Surya (Sun) Mahadasha: What the Sun's 6 Years Bring

It depends on the Sun's strength in your birth chart. A Sun in Aries (its best sign) or Leo (its own sign) does well. So does a Sun in the 1st, 4th, 5th, 7th, 9th, 10th or 11th house. Such a Sun gives great happiness and wealth. Linked with the 9th or 10th lord, it brings high honour. With the 5th lord it brings a child, and with the 2nd lord riches. With the 4th lord it brings vehicles (Parashara).

A weak Sun gives the opposite. Weak means in Libra (its weakest sign), or in the 6th, 8th or 12th house. It also means joined with Rahu, Ketu or harsh planets. Then the period brings stress and loss of money and grain. It brings the anger of bosses or officials and time away from home. It brings poor health, loss of reputation and fights with relatives and friends. A kind planet such as Jupiter or Venus may look at the Sun. Then the middle of the period still gives some ease.

Parashara calls the Sun the soul. He names the Sun and Moon the royals of the planets. The stronger of the Sun and Venus stands for your father. Mantreshwar adds that for a day birth the Sun shows the father. It also rules the right eye.

So the Sun's years test your standing. That means your boss, the government, your father, your confidence and your name. Saravali lists what a good Sun period gives. It gives money through medicine, roads, fire and the ruler. It adds courage, steady effort, fame and a rise in rank. Varahamihira's Brihat Jataka gives the same picture. It gives money through gold, travel and rulers, with courage and fame. Saravali adds that the Sun ripens the results of every period.

Jyotish Ratnakar gives a result for the Sun's period in every house. Count houses from your rising sign (lagna), not from your Sun sign.

The books differ here. Saravali says a Sun in the 1st house gives a large domain. Jyotish Ratnakar gives eye trouble and money loss there. Parashara counts the 5th and 9th as good houses for a strong Sun. Jyotish Ratnakar reads them as an unsettled time.

Saravali sorts the Sun's period into five kinds. Exalted in Aries, it gives a top position with all its trappings. In its root sign (moolatrikona, in Leo), it gives rule over good lands. It also ends sorrow. In an enemy's sign, it brings eye trouble and humiliation. Debilitated in Libra, it brings eye trouble, poor health and restriction.

Jyotish Ratnakar agrees. An exalted Sun grows wealth, grain and cattle and brings money from the ruler. A Sun in Leo brings wealth from farms and forests, fame and honour at court. A Sun in Libra brings loss of money and place. That holds unless it has passed 10° of Libra.

Jataka Parijata adds a twist from the navamsa (the ninth-part chart). A debilitated Sun in its strong navamsa brings royal fortune. An exalted Sun in its weak navamsa brings blame and fear.

Jataka Parijata gives a three-part pattern. The start brings the father's illness and money loss. The middle brings obstacles of every kind, and the end brings happiness. Jyotish Ratnakar agrees: worry and spending first, losses in the middle, a happy close.

Parashara adds a rule for timing. If the Sun sits in the first 10° of its sign, results come early. In the middle 10°, they come in the middle. In the last 10°, they come at the end. The Sun never moves backward, so this order never flips for it.

The Sun-Saturn sub-period is the hardest. Saravali says the person is humbled by authority and loses power to rivals. When Saturn is badly placed, Parashara gives a hard start, brief ease, then strain. Sun-Rahu opens badly. Parashara warns of money loss and fear for the first two months. Then comes ease if Rahu is well linked. Sun-Ketu brings worry, spending and the anger of superiors.

The best sub-periods are Sun-Jupiter, Sun-Moon and Sun-Mars. Saravali says nothing in Sun-Moon is bad. Each sub-period's length follows the standard rule explained on the mahadasha page.

Parashara lists the good and bad planets for each rising sign. The Sun is a good planet for Aries, Taurus, Leo and Sagittarius rising. For Scorpio rising, the Sun and Moon together are the yogakaraka. That is the planet that gives the best results. For Sagittarius rising, the Sun joined with Mercury forms a yoga.

For Gemini, Libra and Pisces rising, Parashara counts the Sun as a harmful lord. So its period needs more care there. Owning the 8th house never spoils the Sun.

For a hard Sun period, Parashara prescribes Mrityunjaya japa. That means repeating the Shiva mantra for protection. He adds a shanti, a peace ritual, to please the Sun. For hard sub-periods he names the remedy by planet. Sun-Mars gets Subrahmanya japa, and Sun-Rahu and Sun-Ketu get Durga japa. Sun-Jupiter gets a gift of gold, and Sun-Saturn gets Mrityunjaya japa. Sun-Mercury gets Vishnu Sahasranama with a gift of food.

Jyotish Ratnakar advises gifting a gold lotus. It adds wheat, jaggery, copper, red cloth, red sandalwood, red flowers and ruby. It also gives 7,000 repetitions of the Sun's mantra. For Sun-Ketu it gives Sun worship where Parashara gives Durga japa.

A full 6-year period holds nine sub-periods. The first belongs to Sun itself. Each length is the main period's years × the sub-period's years ÷ 120. The dasha calculator gives your own dates.