Taurus (Vrishabha) sign in Vedic astrology: traits and lord

The table rows come from two sources: Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra (BPHS, chapter 4, in R. Santhanam's translation) and P.V.R. Narasimha Rao (PVR), author of Vedic Astrology: An Integrated Approach.

Fixed (sthira) is one of three movement types. PVR glosses movable signs as 'to move and to be dynamic', fixed signs as 'to be stable and constant', and dual signs as 'stable sometimes and dynamic sometimes'. Taurus is fixed: its nature is stability.

Earth is one of four elements. In PVR's glosses, fire 'transforms the state of things', earth has 'a constant and solid state', air has 'a varying state' and water has 'a flexible state'.

Guna is a quality of nature; PVR assigns Taurus rajas, glossed as energy and passion. Taurus is also an even (female, yugma) sign, a southern sign, and white in colour.

It is a night sign (nishaa rasi), so it is strong at night. PVR notes that of the two signs a planet owns, one is a day sign and one a night sign; Venus's night sign is Taurus.

Taurus rises with its back or feet (prishthodaya), and is odd-footed.

BPHS chapter 4 (verse 8) describes Vrishabha as: white in complexion; long; four-footed; strong at night; residing in the South; representing villages; earthy; rising with its back; ruled by Venus (Śukr, that is Venus). BPHS closes the list by saying the twelve signs 'are described to evaluate gross and specific effects'.

Light on Life (Hart de Fouw and Robert Svoboda) gives the symbol: 'Taurus's symbol is the bull, an animal known for its strength.'

PVR's indications for Taurus (section 2.3) include places and things such as meadows, plains, luxury halls, dining halls and eating places, and qualities such as beautiful, stable, sluggish, loyal, luxurious and faithful. PVR explains that signs stand for situations that develop in a life and influences that enter it, while planets stand for people.

These are traditional associations, not verdicts on anyone. B.V. Raman cautions that such descriptions 'are only general in nature and should not be applied hastily'.

A sign's lord is the planet that owns it. Taurus's lord is Venus, which also owns Libra; in any chart, the lord of the sign in a house is that house's lord.

Dignity is how the classics grade a planet's strength by the sign it sits in. Own sign means the planet rules that sign, so Venus is in its own sign here.

Exalted means the planet is at its strongest, and the Moon is exalted in Taurus, deepest at 3°. Moolatrikona is the third kind of sign where PVR reads a planet as strong, after its own and exaltation signs; the Moon's moolatrikona runs from Taurus 4° to 30°.

Each planet is debilitated (at its weakest) in the 7th sign from its exaltation sign. That is why Scorpio, the 7th from Taurus, is the Moon's debilitation sign.

The nodes (Rahu and Ketu, two shadow points on the Moon's path) differ by text. BPHS chapter 47 gives Taurus as Rahu's exaltation sign. PVR's Table 6 instead puts Rahu's exaltation in Gemini.

Skybond's engine uses the BPHS translation's values: Rahu exalted in Taurus and Ketu debilitated in Taurus. Neither view is picked as the winner here; other texts differ.

Kalapurusha means time personified, the zodiac imagined as one body with each sign as a limb. BPHS chapter 4 and PVR give Taurus as the face of Kalapurusha; PVR frames it as part of Lord Vishnu's body.

This is sky-lore: a way of picturing the zodiac, not a body reading.

Other texts differ. B.V. Raman's Hindu Predictive Astrology (chapter 23) gives Taurus as the neck of Kalapurusha.

Each text is read within its own frame.

These dates use the sidereal zodiac (signs measured from the fixed stars) with Skybond's True Chitra Paksha ayanamsa (the offset between the tropical and sidereal zodiacs), in IST. In Skybond's computation for every year from 2000 to 2050, the Sun's entry falls between 14 May and 15 May.

Western (tropical) sun-sign dates differ because of the ayanamsa, so the Vedic sun sign is often one sign earlier. Each system is read within its own frame; neither is called more accurate here.

As an ascendant, Taurus also behaves differently by place. B.V. Raman (chapter 5) lists Taurus among the signs of short ascension for places north of the equator (he notes the order is reversed south of it), meaning it takes less time than average to rise.