Chandra (Moon)

Origin & Mythology

Chandra, the Moon god, holds a unique place among the Navagrahas as an incarnation born to test virtue rather than through ordinary birth. According to the Puranas, the goddesses Saraswati, Lakshmi, and Parvati once challenged the chastity of Anusuya, wife of the sage Atri, and to prove her unwavering purity, her austerity caused the Trimurti themselves - Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva - to take the form of infants in her care. From this episode, Vishnu's portion became the sage Dattatreya, Shiva's portion became the irascible sage Durvasa, and Brahma's portion was born as Chandra, the cool and luminous Moon - making him the son of Atri and Anusuya rather than of Kashyapa and Aditi as some of his fellow grahas are.

Chandra later married the twenty-seven Nakshatra princesses, daughters of Daksha Prajapati, but grew so devoted to Rohini alone that he neglected his other wives. Daksha, angered by this partiality, cursed Chandra to waste away completely; only after Chandra's penance and the intercession of Lord Shiva was the curse softened into the monthly cycle observed even today, in which the Moon wanes for a fortnight and is restored over the next rather than disappearing forever. In gratitude for this mercy, Chandra is said to rest eternally on Shiva's matted locks, giving the god his epithet Chandrashekhara, "the one crowned by the Moon."

Family

• Father: Sage Atri

• Mother: Anusuya

• Brothers: Dattatreya and Durvasa, born of the same divine episode

• Wives: The twenty-seven Nakshatra princesses, daughters of Daksha Prajapati, with Rohini as his most cherished consort

• Son: Budha (Mercury), born of Chandra's union with Tara, wife of Brihaspati

Iconography

Chandra is depicted as a serene, fair-complexioned, four-armed deity holding a kalasha (water pot), a lotus, and a mace, with his fourth hand raised in the varada mudra of blessing. He rides a chariot drawn by ten white horses, sometimes shown with an antelope as his mount instead, radiating a calm, cooling light across the night sky.

In Vedic astrology, Chandra rules the sign of Cancer, is treated as a feminine graha governing the mind, memory, and emotional nature, and his gemstone is the pearl; Monday is sacred to him.