VedaExplainer
What the Vedic sciences are, and how they connect
A map of India's classical knowledge traditions, from the Vedas through the six Vedangas to the applied sciences, and where Jyotish sits among them.
7 min read · 17 October 2026
Shunya
Articles
Plain-language pieces on the Vedic sciences, written and reviewed by the School’s faculty. Every Sanskrit word is glossed the first time it appears.
25 articles
- Ganita
Shunya: how India gave the world zero, and why it matters to Jyotish
Zero as a placeholder, zero as a number, and the astronomers who needed both to compute the sky.
7 min read · 16 October 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
How to read a panchang
The five limbs of the Indian almanac, what each one measures, and how to make sense of a printed page.
7 min read · 15 October 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Tithi: why the Hindu day is a lunar day
Twelve degrees between Sun and Moon: how the tithi is defined, why it varies in length, and why festivals follow it.
6 min read · 14 October 2026
- Panchanga
The 27 nakshatras: a sky map older than the zodiac
Before the twelve signs reached India, the Vedic sky was read by the Moon's nightly stations. What they are and how they are still used.
7 min read · 13 October 2026
- SiddhantaExplainer
Sidereal and tropical: what the ayanamsa is, and why Lahiri
Two zodiacs, one sky. How the slow wobble of the Earth's axis separates them, and how India chose a standard in the 1950s.
7 min read · 12 October 2026
- Jyotish · HoraExplainer
The birth chart, house by house
What a kundli is, how it is drawn in North and South Indian styles, and what each of the twelve houses is traditionally said to represent.
8 min read · 11 October 2026
- Jyotish · Hora
Grahas are not planets: the nine "seizers"
Why Jyotish counts the Sun, the Moon and two invisible points among its nine grahas, and what the word actually means.
7 min read · 10 October 2026
- Jyotish · HoraExplainer
Houses and signs: the difference every beginner misses
Twelve signs, twelve houses, and why they are not the same twelve. A plain explanation of the two frames in every kundli.
7 min read · 9 October 2026
- Jyotish · HoraExplainer
Vimshottari dasha: time, divided
A 120-year cycle of nine periods, started from the Moon's nakshatra at birth. How the system is built and how to read its arithmetic.
7 min read · 8 October 2026
- Jyotish · HoraExplainer
Transits (gochar) and what Sade Sati is
How the tradition reads the present sky against the birth chart, and a calm explanation of the seven and a half years of Saturn.
7 min read · 7 October 2026
- Panchanga
Muhurta: choosing a time, the Kalpa way
From the ritual sutras to the Muhurta Chintamani: how the tradition thinks about doing an act at a fitting moment.
7 min read · 5 October 2026
- Jyotish · Hora
Space and Time: the two components of prediction
How the classical tradition separates what a chart shows from when it is said to unfold, and why that framework organises everything a student learns.
8 min read · 4 October 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Why Diwali's date moves every year
Diwali is fixed by the Moon, not the Sun: by the new Moon that closes Ashwina, by the evening it covers, and by the Lakshmi Puja window inside that evening.
7 min read · 3 October 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Ekadashi: the eleventh lunar day
Why a lunar year has 24 Ekadashis and sometimes 26, and why smarta and vaishnava almanacs can print different dates for the same one.
7 min read · 2 October 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Navratri, twice a year: Chaitra and Sharad
The two nine-night festivals of the goddess, at the spring and autumn turns of the year, and the rules almanacs use to fix their first and last days.
7 min read · 1 October 2026
- Siddhanta
Eclipses in the Indian sky: what is computed and what is kept
How the siddhantas compute a grahana, what Rahu and Ketu stand for in that computation, and sutak as a practice that varies from one tradition to another.
7 min read · 30 September 2026
- SiddhantaExplainer
Gochar explained: transits, sign changes and retrograde motion
What a transit calendar actually lists, why a graha seems to move backwards, and how the classical texts and modern astronomy describe the same motion.
8 min read · 29 September 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Rahu Kaal, Gulika and Yamaganda: where the day-divisions come from
Three daily periods printed in almanacs, each an eighth of the daylight chosen by weekday: how they are computed, and why we treat them as later conventions.
6 min read · 28 September 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Choghadiya: the day in eight parts
How the choghadiya divides daylight and night into eight periods each, why the sequence starts where it does, and where the system is used for muhurta.
7 min read · 27 September 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Sankranti: the Sun's twelve sign entries
Why Makar Sankranti stays near 14 January while Diwali wanders, how the twelve sankrantis are classed, and the slow drift that will move the date.
6 min read · 26 September 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Adhika masa: the leap month
Twelve lunar months fall about eleven days short of the solar year. How the calendar inserts a thirteenth month, when it does so, and what the rare lost month is.
6 min read · 25 September 2026
- PanchangaExplainer
Amanta and purnimanta: the Hindu calendar's two month systems
Two ways of deciding where a lunar month ends, why they give one festival two month-names, and which regions use which.
7 min read · 24 September 2026
- Panchanga
Namakshar: the syllables of the nakshatra padas
How a table of 108 syllables came to be used in naming children, what the grihya sutras say about names, and what they do not.
6 min read · 23 September 2026
- Jyotish · Hora
South, North and East Indian charts: one sky, three drawings
The three regional ways of drawing a birth chart hold the same information. How each is laid out, how to convert between them, and what each makes easy to see.
8 min read · 22 September 2026