Rashi Chart

Definition

The Rashi chart, or Rashi Chakra, is the main Vedic birth chart — the D-1, or sign chart, your basic natal horoscope. Each box of the diagram holds one whole sign (rashi) of the zodiac, so the twelve signs become the framework for the houses. You'll see it drawn in two regional styles: the south-Indian style uses a fixed square grid, and the north-Indian style a rectangle of twelve fixed segments, where the numbers mark which sign or constellation sits on each house.

In Tradition

These sources agree that the Rashi chart is the basic birth diagram, built on whole signs. Whatever the exact degree of the Ascendant, the entire rising sign becomes the First house and each sign after it the next house in turn. Frawley, Sutton, and Behari all treat this whole-sign (Equal Sign) house method as the foundational chart that Vedic interpretation rests on, with the signs taking the lead in laying out the houses.

In Practice

Frawley reads the houses in the Rashi chart not only from the Ascendant but from the Moon and other planets too, and finds the south-Indian chart makes this easier to see, since it emphasizes the signs over the aspects between planets; he treats it as the basic method, to which the Bhava Chakra is added for specific indications. Sutton calls the Rashi Kundali (Whole Sign system) the most commonly used system in India, and the one he uses throughout his book. Behari notes that Hindu astrologers regard reading the chart as if one sign equalled one house as perfectly valid and well suited to most fundamentals of interpretation, while unequal-house charts are used as well. In the North Indian style, deFouw and Svoboda add, the number in each house is the constellation set on it, and that constellation's lord becomes the house's lord.

Historical Origin

Modern Jyotish handbooks document the Rashi chart in detail. David Frawley lays out its south- and north-Indian forms and its Equal Sign basis in The Astrology of the Seers; Komilla Sutton presents it as the Rashi Kundali, or Whole Sign system, in The Essentials of Vedic Astrology; Behari describes the rashi kundali sign chart in Fundamentals of Vedic Astrology; and deFouw and Svoboda describe the North Indian diagram in Light on Life.

Further Reading

• Frawley, The Astrology of the Seers
• Sutton, The Essentials of Vedic Astrology
• Behari, Fundamentals of Vedic Astrology
• deFouw & Svoboda, Light on Life