Second House

The Second House

The second house, dhan, means wealth. It reflects the degree of wealth or poverty that we were born into. It reveals our credit account, including valued objects, gifts, and precious gems. It also relates to our immediate social environment—the degree to which our family supports us. All of these external physical attributes support us in our evolutionary journey. However, if we are born into poverty, our lack of wealth provides us with the opportunity to develop the strength of character to continue on our evolutionary path. For example, a very poor young woman, who lacks the backing of her family, may use the strength of her personality to attract people willing to take a chance on financing the start of her own small business.

The second house is also referred to as marak—or killer—as, at this point, we can become overly preoccupied with the acquisition of material possessions. Rather than seeing wealth as a means of providing security and support for our continued evolution, we can become anxious about accumulating it. Consequently, our fixation on acquiring wealth can stunt our evolutionary growth. Wealth, then, becomes an end instead of a means to an end. Marak means killer in the sense that it carries the potential for ending the growing soul’s development at this point. For example, a man may marry for money, and slowly poison his wife in order to inherit her wealth. A little boy who is born into great wealth may grow up squandering his life on drugs that eventually kill him. Awareness of the dangers inherent in the second house allows us to develop wisdom in dealing with money matters.