The Yogas of Spiritual Intensity

By Alison Berker

Once one gets a taste of God, there will be a burning fire under the ass to realize Him totally. Nothing else will ever compare. The rate at which that fire turns a limited human personality into Divine Ash can be understood in part by an analysis of the yogas of spirituality contained within a horoscope.

The most famous class of such yogas are called pravrajya yogas, often translated as "yogas of renunciation." They usually indicate the formal joining of a religious order. Other factors that are important are the strength and position of the trines and trinal lords, the twelfth house and lord, Saturn, Jupiter, the Sun, Moon and Ketu.

Pravrajya yogas include the following:

Moon in a drekkana of Saturn aspected by Saturn or Moon in a navansha of Mars or Saturn aspected by Saturn.
Saturn or Moon in the ninth unaspected
Jupiter, Moon and Ascendant aspected by Saturn with Jupiter in the ninth
Four planets in the same sign with none being combust and one being the tenth lord.
3 planets in the tenth with the tenth lord strong
Saturn aspects the Moon's dispositor or the 1L
Sun, Moon or Jupiter without strength in the 1st, 10th or 12th aspected by Saturn
Saturn or the 1st lord aspects the Moon's dispositor

Three other yogas that are not classed as pravrajya yogas but are powerful spiritualizing yogas are:

Shrikantha Yoga - Lagna lord, Sun and Moon exalted, swa or in a friend's sign in an angle or a trine
Virinchi Yoga - 5th lord, Jupiter and Saturn exalted, swa or in a friend's sign in an angle or a trine
Shrinatha Yoga - 9th lord, Mercury and Venus exalted, swa or in a friend's sign in an angle or a trine

As you can see from a glance above, Saturn and the Moon figure prominently in spiritual intensity. While, from a worldly standpoint, Saturn's influence on the Moon is regarded as unfavorable since it is not conducive to worldly happiness and success, it is a dynamo trigger for spiritual greatness. Saturn often gets a bad rap, but Saturn is both the ground we stumble on and the means by which we pull ourselves up from it. The moon is our manas, our emotional mind. Saturn can give it an otherworldly focus which is the only real succor to be derived from such an aspect.

Here are some examples.

	Paramahamsa Yogananda Famed author of "Autobiography of a Yogi," Yogananda's horoscope abounds with spiritual yogas. He has a Srikantha Yoga formed by the Sun as both the Sun and the lagna lord in the fifth in the sign of friend Jupiter and Moon in the ascendant in the sign of friend Sun. Plus the Moon is the twelfth lord. He also has Moon in a navamsha of Mars aspected by Saturn. And the fifth and ninth lords are conjoined in another moksha house (the eighth) aspected by Saturn. He also has a Virinchi Yoga from his Sun ascendant. All three of his ascendants participate in his spiritual yogas and all three are trined to one another, giving him the one pointed focus necessary to achieve spiritual greatness.
	Ramakrishna Paramahamsa Another great saint who also has all of his ascendants in accord with one another, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa achieved nirvikalpa samadhi at a young age. He has Moon in a navamsha of Mars aspected by Saturn. He has Saturn in the ninth and although it is aspected by Jupiter, it is also retrograde and exalted and so is its dispositor. This also makes a Maha Lakshmi Yoga and while Lakshmi is in this Kali Yuga mostly associated with worldly wealth the root of Her name, Laksh, means goal. She can also give spiritual realization if that is someone's goal. He is very near to having a Virinchi Yoga as well. Fifth lord Mercury is retrograde and in the lagna in the sign of friend Saturn, Saturn is exalted in the ninth and Jupiter is retrograde in the fifth but it is in the sign of Mercury who is only neutral towards Jupiter but not actually friendly. Ketu, moksha karaka, is exalted in Vishakha, a nakshatra renowned for its fixation on goals. And both Sun and Moon are in the ascendant disposited by exalted Saturn from the ninth. His spiritual potency still resonates today.
	Anandamayi Ma Anandamayi Ma was one of those rare individuals born with only a small remnant of work left to be done in the spiritual realm and she initiated herself and achieved full realization in her twenties and lived out her days as a saint sought by all. One glance at her image fills even the most stubborn heart with a tender feeling. She has four exalted planets: Sun, Venus, Jupiter and Saturn. Her chart evokes both a Srikantha Yoga and a Virinchi Yoga. The lagna lord is exalted in the fifth house, the Moon is in the tenth in Jupiter's sign and Sun is exalted in the second. Technically Sun is not in the right place but the second is a positive house. The same is true for Virinchi. The fifth lord Moon is in the tenth in a friend's sign, Jupiter is exalted in the fifth, and Saturn is exalted but in the 8th house. She also has Moon in the tenth aspected by Saturn, a pravrajya yoga. The eighth lord is exalted in the 1st and the twelfth lord is exalted in the eighth - both are moksha houses.

From the October/November, 2011 issue of Michael Laughrin's North American Jyotish Newsletter. The newsletter is administered through Yahoo Groups at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jyotish_ws/ - click to subscribe to this free Jyotish newsletter.