Rati- Hindu GodDeity"Goddess of Passion"

Origins

Rati's name means "pleasure." In most Puranic traditions she is a daughter of Daksha, though the Kalika Purana holds that she emerged from desire itself at the dawn of creation. She became the wife of Kamadeva, the god of love who wields a sugarcane bow strung with a line of honeybees and shoots flower-tipped arrows to kindle desire in the hearts of gods and mortals.

The Burning of Kama

After Sati's self-immolation, Shiva withdrew into deep meditation on Mount Kailasa. The gods grew desperate: only a son born of Shiva could defeat the demon Taraka. They sent Kamadeva to rouse Shiva from his trance. Kama crept close and loosed a flower-arrow, and for one instant desire flickered in Shiva's heart. Then Shiva's third eye opened. A beam of fire reduced Kama to a heap of ash on the mountainside.

Rati threw herself upon the ashes. She wandered the world inconsolable, her grief so raw that even the gods who had sent Kama on his fatal errand were stricken with remorse.

Restoration

Rati's devotion finally moved Shiva to restore Kamadeva. In the Shiva Purana, Kama returns as Ananga, "the bodiless one," a formless presence perceptible only to Rati. He would continue to strike desire into hearts, but no one would see the archer. In the Matsya Purana, Parvati interceded after her marriage to Shiva, and Kama was fully restored in bodily form. In either telling, spring returned and flowers bloomed when Rati had her husband back.