Guna (The Three Qualities)

GUH-nuh

sanskrit: गुण (Guṇa)

Definition

A guna is one of the three primal qualities of Nature, and their blendings make up everything that exists: sattva (harmony, purity, clarity), rajas (activity, energy, passion) and tamas (inertia, darkness, dullness). Together the three are called the trigunas. They are said to arise from Prakriti — the great Nature, or primordial matter, which in the Sankhya scheme is the passive principle paired with Purusha, the witnessing spirit. Several authors also use the gunas to sort the qualitative nature of the planets, the signs and states of being.

In Tradition

Across the modern Jyotish literature the three gunas are read as the qualitative makeup of everything that manifests, and spiritual growth is described as raising sattva while reducing rajas and tamas. Writers also agree you can sort the planets and other chart factors by guna — though which planet gets which guna differs from one author to the next.

In Practice

Writers use the gunas as a lens on temperament and on a chart's spiritual quality. Sutton describes sattvic people as fearless, generous, self-controlled and tranquil; rajasic people as passionate, ambitious, restless high-achievers driven by an inner thirst; and tamasic people as sensual and materialistic, bound by Maya to their desires — she prescribes yoga and meditation to strengthen the inner being and move toward higher consciousness. Frawley holds that because astrology measures the sattvic or mental quality, rajasic and tamasic energies read as negative in the chart, and that evolution means raising sattva. To study how planets interact, several authors sort the grahas by guna: Behari, Cole and Larsen each map the planets to the three gunas, but their assignments differ. Harness, following Behari, notes the 27 nakshatras fall into three groups of nine, each carrying a triple guna value. Joshi's Ashtakuta marriage-compatibility scoring also uses the word 'guna' for its 36 compatibility points — a distinct technical sense.

Historical Origin

The sources here are all modern Jyotish authors, who draw the doctrine from Sankhya philosophy rather than from a single classical astrological text. The guna concept is laid out by Frawley (Astrology of the Seers), Sutton (The Essentials of Vedic Astrology), Behari (Fundamentals of Vedic Astrology), deFouw and Svoboda (Light on Life), Cole (Science of Light), Larsen (Jyotisha Fundamentals) and Harness (The Nakshatras), with Prakriti also glossed by Raman (Notable Horoscopes).

Definition

In Tradition

In Practice

Historical Origin

Further Reading