Lakshmi’s lotus and coins
The lotus she sits on and the gold coins that fall from her hand are the emblems of Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth and good fortune, who is worshipped on the new-moon night of Diwali. Jain merchant families keep a Lakshmi Puja of their own.
Meaning
Lakshmi is the Hindu goddess of wealth, good fortune and beauty, and the wife of Vishnu. Britannica describes her as usually seated on a lotus, sometimes with two elephants pouring water over her (Gaja Lakshmi), with the white owl Uluka as her vehicle and, at times, “a shower of gold coins falling from one palm.” Her other names say the same: Padma and Kamala both mean “she of the lotus” (see Padma). Lakshmi Puja, her worship on the new-moon night, is the main day of Diwali in most of India. The Hindu American Foundation describes families dressing in new clothes, going to temple and performing puja to Lakshmi and to Ganesha, the remover of obstacles. Jains of the image-worshipping communities also keep a Lakshmi Puja at Diwali, which matters most, Nalini Balbir writes, to Jain business families.
Origin and history
The Vishnu Purana tells how Lakshmi came into the world at the churning of the ocean of milk: “seated on a full-blown lotus, and holding a water-lily in her hand, the goddess Sri, radiant with beauty, rose from the waves.” With her, Britannica adds, came a shadow goddess, Alakshmi, misfortune, sometimes called her sister. The two goddesses meet again at Diwali. Britannica cites the Bhavishyottara Purana for a midnight custom on the new-moon night in which women drive out Alakshmi and propitiate Lakshmi. In Tamil Nadu, Anni Kumari reports, the daily kolam drawn at the door is meant to keep out Mūdevī, Lakshmi’s sister, bringer of poverty and ill luck. Around 1030 al-Bīrūnī gave Lakshmi a different part in the festival: on the new-moon day of Kārttika she sets Bali free once a year from his prison in the seventh earth, and so the feast was called Balirajya. Her best-known printed picture is much newer. The Ravi Varma Press’s chromolithograph of Lakshmi standing on a lotus, first printed in 1894, is, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s words, “perhaps the most well-known example of all of the early lithographs of Hindu gods”; simplified versions were still being printed in the 1920s. Britannica notes that posters and images of her are common in homes and shops.
Lakshmi Puja on Diwali night
On the night of the puja, the BBC says, Hindus leave their doors and windows open so that Lakshmi can come in, and the lamps light her way to the houses she favours. Rangolis are drawn on the floor, and their commonest subject is the lotus. In households that keep the puja, Britannica says, her footprints are painted beside the doorways to invite her in. Some families build a small altar to her and decorate it with money.
Coins and account books
Because Lakshmi is wealth, Diwali is when many business people begin their year. On Dhanteras, the first day, Britannica says, people clean their homes and buy small items of gold, and Lakshmi and Kubera, god of wealth, are worshipped; merchants open new account books on the fourth day, the first of Karttika and the new year of the Vikrama calendar. Among Jains, Balbir writes, citing John Cort’s study of Jain worship, some communities worship silver coins with incense or scented powder, the materials used for sacred images, and buy silverware and account books for the new year; the new books open with an invocation to Mahavira and his disciple Gautama.
Not on Diwali night everywhere
In West Bengal, Assam, Odisha and Tripura, Lakshmi Puja comes five days after Vijayadashami, which ends Durga Puja. On Diwali night itself, Bengal worships the goddess Kali.
Read next
- Next in Diwali symbolsLakshmi’s footprintsSmall footprints painted at the door and leading into the house, drawn for Lakshmi Puja so that the goddess of wealth walks in and stays.
- Lakshmi sits on the lotus; Padma and Kamala are her namesPadmaThe lotus flower, held by Hindu deities and used as the seat they sit on.
See also
Owl symbolism, Mithai (sweets), Lakshmi, Diya (oil lamp), Rangoli, Akash deep (Diwali lantern).
Sources
- Lakshmi (Encyclopaedia Britannica), Britannica Editors, Encyclopaedia Britannica (Wayback Machine copy, 25 May 2026), Quick summary; Names and iconography; Origin; Worship
- Diwali (Encyclopaedia Britannica), Britannica Editors; revised and updated by Shatarupa Chaudhuri, Encyclopaedia Britannica (Wayback Machine copy, 22 September 2026), History; Festivities
- 5 things to know about Diwali, Hindu American Foundation blog, 3 November 2020, Hindu American Foundation, 4) How Diwali is celebrated
- Diwali (BBC Religions: Hinduism), BBC Religion and Ethics, archived page, last updated 20 October 2010, BBC, Lakshmi, wealth and prosperity
- The Vishnu Purana, translated by H. H. Wilson (Digital Library of India reprint), Translated by H. H. Wilson, Internet Archive (Digital Library of India copy), Book I, chapter IX (the churning of the ocean)
- Dīvālī (Nalini Balbir, Jainpedia), Nalini Balbir, Jainpedia, Festivals, Jainpedia, Institute of Jainology, Worship of wealth; Account books
- Alberuni's India, vol. 2 (Sachau translation, 1888), al-Bīrūnī, written about 1030, translated by Edward C. Sachau; London: Trübner, 1888, vol. 2, chapter LXXVI, p. 182, Internet Archive (University of Toronto copy), chapter LXXVI, p. 182
- Lakshmi (Ravi Varma Press chromolithograph, 1894), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, object 2013.10, collection page, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Wayback Machine copy, 19 January 2026), catalogue entry
- Significance of Kolam in Tamil Culture, Anni Kumari, Sahapedia, Sahapedia, Significance of kōlam
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from circles or curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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