Sun Transit in Ashwini

Ashwini is the first nakshatra, the horse's head in Aries. Ketu rules it, and the Ashwini Kumaras, physicians of the gods, preside over it.

The Sun enters Ashwini at Mesha Sankranti, the solar new year, and stays exalted through the whole of Aries. The usual lists count Ketu an enemy of the Sun, so the nakshatra makes the strong Sun a little uneasy. Brihat Jataka places the Sun's deepest exaltation at ten degrees of Aries, in the fourth pada of Ashwini.

For about two weeks the Sun's significations move fast. Health improves and vigour rises, and matters with government or with the father come to a quick head. The Ashwini Kumaras are healers, so a cure begun now, a course of treatment, or a surgery with a good muhurta all go well. Ketu adds speed and impatience. Decisions come quickly and are sometimes reversed.

From the Moon, Aquarius, Scorpio, Cancer and Gemini have the Sun in the third, sixth, tenth and eleventh, the houses Phaladeepika calls favourable. Aries Moons carry it in the first, which the same text reads as weariness and loss of standing, and Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn Moons should watch expense, health and the home. The lagna is counted the same way.

Here the Sun is the atma at the start of a cycle, eager and unguarded. The fortnight shows whether that eagerness settles into steadiness or into impatience.

Offer water to the rising Sun each morning of the stay, and recite the Aditya Hridaya. Honour the Ashwini Kumaras by caring for the sick or giving medicine. Parashara's dana for the Sun, wheat, jaggery or copper on Sunday, suits the new year.