The Navagraha
The word graha means 'seizer' — that which grips life. The nine grahas are Surya (Sun), Chandra (Moon), Mangal (Mars), Budh (Mercury), Guru (Jupiter), Shukra (Venus), Shani (Saturn), Rahu (North Node), and Ketu (South Node).
Each planet rules certain signs, certain houses, certain karakas (signification). Their day-of-the-week associations are why we have Mangalvara (Tuesday, Mars), Guruvara (Thursday, Jupiter), Shukravara (Friday, Venus) and so on.
The luminaries
Surya (Sun) — Soul, father, authority, vitality. Rules Leo. King of the chart.
Chandra (Moon) — Mind, mother, emotions, comfort. Rules Cancer. Queen of the chart, and arguably the most important graha for daily life.
The personal planets
Mangal (Mars) — Courage, action, brothers, anger, surgery, real estate. Rules Aries and Scorpio.
Budh (Mercury) — Intellect, speech, commerce, learning. Rules Gemini and Virgo.
Guru (Jupiter) — Wisdom, teacher, husband (in a woman's chart), children, dharma, luck. Rules Sagittarius and Pisces.
Shukra (Venus) — Love, beauty, wife (in a man's chart), wealth, the arts, comfort. Rules Taurus and Libra.
Shani — the great teacher
Saturn is the most misunderstood planet in popular Vedic astrology. It is not malefic. It is the planet of discipline, time, structure, and earned reward. A strong Shani gives a slow, hard-earned, deeply lasting life. A weak one gives early ease and later struggle.
Sade Sati — the 7.5-year period of Saturn's transit over the natal Moon — is famous as a difficult period. It is also famous for what it gives those who survive it well: structure, maturity, the capacity to hold weight.
Rahu and Ketu — the lunar nodes
These are not physical bodies — they are the points where the Moon's orbit crosses the ecliptic, where eclipses happen. They are called "shadow planets" (chhaya graha).
Rahu is hunger — the unmet appetite, the worldly drive, the obsession that drags us forward. It rules ambition, foreigners, technology, addictions, paradigm-breaking work.
Ketu is detachment — the natural renunciation, the spiritual instinct, what we already know from past lives. It rules moksha, mysticism, signal that cuts through noise.
Together, they describe the karmic axis of the chart — what you came in seeking, what you came in already complete in.