Saham

Definition

A Saham is a sensitive point you compute in the chart to spotlight one single life-matter, read alongside the house that covers that area. A house can stand for several things at once; a Saham narrows in on just one. It is the Vedic-Tajika version of the Arabic part, or lot — a point you find by combining planetary and house longitudes, the ascendant (the rising degree) above all. There is a Saham for every concern of life, and Rath records that Kesava counts twenty-one of them while Neelkantha counts fifty.

In Tradition

Across the modern classical Jyotish books gathered here, a Saham is read as a single-matter sensitive point — borrowed into Tajika annual practice from the Arabic-part tradition and worked out by combining set longitudes with the ascendant. The shared reading is that you judge the Saham, or its ruling planet, for the one matter it governs, and the event is held to show up in the period of the planets tied to it.

In Practice

To find a Saham you take three longitudes — a minuend, a subtrahend and the ascendant — adding thirty degrees when the ascendant does not fall between the first two. You then read the Saham, or its ruling planet, for the matter it governs. Rath links the Jeeva Saham (built from Jupiter, Saturn and the ascendant, the order reversed for a night birth) to the life-force, and holds that Saturn passing over to block it brings death. For an uncertain trip abroad, Rath and Raman turn to travel Sahams — Jalapatha or Jalapathana for a sea-voyage, Pradesa or Paradesa for a foreign land — judging the outcome by whether the Saham or its lord ties to the ascendant, the ninth house, or the lords of the seventh, ninth and twelfth. Rao uses the vivaha (marriage) and putra (children) Sahams: when Venus sits near the marriage point or the Moon near the children point, that year is read as a strong indication of the event.

Historical Origin

The Saham comes down through the Tajika tradition, which itself drew on the Arabic lot or part. The sources here attest it in modern treatments rooted in the Sanskrit material: Rath's Crux of Vedic Astrology, Charak's Elements of Vedic Astrology, Raman and Vasudev's How to Judge a Horoscope, and Narasimha Rao's Vedic Astrology: An Integrated Approach. For the count of Sahams, Rath in turn cites the earlier authorities Kesava and Neelkantha.

Further Reading

• Rath, Crux of Vedic Astrology
• Charak, Elements of Vedic Astrology
• B.V. Raman & Gayatri Devi Vasudev, How to Judge a Horoscope, Volume Two (VII to XII Houses)
• Narasimha Rao, Vedic Astrology: An Integrated Approach