Candra (mountain)
Candra · candra, “the shining one, the moon”
Candra is a mountain of Plaksha-dvīpa, the second of the seven dvīpas of the earth. It is one of the seven varsha mountains (varsha-parvatas) of that dvīpa, named in the Brahma Purāṇa where Lomaharshaṇa describes to the munis the dvīpas beyond Jambūdvīpa. It is a different subject from Candra (Soma), the moon.
In Plaksha-dvīpa
Plaksha-dvīpa is twice the size of Jambūdvīpa, whose extent is one lakh yojanas. Its lord is Medhātithi, and his seven sons ruled it: Śāntamaya the eldest, Śiśira, Sukhodaya, Ānanda, Śiva, Kshemaka and Dhruva. Seven boundary mountains bear their names. Besides these, Lomaharshaṇa says, there are seven varsha mountains: “Munis, hear their names”: Gomoda, Candra, a third whose printed name is uncertain, Dundubhi, Somaka, Sumanas and Vaibhrāja.
On these lovely varsha mountains and in the varshas the people live together with the devas and gandharvas. The lands there are pure and full of vigour. The people do not die, and free of ādhi (pain of the mind) and vyādhi (illness) they are happy at all times. Seven rivers flow there to the sea, Anutaptā, Śikhā, Vipāśā, Tridivā, Kramu, Amṛtā and Sukṛtā, and they take away pāpas the moment one hears their names; the people drink their waters always, yet the rivers neither decrease nor grow. Only the chief rivers and mountains are named; the small ones are there in thousands.
There is no order of yugas in those lands; time always runs as in the Tretā yuga. From Plaksha-dvīpa to Śāka-dvīpa the people live five thousand years, free of disease. Dharma there is fourfold, by varṇa and āśrama, and the four varṇas are the Āryakas, the Kurus, the Vivilvas and the Bhāvins. A plaksha tree as great as the jambu tree of Jambūdvīpa stands in the middle of the dvīpa and gives it its name. There Hari, the maker of the world and Sarveśvara, Īśvara of all, is worshipped in the form of Soma by the Āryakas and the other varṇas. Plaksha-dvīpa is surrounded by the Ikshu ocean, the ocean of sugar-cane juice, of the same measure as the dvīpa.
Source: Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 20
Sources
- Brahma Purāṇa, Chapter 20