  By applying the theory of slowly rotating stars to the Sun, the solar
quadrupole and octopole moments J2 and J4 were computed using a solar model
obtained from CESAM stellar evolution code (Morel, 1997) combined with a recent
model of solar differential rotation deduced from helioseismology (Corbard et
al., 2002). This model takes into account a near-surface radial gradient of
rotation which was inferred and quantified from MDI f-mode observations by
Corbard and Thompson (2002). The effect of this observational near-surface
gradient on the theoretical values of the surface parameters J2, J4 is
investigated. The results show that the octopole moment J4 is much more
sensitive than the quadrupole moment J2 to the subsurface radial gradient of
rotation.
