Budha

The baby lay in a clump of long munja grass, and it was brighter than the gods who had come to look at it. That is how the Vishnu Purana introduces Budha: left in the reeds by a mother who had been ordered to be rid of him, with two fathers standing over him arguing about whose he was. Both wanted him. Nobody had wanted him an hour earlier.

The trouble began with the moon. Soma, son of the sage Atri, had been given rule over the Brahmins, the plants and the stars, had performed the great royal sacrifice, and had come out of it badly swollen with pride. He carried off Tara, the wife of Brihaspati, teacher of the gods. Brihaspati asked for her back. So did Brahma. So did the holy sages. Soma kept her.

What followed was a war over one woman, and the texts name it after her: the Tarakamaya. Ushanas, teacher of the demons and no friend of Brihaspati, took Soma’s side, and the Daityas and Danavas came in behind him. Rudra, who had studied under Brihaspati’s father, stood with his old schoolfellow, and Indra brought the rest of the gods. The fighting shook the earth to her centre. She went to Brahma for protection, and Brahma stopped the war and made Soma hand Tara back.

She came home pregnant. Brihaspati told her she would not carry that burden in his house, and so the child was delivered and set down in the grass. Then everyone saw it. The Bhagavata Purana says its body was the colour of gold. The Vishnu Purana says its light put every other divinity in the shade. Brihaspati and Soma each announced, at once, that the boy was his.

The gods asked Tara. She was too ashamed to speak. They asked again and she stayed silent, and it was the infant who lost patience first. He turned on his mother from the grass and told her that unless she named his father that instant he would lay a curse on her that would teach every woman after her not to hesitate over the truth. Brahma calmed him down and put the question once more, gently. Tara, blushing, said two words. “Of Soma.”

The moon’s face lit up. He picked up the boy and held him. “Well done, my boy,” he said, “truly you are wise,” and that is the name: Budha, the one who knows. The Bhagavata tells it a little differently and has Brahma choose the name after seeing how deep the child’s intelligence ran. Either way the name is a judgement on his first act, which was to cross-examine his own mother.

There is an older and quieter Budha behind this story. He is the planet Mercury, the small quick light that never strays far from the sun, and he is named as such in the Vedic ritual literature before the Puranas give him a scandal for a birth. Indian astronomers tracked his revolutions with care. The Vishnu Purana, describing the vehicles of the heavenly bodies one after another, gives him a chariot made of air and fire, drawn by eight bay horses with the speed of the wind.

Painters and sculptors settled on a look for him. His skin is green. He wears yellow. He carries a scimitar, a club and a shield, and he rides that chariot behind eight horses, or else he sits four-armed on a lion. In temples across India he is one of the Navagraha, the nine planetary gods, who usually stand together on a single low platform, each facing a different way. On a Wednesday, which is Budhavara, his day, a worshipper circles the nine in the smell of lamp oil and stops at the green one. At Thiruvenkadu in Tamil Nadu he has a shrine of his own inside the great Shiva temple.

His marriage is as odd as his birth. Vaivasvata Manu wanted a son, and a slip in the sacrifice gave him a daughter, Ila. The sage Vasishtha prayed, and Ila became a man named Sudyumna. One day Sudyumna rode out hunting and strayed into the Sukumara forest at the foot of Mount Meru, where Shiva takes his pleasure with Uma and where any male who enters turns female. Sudyumna looked down and was a woman. His stallion was a mare.

She wandered from forest to forest until she passed the hermitage of Budha. He saw her and wanted her. She looked at the son of the moon and felt the same. The child of that meeting was Pururavas, who would love the nymph Urvashi and found the Lunar dynasty, the line of kings that claimed the moon as its grandfather. Shiva was later persuaded to soften the enchantment, so that Sudyumna would be a man one month and a woman the next. Budha’s wife was his wife half the time.

What Budha can do follows from what he is. He is intelligence given a body, quick from the hour of his birth, and he is a light strong enough to outshine a crowd of gods. Even as an infant he had the power to curse, and came close to using it. As a planet he is counted among the gentle ones, a patron of an agile mind and a good memory, where some of his eight companions are feared.

His limits are just as clear. He owes his existence to a theft and his name to a family quarrel, and the stories never let him forget either. He was thrown away before he was claimed. He has almost no adventures of his own: once the question of his father is settled and his son is born, the texts move on to the son. He is seldom worshipped alone, and stands as one of nine. And he is the smallest and most hurried of the wandering lights, never far from the sun, seen briefly at dusk or dawn and then gone.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Budha in Hindu mythology?

Budha is the Hindu god of the planet Mercury. He is the son of the moon god Soma and Tara, the wife of Brihaspati, and the father of King Pururavas. His name means “the wise one” and he is one of the Navagraha, the nine planetary gods.

Is Budha the same as the Buddha?

No. Budha is the god of the planet Mercury in Hindu mythology, born to the moon god Soma and Tara. The Buddha is a separate figure, and the two names are spelled differently in Sanskrit. Budha means “the wise one” and was given to the child for his intelligence.

Who are Budha’s parents?

Budha’s father is Soma, the moon god, and his mother is Tara, the wife of Brihaspati. Soma carried Tara off, which caused the war called the Tarakamaya, and she was pregnant when Brahma forced Soma to return her. Both Brihaspati and Soma claimed the child until Tara admitted that Soma was the father.

How did Budha get his name?

Budha was named for his intelligence. In the Vishnu Purana the newborn Budha angrily demands that his mother name his father, and when she answers, Soma embraces him and says “truly you are wise.” In the Bhagavata Purana it is Brahma who gives the name after seeing the child’s deep intelligence.

Who is Budha’s wife?

Budha’s partner is Ila, the daughter of Vaivasvata Manu. Ila had been changed into a man named Sudyumna, who became a woman again on entering Shiva’s Sukumara forest near Mount Meru. Budha and Ila had a son, Pururavas, the founder of the Lunar dynasty, and Shiva later arranged for Sudyumna to be a man one month and a woman the next.

Related Entries

Chandra, Soma, Surya, Brahma, Shiva, Rudra, Indra, Daitya, Danava, Apsaras, Gandharva, Mount Meru (Sumeru), Mercury, Nabu