So the joyous moment of child birth arrives and grips you. There’s celebration, goosebumps, sprinting in the hospital and what not. And then with the exasperated energies finally settling. Gradually (over next few days to months) a new discussion dawns upon the family. Name!

What would be the name of this adorable little member. In many cases this becomes the first decision regarding the life of the newborn.

All cultures have some guidelines toward this important selection. Here in Bharat-varsha, our ancestors laid out the most elaborate systems governing all dimensions of life. Obviously they didn’t miss the subject of naming a newborn. The author will share his experience;  how they stumbled around, learned what the ancestral knowledge offers and went through this process. If this could even make you recognize the importance of choosing a proper name. They’ll consider the effort to have met accomplishment.

Before we begin…

Important Note: The author is not an astrologer (not even half of it). They only pursue astrology as a hobby and are sharing their experience, understanding. What follows is not a prescription to be swallowed.

What’s in the name Shakespeare? Well, a lot. Lets start with the bare bone approach.  A name is just a word (or a conjunction of words) used to identify a person. Name will (hopefully) identify them in a considerably unique and suitable fashion. A name in any language is made up of some alphabets and vowels, with hopefully a meaning that conveys a message, ancestry etc.

With the Hindu tradition, this is where the story rather begins. The consonants (व्यंजन) and vowels (स्वर) are codified sounds. Sounds are carrier of vibrations. Vibrations are nothing but energy at a specific frequency. So, in short, the name has everything to do with energy. That’s a lot in the name, isn’t it? Moving on…

When a person’s name is uttered, the energy specific to that name is transmitted by the speaker. So it becomes imperative to see what kind of energy it is and whether it is compatible to that person or not. Hence comes the role of astrology. Because which energy the person is more attuned to and which can throw him out of balance, can be gauged most comprehensively via the system of Indian Astrology aka Jyotish. The portal known as horoscope comes handy in that context. To see how the sounds and astrology are mated. We shall go over two methods here that this novice author has learned and applied.

The Samskritam varnamAlA is a potent and complete tool to achieve our goal here. Each Samskritam sound given in the table below, is mapped to a 3 degrees & 20 minutes wide part of the zodiac and is actually quarter of a constellation. Also known as the नक्षत्र पद. Since the zodiac is also divided into signs (राशि), thus the sound can also be seen as belonging to a particular sign in the zodiac. As can be seen at 3rd column in the table below.

Though the most widely known and followed tradition in India is to see in newborn’s horoscope the nakshatra pada where Moon is located. Based on that they pick the corresponding Samskritam sound and assign it to be the beginning sound of the person name. However, our subject matter today is a more pervasive approach than just the starting letter. So, we’ll avoid weighing in on what the internet is already filled with.

Sound Zodiac mapping table (apologies, unable to trace source for due credit) [image error]

The horoscope (also called ‘chart’) of a person is like a portal, telling us how the person is capable of receiving energy inputs. Every horoscope is well disposed to certain frequencies of energy and is ill disposed to some others. So, in brief our objective here is – to create a alignment between the sounds of the name and the chart of the person. In such a way that the name triggers the well disposed energies in the chart and not the malefic ones.

Let us take a proposed name, say Umang (उमंग) and see if it fits an example chart here.

Umang is made of 4 sounds – U, M Ng(anusvAr) and G. In the devanAgari script these would be written as – उ , म , ङ and ग.

Now we’ll look up these sounds in the sound-zodiac mapping table above. The results are:

उ – Maps to the 3rd pada of nakshatra named KrittikA. It spans 3°20″ to 6°40″ in Taurus.

म – I couldn’t find an exact match. So, I have picked the nearest sound मा which maps to the 1st pada of MaghA nakshatra. It spans 0°00″ to 3°20″ in Leo.

ङ – 3rd pada of Arda nakshatra. It spans from 13°20″ to 16°40″ in the sign Gemini.

ग – I couldn’t find an exact match. So, I have picked the nearest sound गा which maps to the 1st pada of DhanishthA nakshatra. It spans 23°20″ to 26°40″ in Capricorn.

Now we turn our attention to the horoscope.

[image error]

We’ll have to juxtapose the the zodiac locations derived so far from the name, into the chart above. Why? One of the reasons is, we want to see as a basic test whether these nakshatra padas fall at good houses of the horoscope or not. To do that we need to find bhava (house) boundaries for this chart i.e. bhava chalit. Using the Shripati (Porphyry) method of house definition, following are the house assignments for our zodiacal ranges of this example.

3°20″ to 6°40″ in Taurus – 7th house.

0°00″ to 3°20″ in Leo – 10th house.

13°20″ to 16°40″ in Gemini – 9th house.

23°20″ to 26°40″ in Capricorn – 4th house.

Note: This house marking requires the exact ascendant degree as main input parameter. It will be easily available in any astrology software/website as you feed in the birth data.

As you can see, this name activates only the relatively auspicious houses in the chart i.e. the kendra and trikona bhava. Try to avoid picking a name whose sounds trigger the locations in 6th, 8th or 12th house of the horoscope.

To summarize, it won’t be an exaggeration to say that every time this name is used/recited; the native’s 4th, 7th, 9th and 10th houses of the chart are triggered. Not a bad idea at all!

Retrospectively, if you want to reverse engineer. You can start from the horoscope instead. See the most beneficial points in the chart. Starting from there, reach the corresponding sounds and try to build a name that involves them. Or at least derive the sounds which can clearly instigate maximum trouble in the chart, to keep them out of the picture completely.

This time, we are going to map planets with the sounds. Following is the table used for such mapping.

[image error]

It was shown in one of the videos of Mr Deepanshu Giri’s YouTube channel – LunarAstro.



The clue for this schema is said to have come from Manusmriti.

You can also refer to similar classifications taught by other astrologers like Simon Chokoisky – https://youtu.be/QyKiOdv9VFI?t=576

[image error]

If the illustrations I’ve used might be confusing (I’m so lazy). To make things clearer, this method basically maps the planets to the various categories of consonants, vowels, semi vowels etc. Let us see how.

Many of you might know already that the consonants of Samskritam varNamAlA (all 25 of them) are already identified into 5 groups (varga) of 5 consonants each. Each of the 5 vargas is associated with one of the 5 major planets Mercury, Mars, Venus, Jupiter and Saturn. For example Mercury associates with all the 5 consonants of the Ta (ट) varga as shown above.

Then come the semi-vowels i.e. non-classified consonants (अवर्गीय व्यंजनानि). These are mentioned to the right side in Mr. Simon’s illustration above. Such as य, र, ल, व्, श, ष, स, ह etc. They all belong to Moon as is also mentioned in Shri Deepanshu Giri’s slide.

Finally the vowels which fall on the left side in Simon’s illustration. Vowels are all under the Sun.

So here again, as we did the last time. We can pick a proposed name and lookup for its sounds. As to which planets are getting triggered; the beneficial ones or the trouble makers. Again, we can also start with the chart instead, classify the planets in good vs bad dignities. Then move on with name selection via sounds that belong to the chart’s well dignified planets only.

To cover the already discussed example. उमंग consists of:

उ – belongs to Sun who is in this example chart, is in own sign i.e. the 11th lord in 11th house. 11st is an Upachaya house, so +ve for natural malefics.

म – of Saturn who is the yogakaraka here & sits in the 3rd house. Upachaya is +ve for natural malefics.

ङ – belongs to Mars who is the 2nd and 7th lord combust in the 11th house, having friendly sign of Sun. Upachaya is +ve for natural malefics.

ग – Mars the 2nd and 7th lord combust in the 11th house, having friendly sign of Sun.

On closer look we can notice that the picture is not perfect this time. Mars being 2L and 7L in badhaka sthana with badhakesh. This can trigger’s Mars’ marakesh properties during his Vimshottari mahadasha, antardasha etc. But beyond this one factor, the name otherwise again comes with auspicious influences only.

There are all sorts of factors influencing the decision and/or available choices for the name. Such as – the meaning of the name, child’s gender, socio-cultural environment, religion, family members’ preferences, parents’s own notions of the kind of progeny they desire to raise. No wonder that making good with all the factors in one name becomes a herculean task.

But opining strictly in our context. If one is able to zero in on a name that passes both the tests elucidated above with reasonable success. There is a good chance of it being the best possible name for the newborn under consideration. The author wants to remind his viewers again, of the make or break importance of energy in this context. Just keep in mind as golden rule to – follow the energy.

And yes, happy name hunting!