Introduction
Jyeshtha Devi, "the elder goddess", is a Hindu goddess of misfortune, poverty, quarrels and sloth. She is the elder sister of Lakshmi, the goddess of fortune, and the opposite of her. She is also called Alakshmi ("not-Lakshmi") and, in Tamil, Moodevi (Mudevi, from Mootha Devi, "the elder goddess"), a name that is also used in everyday Tamil speech for an unlucky or ill-omened person.
In the Puranic tradition, she is not a wife of Vishnu. She is his consort Lakshmi's opposite and the figure whom households traditionally send away when they welcome Lakshmi.
Names and epithets
- Jyeshtha, "the eldest", the Sanskrit name; the same word is the name of a lunar mansion (nakshatra) and of a month
- Alakshmi, "she who is not Lakshmi"
- Moodevi or Mudevi in Tamil, and Chettabhagavati (Chetta) in Kerala
Origin
According to the Puranic accounts (for example, the Padma Purana and the Linga Purana), when the gods and demons churned the ocean of milk, the goddess Jyeshtha emerged before Lakshmi, at the time of the poison or just before it. Lakshmi came after her, with the nectar and other treasures. Since Jyeshtha was the elder, the tradition says she should have been married before her younger sister. Vishnu chose Lakshmi as his wife, and the elder sister was given in marriage to a sage called Dussaha (in some accounts Uddalaka). In some tellings he could not bear her surroundings and left her at a peepal tree.
Nature
Jyeshtha is said to dwell where there is quarrelling, dirt, laziness, harsh speech and neglect of the household, and Lakshmi where there is cleanliness, industry, generosity and harmony. The two sisters stand for fortune and misfortune, which are treated in the tradition as two aspects of one reality, not as good and evil. Jyeshtha is understood as a goddess who must be acknowledged and propitiated, and then sent away.
Iconography
Jyeshtha is depicted as a heavy, seated woman, with a pendulous belly, with a broom and a pot in her hands, a donkey (or a crow) as her vehicle, and a crow on her banner. In the sculpture of Tamil Nadu from about the seventh to the tenth centuries, images of Jyeshtha are found in Pallava and Chola temples and are shown between her son Mandan (with a bull's head) and her daughter Mandi. The images were later replaced in many places by worship of Lakshmi.
In the Vedic and early tradition
The word jyeshtha, "eldest" or "chief", is an old Vedic word. Alakshmi is named in the Sri Sukta, the hymn to Lakshmi in the appendix (Khila) of the Rigveda, which asks Lakshmi to drive out her elder sister Jyeshtha, Alakshmi, together with hunger, thirst and misfortune. Her cult in early historical South India is attested by sculpture, and she is called Mootha Devi in Tamil.
Worship and rituals
Jyeshtha Devi is not commonly worshipped as a major goddess, but she is honoured in several ways:
- Driving out poverty: many households have a ritual before Diwali and the festival of the new year, especially in South India and Kerala, in which the house is cleaned, and Alakshmi (Jyeshtha) is symbolically sent out with a broom or winnowing tray, before Lakshmi is welcomed in. In parts of Kerala, this is done at the end of the month of Karkidakam, before the new year begins in Chingam.
- The peepal tree: in a tradition, Jyeshtha resides in the peepal tree, where Lakshmi visits on Saturdays, and people worship the peepal on Saturdays for this reason.
- Local shrines: in some parts of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka, there are shrines to Jyeshtha or Chetta.
Not to be confused with
Jyeshtha is also the name of the fifteenth lunar mansion (Jyeshtha nakshatra) and of a month of the Hindu calendar, and Jyeshtha Gauri is a Maharashtrian festival of the goddess Gauri, which is unrelated to this goddess.