what BPHS and Saravali read into it, and checks a real chart by hand. For the general question of what a yoga is worth, see what a yoga in your chart means.

The rule: the condition for Sula Yoga

BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 16-17 defines the Sankhya yogas by a single count, and "if in 3, Sool Yog occurs". In the engine that becomes:

1. 1.List the seven classical grahas - Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn. Rahu and Ketu are not part of any Nabhasa yoga.
2. 2.Read the sidereal sign of each.
3. 3.Count the different signs. Exactly three gives Sula Yoga. The engine's sentence is "Your 7 classical grahas (Sun through Saturn) occupy exactly 3 distinct signs - a Nabhasa 'Sankhya' (counting) Yoga."

Nothing else enters. The three signs need not be related in any way; they need not be in trine, adjacent or opposite. The split can be five, one and one or three, two and two. And the ascendant does not matter, so the same planetary positions are Sula from any rising sign.

Precedence, and the two shapes that always make three signs

BPHS ends the Sankhya rule with a condition: none of the seven "will be operable, if another Nabhash Yog is derivable". This app's engine records that sentence in its source comment and does not apply it - it reports every Nabhasa yoga that forms, and leaves the reader to decide whether the Sankhya one should give way.

For Sula, two shape yogas are guaranteed to trigger that clause, because they can only exist on a three-sign chart. Shringataka Yoga puts all seven grahas in the 1st, 5th and 9th houses. Hala Yoga puts them in one of the other three trine sets - the 2nd, 6th and 10th; the 3rd, 7th and 11th; or the 4th, 8th and 12th. The engine requires each named house to hold at least one graha and no graha to stand outside them, so under whole-sign houses both shapes mean exactly three signs. Every Shringataka or Hala chart is therefore also a Sula chart - and, by BPHS, one in which the Sula should yield to the shape. A Sula chart can also meet an Asraya yoga, when all three signs share a modality, or one of the benefic-malefic group yogas, Vajra and Yava.

In practice that happened little. Of the 151 Sula moments in the engine's sample, only 5 also formed another Nabhasa yoga: Rajju twice and Musala, Vajra, Yava and Hala once each, with one chart carrying two of them. In the other 146, Sula was the only Nabhasa yoga present, and BPHS's clause would not touch it.

What BPHS and Saravali say about Sula Yoga

The two texts give the same rule and closely related readings, under slightly different spellings.

• BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 3-6 lists the yoga as "Sool" among the seven Sankhya yogas, and Sl. 16-17 gives the count of three.
• BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 47 reads it as making a person sharp, indolent, bereft of wealth, tortuous, prohibited, valiant and famous through war.
• Saravali Ch. 21 names it "Soola" in its opening list and "Sula" in the rule at Sl. 19. Its reading at Sl. 48 runs: harsh, indolent, poor, torturous, a prohibited person, bold, successful in war - and fearful.
• Saravali Ch. 21 Sl. 8-10 adds one general reading for every Sankhya yoga: living by others' wealth and help and seldom at peace.
• BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 50 says the Nabhasa results are felt throughout all the dasha periods.

The interesting difference is at the end of the two lists. Both texts make the Sula person warlike - "valiant", "bold", "successful in war" - but Saravali closes with "fearful", a word BPHS does not use, so its portrait holds both courage and fear at once. BPHS instead adds "famous through war". Neither text attaches the reading to a house, a sign or a period. Advanced Predictive Astrology and the Bhrigu Sutras do not mention Sula Yoga.

Both texts also frame the whole family modestly. BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 1-2 says the 32 Nabhash yogas it lists stand for 1,800 varieties in all, and Saravali Ch. 21 Sl. 1 says the Yavanas described 1,800 kinds, of which it details 32. Sula, in other words, is one named bucket in a much finer classification the texts chose not to reproduce. The engine uses Saravali's spelling, "Sula", for the name it reports.

How often Sula Yoga fires

Sula fired in 151 of 3,000 sampled birth moments 1985-2060 - 5 percent, about one chart in twenty. In the engine's longer walk of 20,000 moments to the year 2483, 1,033 had three signs, a similar share. That puts Sula well above its rarer neighbours, Yuga (two signs, 10 in the sample) and Gola (one sign, none at all), and well below Kedara (four signs, 785). The mid-range counts of four, five and six signs take most charts.

Three signs is reachable because the Sun, Mercury and Venus travel close together and often share one or two signs. What a Sula chart then needs is for the Moon, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn to land in those signs or in one more. The worked example shows a common way it happens: a slow pair sharing a sign while the Sun's companions gather in another.

How the seven divide in a Sula chart

Seven grahas can fall into three signs in four ways, and the rule treats them all alike. The sample shows how often each appeared:

Two patterns in the same run say something about how Sula charts are built. The Sun, Mercury and Venus shared a single sign in 50 of the 151 and used two signs in 98; only 3 times did they use all three signs between them. And the Moon was alone in its sign in only 35 of the 151 - most of the time it was sitting with other grahas. A three-sign chart, in other words, is usually one where the Sun's companions are bunched and the Moon has joined one of the groups. None of this is part of the rule; it is simply what the sample looked like.

Worked example: 15 February 1986, New Delhi

The first moment in the engine's walk with Sula Yoga is 15 February 1986 at 03:45 IST, New Delhi. Re-enter it in the birth chart calculator to check the figures. The ascendant is Sagittarius at 8.1 degrees.

Count the signs: Aquarius (four grahas), Aries (the Moon alone) and Scorpio (Mars and Saturn). Three signs, so Sula Yoga, and the engine reports exactly that. From a Sagittarius ascendant the three signs are the 3rd house, the 5th and the 12th - which, again, do not affect the count.

Now check whether BPHS's precedence clause would apply. The occupied houses 3, 5 and 12 are not 1-5-9 (no Shringataka) and not 2-6-10, 3-7-11 or 4-8-12 (no Hala). Aquarius and Scorpio are fixed signs but Aries is movable, so no Asraya yoga forms. Only the 12th of the four kendras holds anything, so neither Dala yoga is possible, and the benefics are not confined to two kendras, so neither Vajra nor Yava. The engine's full list for this chart has no other Nabhasa yoga, so Sula would stand even on a strict BPHS reading.

The same chart shows how independent the Sankhya count is from everything else the engine reads. Mars is in its own sign, Scorpio, in the 12th house - and Scorpio is the 12th sign from Sagittarius, so Mars is the 12th lord sitting in the 12th, which the engine reports as Vimala Yoga. Three of the Aquarius grahas are flagged combust by the nearby Sun. None of that changes the count of three.

Sula among the counting yogas

Moving one graha into an occupied sign would turn this chart into Yuga Yoga only if it emptied one of the three signs - here, only the Moon's Aries could empty that way. Moving any graha out into a new sign would make it Kedara Yoga. Beyond those sit Pasa, Damini and Veena, for five, six and seven signs. Because the Moon changes sign every couple of days, the Sankhya yoga of a birth can differ from that of someone born a few days earlier or later even when every slow planet is unchanged.

What Sula Yoga does not tell you

Sula Yoga is a count, and that is all it measures. It says nothing about which houses are strong, which grahas are dignified, or how the Mahadasha sequence will run. This app gives it no dasha window, because no graha owns a whole-chart pattern, which agrees with BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 50. The warlike reading belongs to the texts and is reported here as their claim, in the engine's reframed words. A yoga is a named rule about positions, not a description of a person.

To see your own count, and whether Sula or a neighbouring Sankhya yoga applies, run the yoga calculator.

Questions about Sula Yoga

What is Sula Yoga?

It is the Nabhasa Sankhya yoga for a chart whose seven classical grahas - Sun to Saturn - occupy exactly three signs. BPHS calls it Sool Yog (Ch. 35 Sl. 16-17); Saravali calls it Sula or Soola (Ch. 21 Sl. 19).

Do the three signs have to be in trine?

No. Any three signs will do. When the seven grahas fill the 1st, 5th and 9th houses the chart is also Shringataka Yoga, and other trine sets give Hala Yoga, but Sula itself only counts signs.

Does it matter which planets share a sign in Sula Yoga?

Not for the yoga. Four in one sign, two in another and one alone is the commonest split in the sample, but five-one-one or three-two-two count the same. Which planets sit together matters for other rules, such as conjunctions and combustion, not for Sula.

How common is Sula Yoga?

It fired in 151 of 3,000 sampled birth moments 1985-2060, or 5 percent. Two-sign and one-sign charts are much rarer; four, five and six signs are much more common.

Does Sula Yoga override other yogas, or the other way round?

BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 16-17 says a Sankhya yoga gives way when another Nabhasa yoga forms. This app records that clause but reports both. In the sample only 5 of the 151 Sula charts had another Nabhasa yoga.

Why do BPHS and Saravali describe Sula Yoga as warlike?

Both texts say so - "valiant" and "famous through war" in BPHS Sl. 47, "bold" and "successful in war" in Saravali Sl. 48 - without giving a reason. This app paraphrases it as resilience under pressure and a bold, combative streak.

When would Sula Yoga give results?

BPHS Ch. 35 Sl. 50 says the results of Nabhasa yogas run through all dasha periods. This app attaches no Mahadasha window to it, since no single graha forms it.