Pradoṣa Vrata

When it falls

The thirteenth lunar day (trayodaśī) of each fortnight, kept not for the whole day but for one watch of it: the hour and a half around sunset, which is the pradoṣa. Twice a lunar month, and the one that falls on a Saturday is Śani Pradoṣa, the most kept of them.

The Phala almanac gives the exact day for your own city; the lunar and solar rules above are what it computes from.

The story

The night belongs to the churning of the ocean. When the poison rose before the nectar did, Śiva drank it and held it in his throat, and the gods waited out the evening not knowing whether he would live. He did, and danced between the horns of Nandi; the hour they waited is the hour kept.

That is why the vrata is an hour and not a day. It marks a particular evening rather than a particular date, and the almanac gives it to the minute because the hour is the whole of it.

Each weekday it falls on carries its own name and its own asking — Soma Pradoṣa on a Monday for a quiet mind, Śani Pradoṣa on a Saturday for relief from Śani himself.

How the day is kept

• A fast from the morning, broken after the evening worship rather than at sunset.
• The liṅga is bathed (abhiṣeka) during the pradoṣa hour with milk, curd, honey, ghee and water, and dressed in bel leaves.
• Nandi is worshipped first and the Pradoṣa Stotra recited; in many temples the reader looks at the liṅga between Nandi's horns, standing behind him.
• Śiva temples across the south keep the hour with a full abhiṣeka, and it fills them on a Saturday evening more than any other routine day.

More fasts and vigils