Ken, it isn't precession that has changed the position of the ancient nakshatras. It's the relatively new boundaries that were set when the equal 27 mansions came into being. (I have no idea when that was.) So my questions remain unanswererd.

Contemporary books are not based on the visual experience. They're based on a misunderstanding of where the stars actually are in the sky (and where they always were). Somehow I don't think you're quite understanding what I'm trying to say.

Does anyone else wonder about the misalignment of the stars and their myths in today's mansions? Should the myths remain with the old nakshatra locations rather than be associated with the new mansions which aren't where some of them are located today?

Should Arcturus be associated with Swati when it's in the middle of Chitra, for example? Or does today's Swati have an entirely new meaning unrelated to Arcturus, perhaps because the Southern Cross lies within its boundaries? (There is no doubt in my mind that it's Swati that has given tropical Scorpio it's occult and mystical reputation.) Then the constellation of Libra lies in Vishaka, and that is a very different mansion from Swati. Those two mansions basically split tropical Scorpio in two.

What seems to have happened (in my observation) is that many of today's manson traits have developed through observation and folklore and don't have any real relationship to the nakshatra stars themselves. This isn't true in all cases since a number of the old nakshatras do fall within today's mansion boundaries of the same name.

But to me it makes no sense to continue to discuss a mansion in terms of stars that lie elsewhere. This really is a question of the location of fixed stars and constellations. If we don't understand the ecliptic location of stars, then we have a nice romantic sounding system that has no basis in the actual sky. Co-risings or course can give us a different picture, but those depend on one's location on the globe.

Wondering,
Therese

Kenneth Johnson wrote:In a few works, you will see cute poetic passages which say that the 5th House includes "the embraces of courtesans," but these texts are somewhat late, and all of them are later than the Arabic invasions, so we might have a bit of the Western 5th House = sensual delights thing going on here.

I'd be very interested in seeing a reference for that, if you have one. The Indian reception of medieval Perso-Arabic astrology is a current research interest of mine.

Therese Hamilton wrote:Ken, it isn't precession that has changed the position of the ancient nakshatras. It's the relatively new boundaries that were set when the equal 27 mansions came into being. (I have no idea when that was.) So my questions remain unanswererd.

According to Prof. Michio Yano (I haven't checked this for myself, but I have no reason to doubt him) the 27 equal mansions go back to the Taittir?ya-sa?hit?. Difficult to be precise about dates, as nearly always in India, but it's definitely BCE, so quite a while ago.

Therese, you are perhaps the seventh or eighth individual I have encountered -- including some from India itself -- who have expressed frustration and difficulty re: conflicts between the mathematics of the nakshatras and their visible appearance in the sky.

Every astrologer has her or his own "tool kit," and none of us can use every single available tool. If you tried to use the Vimshottari, Yogini, Chara and Kalachakra dashas all in a single reading, you would be likely to lose the thread of the person's dharma in a mass of contradictions. So what do we do about it? We add the ones that work for us to our own "tool kit" and ignore the rest. Of the many techniques available in Jyotish -- from the Varshaphal to the Ashtakavarga to the Shad Bala and so on -- I have never met anyone, even pundits from India, who used ALL of them.

If the mathematical inconsistencies of the nakshatras prove intensely bothersome to you, my own suggestion would be to simply leave them out. While I have known some astrologers from India -- notably Chakrapani Ullal -- who made abundant use to the nakshatras in their readings, I have known others -- especially K. N. Rao -- who seldom or never even mentioned them. If they cause you a great deal of difficulty, you don't really need to use them. While some Jyotish texts, notably Brhat Jataka, Phaladeepika and so on, have chapters devoted to birth in the nakshatras, Parashara does not.

It's a choice. I like 'em. Others don't. Like any other astrologer, you will construct the "tool kit" that works best for you.

Ken, you are begging the question and being somewhat condescending. I'm not asking these questions for myself, but in the interests of a better and more honest astrology for everyone. If the 27 mansions are a separate entity from the ancient nakshatras, then we need to explore that possibility.

I'm not asking you or anyone else to dispense with Indian mythology. But the myths need to be in their proper location in the stellar scheme of the sky. They cannot be artificially placed elsewhere for the sake of creating a nice mythological scheme of measurement, which is what is currently happening in the modern books.

I'm quite convinced that the 27 mansions are a reality, and constitute the evolution of astrology through the ages reflecting our developing human consciousness. We have much more to learn about them, and I'm working on research projects in this area now. But (as I said before) the old nakshatras are only partly related to these 27 divisions. For those who don't have Surya Siddhanta, it seems that Burgess still has the latest word on the 28 nakshatras and 27 mansions:

It will be at once noticed that while in a former passage (ii. 64) the ecliptic was divided into twenty-seven equal arcs, as portions for the asterisms, we have here presented to us twenty-eight asterisms, very unequally distributed along the ecliptic, and at greatly varying distances from it. And it is a point of so much consequence, in order to the right understanding of the character and history of the whole system, to apprehend closely the relation of the groups of stars to the arcs allotted to them, that we have prepared the accompanying diagram....
(Surya Siddhanta, p. 207 in the Burgess translation (Delhi: Indological Book House, 1977).

It seems (according to Burgess) that the nakshatras represent specific areas of the sky while the identifying stars are termed "junction stars:"

"The stars of which the text thus accurately defines the positions do not, in most cases, by themselves alone, constitute the asterisms (nakshatras); they are only the principle members of the several groups of stars--each, in the calculation of conjunctions (yoga) between the planets and the asterisms...representing its group and therefore called..."Junction-star" (yogatara) of the asterism." (p. 207)

(The term "junction star" is somewhat misleading as we tend to associate a junction with the boundary between two areas rather than as a central marker.)

Therese, I had not intention of being condescending. In point of fact, I do know many astrologers from India who don't use the nakshatras in their work. An astrologer's tool kit is typically made up of the technqiues that work well for them personally. I myself gladly toss out anything that refuses to yield to my experiments; for example, I can't get Varshaphal to work for me worth beans, so I simply use other methods of prediction. If a certain technique is giving me problems, I just switch to one which feels easy and natural to me and gives good results. I don't see how that sort of strategy in our profession can be considered condescending.

The nakshatras have occupied their current boundaries for quite a long time, at least since Minaraja (c. 325 CE), though Martin cites an earlier source, the Taittiriya Samhita, which I have not yet explored but which I hope I can find somewhere -- thanks for the reference, Martin. That there were 28 nakshatras at one time is clear -- the Mahabharata reference I cited earlier is explicit on that point, and all the earliest lists I have been able to examine give 28.

Eventually one reaches a point where all is confusion -- if there were 28 nakshatras, they could not have been 13.20 degrees each, thus causing difficulties regarding some of our most cherished concepts, inc. the idea that 27 mansions of 4 padas each will equal the Hindu magic number 108. Personally, my own feeling is that the references in the Atharva Veda as well as in many of the Brahmanas suggest that they were originally marked by naked-eye observation, as these tremendously early dates would seem to be earlier than the adoption of sexagesimal Babylonian math. In his massive book on the Indus script, Asko Parpola tried to push the nakshatras back to about 3200 BCE, though it is only fair to say that many or perhaps even most of his colleagues disagree with him.

In my own head-scratching moments about the mansions, I have often wondered if all the mathematical formulae are nothing more than a rather unsuccessful attempt to quantify a system which was once based entirely upon observation -- but if I were to suggest such a thing to some of my Vedic colleagues, I would not only experience "condescension" but most likely be burned in effigy.

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Please refrain from posting extensive excerpts from books or articles. Referencing and recommending sources is fine. It should be noted, though, that Thompson had his own agenda, namely, to prove the somewhat outr?, Hindu literalist world-view of his guru, Bhaktivedanta Swami (founder of the Hare Krishna movement). His writings are comparable in many respects to those of Biblical creationists.

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People cite Pingree as though he were some infallible god, and they disregard the Indian side of the story completely, while pretending not to.

RV 1.164, which you cite, is commonly called "The Dirghatamas Hymn" and is acknowledged as the most difficult, bewildering, and controversial poem in the entire RigVeda. Scholars have been ripping at each other's throats for generations about its meaning. Some don't think that the passage you cite has anything to do with astronomy at all.

I studied Classical rather than Vedic Sanskrit; the only Vedic I've read was when we did a classroom exercise on the stunningly beautiful creation hymn numbered 10.129, so I am not competent to interpret Dirghatamas. But.... Pingree stood alone among Western scholars in agreeing with your assertion that the lines you quote refer to the zodiac. Despite the respect he had gained from other academicians, they all shunned him and turned their collective backs on him about that one, so at the very least you are expending your anger against Western civilization on the wrong person.

Since this is becoming all too reminiscent of the constant squabbles and arguments that tore the American Jyotish community to pieces, I shall withdraw and confine my posts to the Western astrology message boards.

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