Shravana nakshatra: traits, lord, deity and name letters

Character

Shravana is the twenty-second nakshatra, filling the middle of Makar Rashi from 10°00′ to 23°20′, with Uttara Ashadha behind it and Dhanishta ahead. Because the Moon is its lord, a Moon in Shravana stands in a nakshatra that belongs to her. The sign around it is Makara, which belongs to Saturn, and the Moon is neither exalted, own nor debilitated there. The result is a lunar nakshatra set in a sober, structured sign.

A Moon here is read as attentive, receptive and good at absorbing. The symbol, an ear, points the same way, and is read as a mind that learns by listening, collects what it hears and passes it on. Makara supplies discipline to that receptivity: the listening is directed at something, whether a craft, a body of knowledge or a duty.

Shravana is a deva-gana nakshatra and its nature is chara, movable. Between them the two labels suggest a gentle disposition that is not content to sit still, one that wants to travel, follow a path and keep moving toward a purpose. Vishnu as the deity adds the image of a steady figure on the move, the Vamana of the three strides.

Lord and dasha

The Moon is the lord of Shravana. She governs two more nakshatras at the same spacing, Rohini and Hasta, eighteen and nine places earlier. Vimshottari gives her 10 of its 120 years, and the sequence of anyone with the Moon in Shravana starts with the Moon’s own mahadasha. The share that remains is fixed by the degree the Moon had reached.

The remaining periods then follow in their fixed order: Mars for 7 years, Rahu for 18, Jupiter for 16, Saturn for 19, Mercury for 17, Ketu for 7, Venus for 20 and the Sun for 6.

Saturn holds the sign Makara around the nakshatra, but his 19 years come only fifth in this sequence, after Jupiter’s, so the sign and the dasha point to different planets.

Deity and symbol

The deity is Vishnu. Varahamihira’s Brihat Samhita names him hari, and the Muhurta Chintamani names him govinda, both names of the god. Vishnu is read as the sustainer, so a nakshatra under him is described as dutiful and protective of order.

There are two symbols. The ear is the first, and Harness gives it together with three footprints as the symbol in current use. The second is the Muhurta Chintamani’s shape: three footprints, which Govinda’s Piyushadhara glosses as Trivikrama, the three-strided Vamana, a form of Vishnu. The ear and the footprints are therefore two images for one nakshatra, one of hearing and one of striding. An ear can be read as a listener, and the footprints as a path crossed in three steps.

Gana, yoni and nature

Deva, the divine class, is the gana of Shravana, and its yoni is the monkey. The verse in the Muhurta Chintamani puts Shravana and Purva Ashadha under that animal, and B. V. Raman’s Muhurtha makes Shravana the female and Purva Ashadha the male. In the 36-point Ashtakoota system the gana koota scores 6 and the yoni koota 4.

The nature is chara, movable, a class it shares with Punarvasu, Swati, Dhanishta and Shatabhisha. The Muhurta Chintamani assigns movable nakshatras to works of motion: mounting an elephant or a horse, going out to gardens and setting off on journeys. The Brihat Samhita calls these nakshatras suitable for any work that moves.

Padas and name letters

The navamsas of Shravana begin again at Mesha and run Mesha, Vrishabha, Mithuna and Karka across its four padas, each 3°20′ long, which end at 13°20′, 16°40′, 20°00′ and 23°20′ of Makara.

The sources do not agree on the syllables. In the table that the Piyushadhara quotes for naming, Shravana takes Khi, Khu, Khe and Kho, and the facts card here uses that set. B. V. Raman’s Muhurtha, on page 195, gives Ju, Je, Jo and Gha. The commentary reserves Ju, Je, Jo and Kha for Abhijit, the extra nakshatra that the list of 27 leaves out, so Raman’s set matches Abhijit’s except for the last syllable, Gha where the commentary has Kha.

Whichever set a family follows, the pada the Moon held at birth does the choosing in Namakarana, and the four padas map either to Khi, Khu, Khe and Kho or to Ju, Je, Jo and Gha.

In Prashna and muhurta

Ask a question while the Moon is in Shravana and she stands in a nakshatra of her own, set in Makara, Saturn’s sign. If the question depends on information, news or advice and is still in motion, that is how this Moon can be read, with the person asking in the Lagna and the Moon as their mind and the progress of the matter; Saturn’s condition in the chart belongs to the picture as well.

Journeys and departures are the works that muhurta assigns to Shravana’s movable class.

A question typed into the AstroGPT app gets a sidereal chart of its own, and the horary astrology guide sets out how the judging goes. To see which nakshatra the Moon held at a given birth time, use the free kundli.