Worth of Sasa Yoga


Decoding Sasa Yoga

I follow Astrology on the logic of characteristics and significance of Signs, Planets and the houses of Horoscope. Everything is manipulation of different combinations between these three factors. I, therefore, never bother to remember or rote by heart, any great yogas prescribed by the classical books of Indian Astrology. It is not that I have not learnt them.. but things devoid of logic never appealed to me and in, my more than 35 years of, experience of astrological consultation, I never had to repent for this omission.

Here, we are dealing with Sasa Yoga. Let us try to scrutinize it logically with the accepted rules of classical astrology.

Sasa Yoga is one of the Pancha Mahapurush yogas, therefore, it is most logical to accept that a Mahapurush yoga has to deal with the Ascendant i.e., Self and his Karma or deeds i.e., 10th house.

Sasa Yoga is believed to be formed when Saturn is in either Capricorn, Aquarius or Libra sign and placed in Kendra e.g., 1st, 4th, 7th or 10th house.

Let us tabulate the above conditions to facilitate logical inferences. The following table shows different Ascendants when Sasa Yoga is formed by way of Saturn’s placement in 1, 4, 7 and 10th house in either Capricorn, Aquarius or Libra Sign.


When I tried to find the scriptural source of this Sasa Yoga, I found it in Ch.75 of Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra. It says :

Sasa yoga is caused by Saturn ocupying a kendra, in own or exaltation rasi.

A jataka of Sasa yoga has small teeth and a small face but is not of short stature. He is possessed of velour, slim at waist, of beautiful thighs, intelligent and likes to wander over hills and forests. He knows the weak points of the enemies, is the leader of his army, with somewhat elevated teeth and is lively. He is knowledgeable in metallurgy, fond of women and able to usurp other’s wealth. His palms and feet carry the marks of Mala, Veena, Mridunga and weapons. He rules over many parts of this earth with happiness and lives upto 70 years, attaining the abode of Gods.

I think anyone who knows about astrology, will agree that whenever we hear of Saturn, we apprehend to come across something negative e.g., Delays, Restriction, Cold, Hardships, Separation, Obstacles, Burden of Responsibilities, Slavery, Labour, Hard-work, Discipline and beyond this it is linked with longevity and Karma as if it wants the native to live long and suffer. While holding this background, we must be shocked to hear about something great denoted to Saturn.

In the results described about this yoga, we can see that none of the above negative traits of Saturn are visible.

So, we can well infer that the extra ordinary Mahapurusha qualities cannot be directly attributable to Saturn. It is possible that Saturn’s placement may merely be indicative to some other secret source of power. It may be like landmark being used in postal address of a Corporate House building e.g. Birla House, Opp: Old Kabutarkhana..!! We know that the landmark is only useful in identifying the location but it is not the center of interest.

So we need to dig further..

Let us recall what are the denominators of strength in a horoscope?

(A) Lords of relevant houses placed in own, moolatrikona or exaltation sign

(B) Aspect or placement of benefic planets on relevant houses

(C) Combination of lords of Trikona and Kendra houses

(D) Absence of influence of or weakness of

  • (Da) natural malefic or

  • (Db) functional malefic planets

Since the yoga is silent about lordship and sign strength of houses other than where Saturn is placed, we cannot examine Sasa Yoga on the basis of condition (A) above.

Since, there is no reference of any aspects, condition (B), too cannot be useful. Similarly, condition (C) also is not useful. Saturn being a natural malefic and placed in Kendra houses in its own sign or exaltation, condition (Da) & (Db) also cannot be useful.

However, respecting the scriptures, let us primarily accept the Sasa Yoga and try to scrutinize its merit in different Ascendants.

Let us first mark out the possibilities where Saturn becomes Badhakesha:

Note that under Aries and Taurus ascendants, Saturn becomes lord of Badhaka house and cannot be considered beneficial.

Same way, let us mark out where Saturn becomes Marakesha.

Further, we need to identify where Saturn becomes Functional malefic:

Now let us super-impose all the above constrictive factors on Sasa Yoga table:

So : we are left with Only two possibilities of Sasa Yoga i.e., Saturn in Libra in 4th house and Saturn in Libra in the 1st house which are free of any Badhaka, Maraka or functional malefic factors. Can we infer that the secret power of Sasa Yoga lies in Venus the lord of Libra where Saturn gets exaltation? I have checked a few illustrative charts on the net where greatness on the native is attributed to Sasa Yoga e.g. horoscope of Marilyn Monroe, Graham Bell, Shahrukh Khan etc. and there also I found the power of Venus conferring the greatness.

We need to keep the above test in view when we predict great results on the basis of Sasa Yoga.

If we take an overview of Parashara’s writings we find that the Sasa Yoga is one of the Pancha Mahapurusha class of yogas. In every yoga e.g., Ruchaka, Bhadra, Hamsa, Malavya and Sasa, there are symbols of Deva. We also find different planets signifying different Devas e.g.,

  • 5-7. From Surya the incarnation of Ram, from Candr that of Krishn, from Mangal that of Narasimh, from Budh that of Buddha, from Guru that of Vaman, from Sukr that of Parashuram, from Sani that of Kurma (Tortoise), from Rahu that of Varah (Pig) and from Ketu that of Meen (Fish) occurred.

And here lies the secret of Sasa Yoga: When we dissect the Sasa Yoga we find:

  • Some of the characteristics presented here are akin to Kurma or Tortoise e.g., small teeth, small face, long life span

  • Some other characteristics e.g., velour, slim at waist, beautiful thighs, wandering over hills and forests, knowing weak points of the enemies and ruling are akin to Lion

  • Characteristics of fond of women and wealth are akin to Venus

  • Thus there is no direct or indirect relationship with Sasa (Rabit) nor to any of the generally accepted characteristics of Saturn. The closest name should have been Kurma Yoga since Saturn and Kurma as Avatara of Sri Vishnu has already been mentioned by Parashara.

If we wish to relate the qualities of Sasa Yoga, we need to focus upon Saturn being Exalted and placed either in Ascendant or in 4th house with support of strong Venus. Whenever Saturn is in Asc. Libra in Sasa Yoga, it will own 4th and 5th house thus validating the test of rajayoga (lord of Kendra and Trikona in exaltation and placed in a Kendra) is superior.