Dwitiya tithi is the second lunar day of each fortnight, covering the Moon’s progress from twelve to twenty-four degrees past the Sun, or past the spot in the zodiac directly facing it. In the bright fortnight it is usually the evening of the first crescent, the thin sliver low in the west that tradition greets as Chandra Darshan; in the dark fortnight it is the second night after the full moon, when a still almost round Moon climbs into the sky a little after dusk. Between them the two halves account for roughly one birth in fifteen. The name is also spelled Dvitiya tithi, and your own birth tithi is listed with the rest of the panchang whenever you cast a chart in the kundali calculator. This article looks at what it means to be born on Dwitiya tithi, what the Moon is actually doing in each half, the classical associations of the tithi, and where it sits against the rest of the chart.
The day before is covered in Pratipada tithi, which also explains why a calendar can list a different tithi for your birth date than your chart does. The day after is Tritiya tithi.
Conventions used. The birth tithi is read at the moment of birth from the Moon’s lead over the Sun, twelve degrees to a tithi, a figure that does not depend on the ayanamsa. Timings of the Moon at dusk were calculated for Delhi from Swiss Ephemeris positions, and birth shares from a random sample of moments between 1950 and 2010.
Born on Dwitiya? See what the rest of your chart says.
A consultation reads the tithi alongside the things that decide more: the Moon's sign and nakshatra, its strength and sub-lord, the lagna and the dasha you are running, and what they promise for the years ahead.
In this article
- Dwitiya tithi in brief
- The first crescent: Chandra Darshan
- Shukla Dwitiya: a thin Moon that has cleared the Sun
- Krishna Dwitiya: a bright Moon rising after dusk
- Brahma the ordainer and the Bhadra tithis
- The Moon as the tithi’s planet
- Sagittarius and Pisces: the burnt signs
- Days that fall on Dwitiya
- Dwitiya in muhurta, a separate question
- Dwitiya and the KP method
- Two Dwitiya births
- Frequently asked questions
Dwitiya tithi in brief
The dwitiya tithi meaning starts with the word itself, which simply means the second. Shukla Dwitiya runs from twelve to twenty-four degrees of separation between the luminaries, Krishna Dwitiya from 192 to 204. In the sample, 3.3 percent of births fell on Shukla Dwitiya and 3.4 percent on Krishna Dwitiya. The tithi belongs to the Bhadra group, the auspicious or well-ordered tithis, its presiding deity in the Muhurta Chintamani is Vidhata, Brahma in his role as the one who arranges what is to come, and some lists call it Mangalaprada, the giver of good occasions. In the common scheme of planetary lords, Dwitiya belongs to the Moon.
The first crescent: Chandra Darshan
What sets Dwitiya apart from every other tithi is what can be seen in the sky. A new crescent cannot be seen at all until the Moon has pulled several degrees away from the Sun, and it is usually around Shukla Dwitiya that it first shows itself to the naked eye, which is why so many calendars mark Chandra Darshan, the sighting of the Moon, on this day. The table follows the Moon through the evenings on either side of the two Dwitiyas.
| Moon’s lead over the Sun | Tithi | What the evening sky shows |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to about 7 degrees | End of Amavasya, start of Shukla Pratipada | No crescent at all; the Moon is lost in the Sun’s glare |
| About 7 to 12 degrees | Later Shukla Pratipada | A crescent exists but is seldom seen without optical help |
| 12 to 24 degrees | Shukla Dwitiya | Usually the first naked-eye crescent, low in the west; in Delhi it set a median of 70 minutes after the Sun |
| 24 to 36 degrees | Shukla Tritiya | A clear crescent, still well up at dusk |
| 180 to 192 degrees | Krishna Pratipada | A full-looking Moon rising around sunset |
| 192 to 204 degrees | Krishna Dwitiya | A Moon still 96 to 99 percent lit, rising a median of 73 minutes after sunset in Delhi |
The timings vary a good deal with the season and with the Moon’s own latitude. On the Shukla Dwitiya evenings in the sample, the crescent set anywhere from about a quarter of an hour to two hours after the Sun, and on the lowest of those evenings it would have been very hard to catch.
Shukla Dwitiya: a thin Moon that has cleared the Sun
A Shukla Dwitiya birth takes place a day or two after the new moon, with the Moon between twelve and twenty-four degrees ahead of the Sun. That puts it just outside the twelve-degree orb within which the Moon counts as combust, so unlike Shukla Pratipada, a shukla dwitiya chart never carries the combust badge explained in the combust Moon article. In 39 percent of these births the Moon still shares the Sun’s sign; in the rest it has moved into the next one.
By phase the Moon is still weak, only one to four percent lit and counted among the malefics until the eighth day of the bright half. The traditional picture that follows is of an emotional life that starts quietly and gathers strength, someone whose confidence grows with age rather than arriving early, and who has just begun to separate their own feelings from the aims set by the Sun. How far that holds depends on the Moon’s sign and nakshatra. A Shukla Dwitiya Moon in Cancer or Taurus stands on firm ground despite its thin light; one in Scorpio has both phase and sign against it and needs support from elsewhere in the chart.
Krishna Dwitiya: a bright Moon rising after dusk
A Krishna Dwitiya birth falls on the second day after the full moon. The Moon is 192 to 204 degrees ahead of the Sun, 96 to 99 percent lit, and in 41 percent of these charts it sits in the seventh sign from the Sun, in the rest in the eighth. By phase it remains strong and benefic, since the Moon only crosses into weakness after the eighth day of the dark half. People born on krishna dwitiya tend to show the fullness of that Moon: warmth, emotional steadiness, an easy manner with others. Tradition adds that the waning half suits carrying things through rather than starting them, and many people with this tithi are at their best seeing a commitment to its end.
Brahma the ordainer and the Bhadra tithis
The Muhurta Chintamani names Vidhata as the deity of Dwitiya, the form of Brahma who orders and arranges, the one who sets a course. Brahma is creation that has been thought through, and the classical uses of Dwitiya follow from that: foundations, planned undertakings, arrangements meant to last. The Bhadra group it belongs to, which also includes Saptami and Dwadashi, is the class of well-ordered, beneficial tithis, and many muhurta authors count Dwitiya among the safest days of the fortnight for beginning something.
As a birth tithi, those themes translate into a liking for order and structure, patience with plans, and a tendency to build carefully on what the first step started. The second day consolidates the first. Taken as tendencies they are useful; taken as a character sketch that fits everyone born on the day they are not, because the Moon’s own placement and the lagna vary enormously among Dwitiya births.
The Moon as the tithi’s planet
In the widely used scheme that assigns planets to tithis in weekday order, starting with the Sun at Pratipada, Dwitiya falls to the Moon, as does its counterpart ten days later, Dashami. That gives a Dwitiya birth a double emphasis on the Moon: the tithi is measured by the Moon and is also ruled by it. In practice this makes the Moon’s condition, its sign, nakshatra, aspects and house, the first thing to examine in a Dwitiya chart, and the Moon’s significations are the natural place to start.
Sagittarius and Pisces: the burnt signs
The shunya or dagdha signs of Dwitiya are Sagittarius and Pisces, the two signs of Jupiter. In a birth chart the traditional reading is that houses occupied by those signs give less than their placement promises and that Jupiter, as their lord, delivers its results in a muted way. The same tradition excuses the lord when it falls in a dusthana or upachaya such as the 3rd, 6th, 8th or 12th, or when it is retrograde, and treats natural malefics in a burnt sign as doing well there. In muhurta the rule is used the other way round: when the Sun is passing through Sagittarius or Pisces, a Dwitiya becomes a dagdha tithi and is avoided for starting new work.
For a birth chart this is a secondary rule. A Jupiter in its own sign in a kendra, well aspected and running a good dasha, is not undone because the birth fell on Dwitiya, and the rule should never be the basis for telling someone that a house of their life will fail.
Days that fall on Dwitiya
Several much-loved days of the Hindu year are Dwitiyas. Bhai Dooj, also called Yama Dwitiya, falls on the Shukla Dwitiya of Kartika, two days after Diwali, and remembers the Yamuna feeding her brother Yama. The Rath Yatra of Puri begins on the Shukla Dwitiya of Ashadha. Cheti Chand, the Sindhi new year, falls on the Shukla Dwitiya of Chaitra, and the second day of Navratri, given to the goddess Brahmacharini, is the Shukla Dwitiya of Ashvin. Every month, Chandra Darshan marks the same evening in a quieter way.
Dwitiya in muhurta, a separate question
As a Bhadra tithi, Dwitiya is one of the most frequently recommended days for beginnings, and the site’s wedding muhurat guide lists it among the favoured tithis for marriage. A Bhadra tithi falling on a Wednesday is called Siddha, especially favourable, while the dagdha rule above removes some Dwitiyas from consideration. All of that concerns choosing a day for an action. It does not transfer to a person born on the day: nobody’s chart is improved because Dwitiya is good for weddings, or harmed because a particular Dwitiya was dagdha.
Dwitiya and the KP method
KP has no place for the birth tithi in its judgments. The system works from cusps, sub-lords and the four levels of significators described in the KP significators guide, and the Moon is judged there like every other planet, by the houses signified through its own chain of rulers. A Dwitiya Moon that is weak by phase is not marked down in KP for that reason, and a bright Krishna Dwitiya Moon is not credited for it. For a KP reader the tithi is descriptive background, worth knowing, never evidence.
Two Dwitiya births
A woman born in the late afternoon, details altered, with Libra rising. The Sun is at 25 degrees Gemini in the ninth house and the Moon at 8 degrees Cancer in the tenth, thirteen degrees ahead: a Shukla Dwitiya birth, clear of combustion but with a Moon only about one percent lit. That same Moon, though, is in its own sign in the tenth house. She was a shy, watchful child who found her confidence in her twenties, and she now runs the children’s ward of a district hospital. The phase describes how slowly the emotional confidence arrived; the sign and house describe the career it went into.
A man born mid-morning, details altered, with Sagittarius rising, the Sun at 5 degrees Leo and the Moon at 20 degrees Aquarius: a Krishna Dwitiya birth with a bright, waning Moon. A reading years earlier had told him that both his lagna sign and Jupiter’s other sign were burnt by his birth tithi, and that Jupiter, his lagna lord, would disappoint. Jupiter sits in its own sign Pisces in the fourth house, a kendra, where it forms Hamsa yoga, one of the Pancha Mahapurusha yogas. He has been the respected headmaster of a school for fifteen years. The burnt-sign rule described, at most, a nuance.
Frequently asked questions
What is Dwitiya tithi?
The second lunar day of each fortnight, when the Moon is 12 to 24 degrees ahead of the Sun (Shukla Dwitiya) or 192 to 204 degrees ahead (Krishna Dwitiya). It is also spelled Dvitiya.
Is Dwitiya tithi good for birth?
A birth tithi is neither good nor bad by itself. Dwitiya is a Bhadra tithi with orderly, constructive associations, and the Moon’s sign, nakshatra and strength decide how those show in a particular life.
How do Shukla and Krishna Dwitiya differ?
Shukla Dwitiya comes just after the new moon, with a thin Moon that has cleared the Sun’s combustion orb; Krishna Dwitiya comes just after the full moon, with a bright, strong Moon rising after dusk.
Why is the new crescent first seen on Dwitiya?
A crescent only becomes visible once the Moon is several degrees clear of the Sun’s glare, and around twelve degrees it usually becomes a naked-eye sight, which is where Shukla Dwitiya begins. Calendars mark it as Chandra Darshan.
Which deity rules Dwitiya tithi?
Vidhata, Brahma as the ordainer, according to the Muhurta Chintamani. Dwitiya belongs to the Bhadra group, and in the common weekday scheme its planetary lord is the Moon.
What are the burnt signs for Dwitiya?
Sagittarius and Pisces, both ruled by Jupiter. In a birth chart it is a secondary rule hedged with exceptions; in muhurta it makes a Dwitiya dagdha while the Sun is in those signs.
Which festivals fall on Dwitiya?
Bhai Dooj (Yama Dwitiya) in Kartika, the Puri Rath Yatra in Ashadha, Cheti Chand in Chaitra and the second day of Navratri in Ashvin, all on the Shukla Dwitiya of their month.
The tithi is the backdrop. Your chart is the story.
A consultation reads your Moon's sign, star and sub-lord, the lagna and its lord, and the dasha you are in, and treats the birth tithi as context rather than a verdict.