ಯೋಗ: ಇಪ್ಪತ್ತೇಳು ಸಂಯೋಗಗಳು | Yoga: the twenty-seven combinations

Of the five limbs the yoga is the one that puzzles people most, because unlike the others it does not correspond to anything you can point at in the sky.

To find it, add the longitude of the sun to the longitude of the moon and divide the sum into twenty-seven parts of 13 degrees 20 minutes. The part the sum falls in is the yoga of the moment.

The twenty-seven are: Vishkambha, Priti, Ayushman, Saubhagya, Shobhana, Atiganda, Sukarma, Dhriti, Shula, Ganda, Vriddhi, Dhruva, Vyaghata, Harshana, Vajra, Siddhi, Vyatipata, Variyana, Parigha, Shiva, Siddha, Sadhya, Shubha, Shukla, Brahma, Indra and Vaidhriti.

What it is measuring

The sum of two longitudes has no direct physical meaning, and it is worth being plain about that. What it does have is a useful period. The sum increases at about 13.2 degrees a day, so a yoga lasts a little under a day, giving a third independent cycle alongside the tithi and the nakshatra. Three cycles of similar length but different periods produce a rich set of combinations that rarely repeat, which is precisely what a system of muhurta selection needs.

There is also a geometric reading. When the sum is zero the sun and moon are symmetric about the fixed starting point of the zodiac; certain yogas therefore mark configurations in which the two luminaries stand in a particular relationship to the equinoctial and solstitial points.

The ones that are avoided

Four yogas are traditionally set aside for beginnings and for auspicious work: Vyatipata (the seventeenth), Vaidhriti (the twenty-seventh), Parigha (the nineteenth, its first half only) and Vyaghata (the thirteenth). Vishkambha, Atiganda, Shula and Ganda are also treated with some caution.

Vyatipata and Vaidhriti are singled out most often. Both are considered suitable for charity, for shraddha and for offerings to the departed, and unsuitable for weddings, travel and new ventures.

At the other end, Siddhi, Siddha, Shubha, Amrita and Brahma are considered favourable, and a yoga on that list strengthens an otherwise ordinary muhurta.

A caution about the word

This yoga has nothing to do with the physical and meditative discipline of the same name, and nothing to do with the planetary yogas of horoscopy such as Gajakesari or Raja yoga, which are combinations of planets in a birth chart. Three unrelated things share one Sanskrit word meaning “joining”.