What sign are you? Vedic Vs Western.

What if you have been thinking you are a Scorpion all of your life, and suddenly discover you are actually a Libran?

Very often I hear from people, "I am a Saggitarius" or I am a "Leo", to which I say, "Don't be so sure". I also try to explain the reason sometimes, but very few are able to understand. Doesn't really surprise me because this is what people read in the Sun-sign columns of the newspapers and thus they associate all of their self to be their Sun Sign, that too a Western one.

But just think of it.

• Will all births taking place from 21st March to April 20th have the same Arien characteristics of leadership and impulsiveness?
• Will everyone born in the months of late September-October be peace-loving and charming, like a true Libran?
• Scorpio is your Sun-sign but what about the other planets? Where do Mercury and Venus go? What about other zodiacs like Capricorn and Pisces? Won't they have an influence on your life?
• Will everyone born in those 30 days, under the same zodiac go through the same course of events in his/her life?

Sounds strange right? All this basically account to the limitations of the Western System of Astrology. So if you are a Capricorn acc to Western Astrology does not mean you will have all the Capricorn character traits, because Capricorn is just your Sun-sign(based on Tropical Zodiac), while if you see your Vedic horoscope, your rising sign, sun sign, moon sign will all be different. Yes even the Sun-sign would be different in most cases.

So, the first surprise using Vedic Astrology is that you are no longer the Sun Sign you always thought you were. This happens with most of the charts. However, if you were born in the last 5 days or so of the Western Sign month, then you will probably still be that sign in Vedic since the difference is 23 degrees currently, and signs are 30 degrees long in space.

But why this difference? Lets get more into the astronomical part of it.


Vedic Astrology, (Jyotish) uses the astronomically scientific calculations for the signs of the Zodiac, the zodiac is called the Sidereal zodiac. Sidereal means star and is based on which stars or constellations the planets appear to be in from our perspective here on earth. (This is what the zodiac astronomers use.)

Western astrology uses the Tropical system which is Sun-based and is determined by the seasons. Tropical defines 0° Aries as wherever the Sun is at the moment of March Equinox. The Sun’s position then becomes 0° Aries even though side really (as seen from Earth) it’s only about 7° into Pisces and still needs to travel 23° before it gets to 0° Aries so Western Astrology does not take into account the precession of the equinoxes; therefore after 2000 years it is off by about 20 degrees of longitude--almost a whole Zodiac sign (30 degrees). From 0-600 C.E. , scientists were not aware of the precession. At that time it so happened that the beginning of the Zodiac sign Aries coincided with the beginning of the spring equinox (March 21). Western astrologers (in Greece and Egypt) assumed that the heavens would always stay the same. What they didn’t know is that each year that the earth revolves around the sun, it returns to a place in space slightly behind where it was the previous year. Therefore, it is going backward through the signs of the Zodiac.

The newspaper and thousands of books use the Sun sign for telling you about yourself and your life.  But the Sun is in the same sign for 30 days--think of all the thousands of people born during that time that have the same sign as you. In contrast, Vedic astrology places more emphasis on the Ascendant and the Moon sign, because the ascendant/rising sign changes every 2 hours a day and the moon every 2-1/2 days; thus it is more representative of who you are, this is the reason a Vedic reading requires your time of birth and place of birth too, and not just the date of birth. Ascendant plays a very significant role since it is representative of the moment you are born. This is what distinguishes you from all the others born on your birthday.

Actually western astrology emphasizes more on the psychological nature of the individual, but lacks reliability for predicting future cycles and events. Although Vedic astrology also defines a person’s psychological nature, it gives more focus to understanding when certain events are likely to take place. Moreover it exercises the free will of the people and works on the solutions to their problems. Remedial measures are prescribed to make peace with the planets. Since none of these is in scope of the Western system, the Western Astrologers after being exposed to our system, get so fascinated by its precision that most of them switch to Jyotish after certian point of time.