Thursday, Guruvara

a birth falling on a Thursday

What the tradition reads

Thursday, Guruvaram, is the fifth of the seven varas, ruled by Brihaspati, Jupiter, whose title itself, Guru, gives the day its common Sanskrit name. Astrosurkhiyan's tradition assigns the day the quality of sattva and calls it the day of the Guru and of higher officials, favouring worship, wisdom, knowledge, devotion, matters concerning children and money, spiritual practice, education, finance and charity, while advising the native to guard against greed, anger and dishonesty on a day otherwise given over to such generous themes. Wikipedia's account of the Surya Siddhanta's hora sequence places Jupiter second among Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury and Moon; the weekday order this cycle produces, Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn, places Jupiter fifth, matching Thursday's own name. Brihaspati's standing as guru to all the devas, a role Wikipedia's article confirms directly, is what the day's own emphasis on wisdom, teaching and rightful counsel draws upon most closely.

The story

Brihaspati, Wikipedia's article records, appears already in the Rigveda as a sage born from the first great light, the one who drove away darkness, and he carries a bow whose string is Rta itself, cosmic order, the same order that underlies dharma throughout the tradition. His marriage to Tara, goddess of the stars, is disrupted when Chandra, the Moon, abducts her, and the child born of that abduction, Budha, becomes Mercury, a scandal that touches Brihaspati's own household without diminishing the reverence given to his wisdom and character elsewhere in the tradition. As guru to all the devas, his counsel is what the gods depend on in their long struggle against the asuras, whose own teacher, Shukra, is read throughout the tradition as clever but partisan where Brihaspati is read as wise and concerned above all with what is right. A day named for the counsellor the gods themselves cannot do without fits Guruvara's reading as the vara most given over to teaching, to considered judgement and to the kind of generosity that asks nothing dishonest in return.

Written from

Corpus key vara:Thursday.