Vṛścika (Rāśi)

Vṛścika, “the scorpion”

Grammar: masculine noun, from the root vraśc (to cut, to wound): “the one that stings”, the scorpion.

Meaning: the scorpion; and the eighth of the twelve rāśis (the signs through which the Sun and the planets move), the second house of Kuja, named for its form as a scorpion.

In the scriptures: when the devatā of Daksha‘s yajña fled into the sky in the form of a deer, Bhagavān Śiva pursued it as Kālarūpī, the form of Time, and occupied the sky. Pulastya Maharshi describes that body to Nārada limb by limb, each limb a rāśi with its nakshatras. The private part of Kālarūpī is Vṛścika, the second house of Kuja, made of the fourth pāda (quarter) of Viśākhā, Anurādhā and Jyeshṭhā (Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 5).

Nārada then asks the form and marks of the twelve rāśis, and Pulastya Maharshi tells each in turn. Vṛścika has the form of a scorpion, and anthills, high dry ground, pits, poisons, cow-dung, stones and gravel, and insects lie under its influence. Pulastya Maharshi closes by saying that what he has told of the rāśis is very secret and ancient, not to be told to anyone (Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 5).

The entry of Sūrya into Vṛścika marks the end of the devas’ sleep. When Sūrya enters Mithuna, on Āshāḍha śukla ekādaśī, Jagannātha begins his sleep on the bed of Śesha, and the devas sleep after him. In the Aśūnya-śayana Dvitīyā vrata to Lakshmī-Nārāyaṇa, one keeps the vrata as a cāturmāsya (the four months of the rains) until Sūrya enters Vṛścika rāśi; then the devatās wake from sleep one by one, and on the dvitīyā one gives away the image of Lakshmī-Nārāyaṇa with its bed and bedding (Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 17).

In the dvādaśa-patraka yoga, the yoga of the twelve leaves that Brahmā (Pitāmaha) teaches Sanatkumāra, each leaf has a syllable, a place on the body, a rāśi and a month. The eighth leaf is the syllable vā on the navel, with Vṛścika and the month Mārgaśira. The twelve leaves make the cakra of Keśava Vāsudeva, the Paramātmā, and for those who know it there is no more death (Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 35).

The word also gives its name to the naraka Vṛścikāśana, “eaten by scorpions”: those who steal wealth left in their care are bound in fetters by the dūtas of Yama and thrown into it, crying out with tongues dried by hunger (Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 12).

Related terms: Rāśi · Kālarūpī · Viśākhā · Anurādhā · Jyeshṭhā · Cāturmāsya

Sources

• Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapters 5, 12, 17, 35