01Overview
02A point, not a planet
Rahu is where the Moon's orbit crosses the ecliptic heading north — a calculated point with no mass, no light, no disc. The tradition calls him a chhaya graha, a shadow planet, yet gives him a full 18-year mahadasha and some of the loudest results in any chart. What he lacks in body he makes up in direction: Rahu always marks where you are being pulled.
03The eclipse myth
Svarbhanu drank the nectar of immortality in disguise; the Sun and Moon reported him, and Vishnu's discus took his head — a moment too late. The immortal head became Rahu, the body became Ketu, and the head still swallows Sun and Moon at every eclipse. It is the tradition's most exact image of craving: he swallows the light, and it passes straight through.
04Rahu by life area
05The amplifier
Rahu has few results of his own; he amplifies the house he occupies and the planets he touches. With Jupiter this forms the famous guru chandala combination — wisdom and appetite in one room, which can corrupt the teacher or supercharge the student. Which way it goes depends on the whole chart, never on Rahu alone.
06The nodal axis
| ☊︎Rahu | ☋︎Ketu | |
|---|---|---|
| Direction | Where you're hungry to go | What you've already digested |
| Drive | Craving, ambition, more | Detachment, release, enough |
| Myth | The head — tastes everything | The body — needs nothing |
| Dasha | 18 years of acquisition | 7 years of subtraction |
| Growth | Learn the new, clumsily | Spend old mastery, indifferently |