Second House (Dhana Bhava)

Definition

In Jyotish the second house is the Dhana Bhava, the house of wealth. Five main matters sit with it: wealth, family relationships, speech, eyesight and death. Sutton names its karaka (significator) planets — Jupiter for wealth, Mercury for speech and childhood, Venus for family, the Sun and Moon for the eyes and insight — and reads these as parts of life you don't directly control. Behari also calls it the House of Affluence and ties its wealth to the goddess Lakshmi.

In Tradition

Both Sutton and Behari see the second house as more than a material marker. Astrologers do tie it to the outward affairs of wealth, family, speech and the body, but both authors also read it metaphysically — as the expression of a deeper potential a person carries within.

In Practice

Behari reads the house through where its lord (the planet ruling the second house) sits. Favourable results tend to follow when that second lord occupies its own sign or the 1st, 4th, 5th, 7th, 9th or 10th house; tying it to the 6th, 8th or 12th instead points toward impoverishment. Sutton, for his part, links the house to past lives and to the potential a person brings forward from them, framing its wealth, speech, eyesight and other matters as conditions you don't directly control.

Historical Origin

This reading draws on two modern Jyotish authors. Komilla Sutton treats the second house in The Essentials of Vedic Astrology, and Bepin Behari in the Vedic Astrologer's Handbook Vol II, where he calls it a mysterious house best defined metaphysically and notes that the classic texts relate it to death, eyesight, speech and wealth.

Further Reading

• Sutton, The Essentials of Vedic Astrology
• Behari, Vedic Astrologer's Handbook Vol II