Understanding the Navgraha - Part 1

How can 9 planets have any influence over my life?

People who criticize jyotish shastra or vedic astrology (not your Western one) miss the whole point that the navgraha are not the literal planets … and here’s the tea.

The term planet comes from Greek planates which means the wandering things, usually around a center.

Graha on the other hand comes from root verb Grnhati which means to grab or take hold of - which is why we have grahak, the customer who takes.

The concept of Graha uses the Earth as a reference point, still keeping the Sun at the center scientifically, but focusing on how the positions of diffierent physical bodies can be markers or indicators of the pressures exerted by non-physical cosmic forces in space sitting behind these bodies, which can tell us about some patterns in our life because the vedas tell us which deity controls which aspect, like the Sun rules leadership while Shukra manifesting as Venus, rules your sex life.

In simple words, imagine you & your friends are using crayons to talk about your feelings on a paper, so if you use red, it means you’re angry or if you use yellow it means you’re happy.

Similarly jyotish shashtra at its core uses the universe as a paper with positions of planets acting as colored crayons to explain your relationship with the deities, revealing the possibilities of how things went (which is our karma) & how things can go for us because of forces in space, not emissions or radiations from the literal planets.

In psychology, we call this syncronicity i.e. meaningful coincidence, not scientific causation.

So this begs the question - who are these 9 markers, what do they symbolize, and what are their job roles?

Source & Info Credits: The Sanskrit Channel, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wr7pNA2T5E&list=PLAPrVB8wngPmy56kgFxotdmjPJ_YkzO0a

Vedic Astology Channel, https://www.youtube.com/@vedicastrologythroughanimation