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Shiva seated in meditation on a tiger skin, a cobra hood above his head, Parvati beside him and the ghats of Kashi (Benares) behind — a colour lithograph of about 1895.
Shiva in contemplation — Popular colour lithograph, Calcutta (British Museum album), c. 1895

Shiva · Day fast; puja 20 min morning & evening

Shravan Somvar vrat

Mondays of Shravan; see calendar entry for this year's Mondays

In the simplest words

The monsoon Mondays for Shiva, kept plain: light fast, a little abhishek, bel leaves, and his name through the day.

The gentlest and best-loved vrat of the year: Shiva's day in Shiva's month. One fast, two short pujas, water and bel on the linga, kept by grandmothers and first-timers alike, and the classic opening of a solah-somvar vow.

By popular tradition Sawan is the month the ocean was churned and Shiva drank the poison; its Mondays are kept in gratitude for that swallowing. Rain on the roof, bel leaves on the linga, a plain fast. The vrat asks little, which is exactly its teaching: Shiva is the god most easily pleased, Bholenath, and steadiness pleases him most of all.

Perform this puja

5 steps, one at a time, with the lamp, the mantras and the bell, on this screen.

Samagri: what you need

0/4 gathered

The vidhi, step by step

0/5 done

  1. Morning snan & sankalpa

    Bathe, wear clean (many prefer white or green) clothes, and take the day's vow before the linga.

  2. Jalabhishek

    Pour water, then milk, then water again over the linga in a thin stream; lay bel leaves smooth side down, with dhatura or white flowers if you have them.

    ॐ नमः शिवाय

    Oṁ Namaḥ Śivāya

    I bow to Shiva, the auspicious one. Shiva names what is ever-kind and ever-pure: stillness itself, the ground under every wave of experience, rather than a being who possesses stillness. The five syllables na-mah-shi-vā-ya are held to answer the five elements, so the whole person, earth to ether, is folded into one bow. Nothing is asked for; this is the rare prayer whose entire content is surrender.

    Source: Taittirīya Saṁhitā 4.5.8, Kṛṣṇa Yajurveda: Śrī Rudram, anuvāka 8 ('namaḥ śivāya ca śivatarāya ca')

  3. Through the day

    Phalahar fast; where possible, visit a shivalaya. The mind kept on the name in spare minutes.

  4. Evening puja & katha

    Diya and dhoop; the Somvar vrat katha read aloud; a closing short jaap.

    ॐ त्र्यम्बकं यजामहे सुगन्धिं पुष्टिवर्धनम् । उर्वारुकमिव बन्धनान्मृत्योर्मुक्षीय मामृतात् ॥

    Oṁ tryambakaṁ yajāmahe sugandhiṁ puṣṭi-vardhanam, urvārukam iva bandhanān mṛtyor mukṣīya māmṛtāt

    We worship the three-eyed one, fragrant, nourisher of all. As the ripe cucumber is released from its vine, may I be freed from death, not from immortality. The image carries the whole teaching: the fruit does not tear itself from the vine; it ripens until release is effortless. So the prayer is not to escape dying. It is to be so fully ripened that death loses its grip, while the bond with the deathless is never cut.

    Source: Ṛgveda 7.59.12

  5. Parana

    Break the fast after evening puja with one satvik meal, shared if you can.

Note: North and Deccan reckon Shravan a fortnight apart (purnimanta vs amanta); your region's Mondays are in the calendar entry. The solah-somvar vow continues this vidhi for sixteen Mondays.

Note: Fast within your health. A single light meal with the same bhava is a full vrat.

Shravan Somvar →Sawan Shivratri →