Wishing all my Indian friends here a very Happy Dhanteras. It is one of the very special days during the festival of Diwali. The meaning of this word comes from 2 different words. Dhan - teras, Dhan means wealth, and teras is the number 13, the day falls on the 13th day of the lunar fortnight. This day is celebrated 2 days before Diwali. On this day we have a tradition of buying some precious metal, like Gold or Silver.

There are 2 stories which signify the celebration of this day, one is that a son of a renowned king had a snake bite and he was destined to die on the 4th day of his marriage. On the night of his destined death his wife placed a heap of gold and silver precious ornaments on the door entrance blocking the path completely. She lit lamps all around, sang songs and did not let her husband sleep. When the God of death came to take the last breath of her husband, at the door step the heaps of gold and silver and the lights blinded him with its light and he could not reach till the prince, thus the life of the prince was saved.

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The other story is that the Gods and Demons were in the process of churning the ocean, which is known as the Samudra Manthan. They churned the ocean to get the divine nectar of immortality, and then Dhanvantari who is the physician of the Gods emerged from the ocean with a jar of the immortality nectar. Both these stories somewhere defy death.

Dhanteras is hence celebrated by lighting lamps and buying precious metals to ward off evil and negativity and to bring prosperity and happiness in our lives.
Every year I buy a small quantity of any precious metal, Gold or silver as a good luck and we do have a small ritual around it. I will be doing the same today as well.

These rituals and traditions have been happening since 100s of years and they follow down from one generation to another. Though some ways of celebrations have changed but the spirit of it is still alive and following them brings a lot of positive energy into our homes and lives.

This Dhanteras may Goddess Lakshmi walk into our lives and bless us with Good health and prosperity.

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