I deleted this original post because it was unintentionally rude to Ken as a person, whom I accidentally offended initially, and it took me some revision and thinking as to what I want to leave in its place as a testimony to the Indian dating argument. I have collected excerpts and links that I have posted in various parts of the forum previously.

What always happens at this forum and likely anywhere, is an example of how wonderful multiculturalism is.

I do not think this history must have an either the vedas date to 3000 years ago or 12000 years ago proposition, nevermind the traditional Hindu perspective either. Let us ponder this for a bit, why is all history only dated to several thousand years ago? Were there no humans on this planet until 3000-4000 BCE? Did all humans invent their cultural teachings only a few thousand years ago and before that there was only void and empty minded peoples? The reason history is portrayed this way has a few explanations, one of which is to destroy other people's roots, but it is a symptom also of the thinking common in Europe several hundred years ago that the world was invented around 4000 BCE. This is nowadays considered rubbish natural history understanding, but the constraints it put into place still affect the dating of the vedas and nakshtras discussions! Did paleolithic peoples not have any cultural teachings or ideas passed down to their descendants? Of course they did, but this is not accepted in scholarly circles because of the mind-control still in effect which goes unrecognized...

When Westerners first looked at the ages and yugas and cycles in Indian thought, they could not believe it. Nowadays those vast time scales look normal... But this narrowmindedness still affects the dating discussions like this one...

I do not believe the option that either one is a rational scholar or a rabid nationalist in regards to this argument, neither do I believe nationalism=evil, nor is this belief evil according to the UN mandate on Indigenous People's Rights: to their own identity and culture and history (even if some people believe other people's history is myth). All peoples are indigenous peoples, therefore all peoples have a right to their own worldview according to the UN mandate on the Human Rights. Therefore, hindus have a right to their own history of the vedas.

The reason I call Western versions of Indian history a myth is because this is what contemporary Western academics call everyone else's history (including oftentimes their own ancestor's history).

When I referred to the "fraudulent foundation" of Western versions of Indian history I did not mean it was necessarily motivated by malintent on everyone's part, only that zero evidence was used to establish the vedic period and that period has not moved since then, but when evidence is brought up suggesting a large error thet evidence is reviled as 'not evidence' or motivated by evil.

I would encourage people to read the Indian academic literature insofar as their own 'history of science', and Indian archeology, from Indian perspectives. There are discrepancies. Nevermind the traditional teachings.

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1998BASI...26...61A

http://insaindia.org/comijhs2.php

There are cities in India dated older than the Harappa dating, according to Indian archeologists, but even if there were not, any paleontologist knows that lack of evidence does not prove something in this regards.

Here is a caricature of the usual teaching that is taught in Western Academia:

The Indians were crawling around on their hands and knees and all of a sudden stood up and built Harrapa and Mohenjo-daro (nevermind Mehrgarh). Then the Indians sort of did nothing for 2000 years and all of a sudden whipped out the vedas in 1000 BCE. Even the western academia acknowledges cities older than the oldest Hindu literature. This is a suspicious history.

"Among all of these the most influential on my career was Otto Neugebauer, who showed me how [to] interpret correctly ancient astronomical texts and tables in various ancient languages and to demonstrate the dependence of one culture?s mathematical models and parameters on another?s." - David Pingree

Study very carefully the background and lifestory of this mentor of Pingree who was one of the primary persons responsible for creating the myth that I will give a caricature of: that all humans were crawling around on their hands and knees until they were gifted with civilization from the people from Mesopotamia. The irony is that the ethnocentrism was on the side of Pingree's mentor and the daters of the vedas in the West, yet when Indians challenge this history version, then it is Indians who are falsely accused. When everyone else's history is destroyed, e.g. the burning of Alexandria, or the burning of the libraries in India by Muslims, or the forced conversion of Europe one tribe at a time, then it certainly does start to look like Mesopotamia was the only source...The Book of Deuteronomy (KJV translation is more honest) is a synopsis of what has happened in the West these last thousands of years.
The so-called Holy Roman Empire was neither Holy nor Roman nor an Empire, said Voltaire, and it is doubtful that it actually ended since the memes and power centres morphed to a continuation of the old in new places.

The rg veda contains sexagesimal maths and this veda also has identical deities as found among indigenous European tribes before they were secretly murdered and oppressed by the so-called Holy Roman Empire, therefore the vedic deities go back to before the split when the indigenous Europeans traveled to and were found in Europe, i.e., at the latest, the upper Paleolithic, since these things had to have been in existence before the split of the Indo-European tribes.

I will present a few excerpts from a text titled: Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by mathematician Richard L. Thompson, to demonstrate what happens when we actually begin to investigate the work of Western historians of science, rather than just defer to them as "scholars" (i.e. modern priests) and regurgitate their conclusions and cite references to their work as though it were inviolable scripture...

The purpose of this presentation is to demonstrate how lies become truth in Western history, this is not unique to the history of science either...

"Nonetheless, even though our knowledge of the history of ancient astronomy is extremely incomplete, there are scholars who believe that they can uncover important parts of this history by speculative reconstruction. One example of this is a paper entitled 'The Recovery of Early Greek Astronomy from India,' by David Pingree (PG). In order to indicate the complexities and pitfalls of the speculative process, we will examine the key argument of this paper in detail. This will involve the use of a number of technical astronomical terms, but we will explain these as we go along. Our method will be to first present Pingree's theory, and then give his reasons for accepting this theory as true. Then step by step we will show the fallacies in his reasoning and present an alternative theory that is in better agreement with the facts (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"Now, how does Pingree know that this is what Aryabhata did some 1,400 years ago? His key argument is that if we use Ptolemaic calculations to reproduce Aryabhata's supposed steps, then we obtain Aryabhata's parameters for mean planetary motions almost exactly. Aryabhata's parameters, listed under R in Table A2.1, are in the hundreds of thousands and millions. Column (1) of this table lists the differences between Aryabhata's parameters and these parameters as reconstructed by Pingree. For example, for Jupiter, Aryabhata's rate is 364,224 revolutions per yuga cycle, and Pingree's reconstruction is larger than this by 4. Since these differences are very small, it is hard to imagine how Aryabhata could have arrived at his parameters without following the scenario that Pingree proposes. This makes it seem that Pingree's conclusion concerning Aryabhata is indisputable, and equally so his contention that nearly every aspect of Indian astronomy was imported from Greek sources without acknowledgement (PG, pp. 114-15).

An argument such as Pingree's has a great impact on the academic world. It tends to be immediately convincing to scholars, and it becomes established as a foundation stone in an imposing school of thought that cannot be easily challenged by nonprofessionals. As a result, scholars in other fields (such as comparative religion and history) accept the conclusions of such a school as a matter of course, and modify their own views in accordance with it...

...However, one can indeed find other ways by which Aryabhata could have arrived at his parameters...

...most of the significant digits in these parameters come from the Brahmapaksa parameters, which Aryabhata acknowledges as source material...

...As we shall see, this fine tuning can be accounted for in ways other than the one advocated by Pingree. To do this, it is first necessary to examine Pingree's argument more closely" (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"After we have checked our Ptolemaic calculations at the Kali-yuga starting date, the next step is to perform these calculations for noon of March 21, A.D. 499, the date of Aryabhata's alleged calculations. There are 454,759 days from Ptolemy's epoch to this date. If we compute the Ptolemaic mean positions for this date, a number of interesting points emerge. First of all, the Ptolemaic mean longitudes do not at all agree with Pingree's figures, as given in his Table 2 (PG, p. 116). This can be seen by comparing the rightmost and leftmost columns of Table A2.2." (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"In his Table 1, Pingree lists distances from Zeta Piscium under the heading "Distance from Zeta Piscium," and mean longitudes under lambda, the Greek letter symbolizing these quantities (PG, p. 115). Yet in his table 2, he lists quantities under lambda that are really distances from Zeta Piscium, and he refers to these quantities as mean longitudes. We have not been able to account for this discrepancy in nomenclature.

We have also not been able to account for the discrepancies between the middle and rightmost columns of A2.2, for it would seem that calculations for 454,759 days after Ptolemy's epoch should be even more precise than calculations for 860,172.25 days before that epoch. (We note that Pingree's Ptolemaic calculations apparently have not been corrected for the time difference between Ptolemy's city of Alexandria and Aryabhata's city of Ujjain; this possible correction does not account for the discrepancy.)...

...For Venus and Mercury the errors in Pingree's reconstruction of Aryabhata's parameters turn out to be worse than those reported by Pingree in his paper. (Compare columns 1 and 2 of Table A2.1.) This indicates errors on Pingree's part, but it might be argued that it does not detract very badly from his hypothesis. We therefore ask, Is there some reasonable way of reconstructing Aryabhata's parameters that produce smaller errors for all of the planets than Pingree's method? The answer is yes. To explain this, we must turn to a discussion of the mean positions of the planets according to modern astronomy...

...Let us suppose that Aryabhata did this, and that he then computed his parameters using his observed longitudes rather than longitudes copied from a Greek table. This leads to a reconstruction of his parameters based on modern calculation of the differences between mean longitudes and the sun's mean longitude. The longitudes and resulting parameters for this reconstruction are listed in the last two columns of Table A2.3, and the errors in this reconstruction are listed in column (5) of Table A2.1. As we can see, these errors are zero, except for Mercury, where the error is equal to that in Pingree's reported reconstruction (see columns (1) and (2)). Thus, the hypothesis of observation yields better results than the hypothesis of copying from Greek tables" (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"These statements certainly convey the impression that the Indian sine table was directly obtained from a related trigonometrical table used by the Greek astronomer Hipparchus. However, what do we find if we actually examine the paper by G.J. Toomer that these authorities are citing? Let us briefly consider this.

The first thing that we learn from this paper is that there are no surviving Greek documents containing Hipparchus' chord table, even in a fragmentary form. Indeed, 'there is no explicit evidence about the nature of Hipparchus' chord table,' and no real proof that such a table ever existed (TM1, p. 6). It is important to note that only one work of Hipparchus' had survived - a commentary on the stars - and this does not present his mathematical methods. As we have already noted, this is typical of the state of our knowledge of pre-Ptolemaic Greek astronomy...

...By this reasoning Toomer maintains that "the nature of Hipparchus' chord table is conclusively established" (TMI, p. 16). Since the table has the structure of an Indian sine table, it follows that Indian trigonometry must have been derived from the Greeks. The idea that Greeks may have been influenced by Indian developments is never even suggested by modern Western historians of science. But in this case, of course, we have no evidence for influence either way, since the connection between Hipparchus' two numbers and the Indian sine table is purely speculative" (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"Since the chord table of Hipparchus has not survived (if it ever existed), it is remarkable that such slender evidence can be offered as the basis for 'inevitable' conclusions about it. Yet, as we have seen, such speculative reconstructions are not unusual in the field of the history of science. Here we will give one more example. This is provided by the mathematician B.L. van der Waerden, who traces back Hipparchus' trigonometry to the Greek mathematician Appolonius of Perge...

...One should note here that van der Waerden does not cite a reference giving Appolonius' estimate of [greek math pi symbol], and he also gives no reference that specifically attributes studies of trigonometry to Appolonius. Thus we do not know what Apollonius's estimate of [greek pi math symbol] was, nor do we know whether he actually knew any trigonometry" (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

"We have discussed the arguments of Pingree, Toomer, and van der Waerden in detail to show the kind of foundations that underlie scholarly conclusions about the origins of Indian astronomy. The main characteristic of these foundations is that they are composed almost entirely of unsupported assumptions, biased interpretations, and imaginary reconstructions. It is unfortunate, however, that after many scholars have presented arguments of this type in learned treatises, the arguments accumulate to produce an imposing stratified deposit of apparently indisputable authority. In this way, supposedly solid facts are established by the fossilization of fanciful speculations whose original direction was determined by scholarly prejudice. Ultimately, these facts are presented in elementary texts and popular books, and accepted on faith by innocent people" (Vedic Cosmography and Astronomy by Richard L. Thompson).

In the work of B.G. Tilak, it is found that he was informing Western Indologists of Sanskrit words found in Mesopotamia, and yet those Western scholars never informed the general public of this, because they had ulterior motives to present everything as a one-sided transmission coming out of Mesopotamia. Therefore, some Western scholars can be said to be liars by omission.

Indians developed various maths and discovered various things about the universe before the Western dating of these things, and Western history of science still to this day does not include the Indian discoveries in their fradulent so-called history of science.

See this thread for example:

http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7368

Also, insofar as the allegations the Indians borrowed 12 house or sign astrology from Mesopotamians via Hellenists, contemplate the 12 adityas, for example:

See 8:

http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/sbr/sbe44/sbe44036.htm

See 9:

http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/sbr/sbe12/sbe1246.htm

So, we an association of the Adityas as a division of the year and the day and the sky.

Also, see 4.5.1-3:

http://www.safarmer.com/Indo-Eurasian/O ... miniya.pdf

Also, see 4.10.10:

http://www.safarmer.com/Indo-Eurasian/O ... miniya.pdf

Further original source parallels can be found in a text titled: Studies on Rigvedic Deities: Astronomical and Meteorological by Ekendranath Ghosh.

Also, see these articles:

http://www.vedicsociety.org/articles.php?authors_id=1

"Some scholars have claimed that the Babylonians invented the zodiac of 360 degrees around 700 BCE, perhaps even earlier. Many claim that India received the knowledge of the zodiac from Babylonia or even later from Greece. However, as old as the Rig Veda, the oldest Vedic text, there are clear references to a chakra or wheel of 360 spokes placed in the sky. The number 360 and its related numbers like 12, 24, 36, 48, 60, 72, 108, 432 and 720 occur commonly in Vedic symbolism. It is in the hymns of the great Rishi Dirghatamas (RV I.140 ? 164) that we have the clearest such references." This excerpt from:
http://www.vedicsociety.org/vedic-origi ... 0o91kj6e44

"To quote from David Pingree?s "History of mathematical astronomy in India," in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography, C.S. Gillespie (ed.), pp. 533-633, Charles Scribners, New York, 1981, page 534: "In the case of the priority of the Rgveda to the Brahmanas, it is not always clear that the views expressed in the latter developed historically after the composition of the former. All texts that can reasonably be dated before ca. 500 BC are here considered to represent essentially a single body of more or less uniform material." The point of his statement is to try to get such Rig Veda references as those of Dirghatamas later than the Brahmana texts as both reflect a similar sophisticated astronomy, which is necessary to make it later than the Babylonian references and a product of a Babylonian influence as he proposes. This requires reducing all the layers of Vedic literature to a more or less uniform mass at a very late date, which is contrary to almost every view of the text." This excerpt also from the above link and below link:

http://www.vedicsociety.org/vedic-origi ... 0o91kj6e44

Pingree tried to attribute the veda itself as a product of Mesopotamians...


At the following link there is an online text titled: Astronomical dating of events from Indian history

http://www.ancientindianastrology.com/cmsa/

From the above stated online text at that site:

"Description of Event Dating
Sri Krishna, on his final peace mission, set out for Hastinapura, when the moon was at the asterism Revati. September 26, 3067 BCE
Krishna arrived in Hastinapura when the moon was at the asterism Bharani. September 28,3067
The lunar eclipse September 29, 3067 BCE
The solar eclipse at Jyestha October 14, 3067 B.C.
The Great Bharata War November 22, 3067 BCE
Balarama sits out the war and sets out for pilgrimage along the Sarasvati November 1, 3067 B.C.
Balarama returns from his pilgrimage, on the last day of the war Dec 12, 3067 BCE
The winter solstice occurred on January 13, 3066 BCE
Bhishma?s expiry January 16, 3066 BCE
Birth and nirvana of Sri Krishna (we have used 81 years as his lifespan but some traditions put his lifespan as 197 years) with a birthdate of July 21,3228 BCE 3112 BCE to 3031 BCE
The comet Mahaghora appeared at the asterism Pushya October ,3066 BCE
Birth and Nirvana of Lord Buddha April 9, 1887 to March 27,1807 BCE
Birth and Nirvana of Adi Sankara April 5, 509 BCE
Beginning of the Vikrama Era (Sukla pratipada) March 14 , 57 BCE
Salivahana Saka 78 CE"


"Most countries in Central Asia, particularly those with their names ending with ?stan? or ?istan?, such as ? Balochistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Turkistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan ? could be part of Greater India in ancient times. ?Sthan/stan? is a Sanskrit word, meaning ?place?. When drawing a line around these istan countries, beginning at Kazakhstan, in the extreme northwest, and ending at Pakistan, they make a block connecting with India. These countries were snatched away one by one by Muslim tribes. Last being Pakistan."

?He who has money, lives long: he who has authority, can do no wrong: he who has might, establishes right. Such is history?. - Gottfried Benn.


"The present narration of [Indian] history especially in the English language is not accurate and is fundamentally flawed both chronologically and as to the nature of the content . There should be no question in anybody?s mind that the present narrative of our history as taught to our children is the legacy of the British . I would be astonished if anybody were
to contradict me on this assumption. This is therefore not an opinion but a fact.."

"The First Boden Professor of Sanskrit in Oxford University was H.H. Wilson. Then it was Monier Williams and he was followed by Max M?ller. Personal letters of Mr Max M?ller gives a true picture of the writer's inner mind. Such letters are very helpful in estimating his real nature and character. In a letter to his wife in 1886 A.D. Max M?ller wrote:

This edition of mine and the translation of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India ... It is the root of their religion and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last three thousand years."

In a letter on 16th December 1868 A.D he writes to Duke of Argyll, the Minister for India:

'The ancient religion of India is doomed and if Christianity does not step in, whose fault will it be?'

You can understand how biased was colonial scholarship of Sanskrit learning. Max M?ller's bias is now an open secret. The strange factor is that Max M?ller does not understand simple Sanskrit and he cannot write and translate. Then what about his Vedic knowledge?"

"Indian astronomy is claimed to be borrowed from the Greeks, but the Vedanga Jyotisha cannot be dated later than the 14th century BC. The name itself, Vedanga, indicates it is later than the Vedas, so the astronomical references in the Vedas must be older. In addition, Harappan archaeology of the third millennium BC belongs
astronomically to the ?Krittika period? (vernal equinox in Krittika or the Pleiades cluster in Taurus), which is mentioned in the later Vedic literature. This places the Harappan civilization later than the Rigveda and not before it as claimed by historians."

"Migrations: The major migration or invasion?the famous or infamous Aryan invasion?is supposed to have taken place after 2000 BC, but available genetic evidence shows that the people of India have lived where they are for tens of thousands of years, perhaps as long as 50,000 years or more."

"It is my firm conviction that the current history, as revised by the colonial overlord, and taught to our [Indian] children worldwide does not meet the minimum standards of any episteme. I do not know of any civilization or nation that lets its history be hijacked by those who have a minimum accountability to ensure its veracity and in fact has an agenda that is very cavalier and nonchalant, if not hostile to our traditional heritage. Till the advent of independence we had an excuse that we were held on a short leash by the colonial overlord, but what is the excuse today?"

Note: I personally know of many groups of people who have had their roots and history hijacked and destroyed. We could start looking right here at home - look at the European university programs which teach "European" religion and include Christianity.

Isn't the Aesir-Vanir war the same as the stories of the asura-deva wars?

Are not Arvak and Alsvin, the horses connected with the Sun in the Norse religion, the very same Ashvini twins connected with horses and the Sun in the Vedic tradition and which the Ashwini nakshatra is named after?

"These scholars have discounted the fact that two of the greatest epics of
the world, Ramayana and Mahabharata are traditionally regarded as itihasa s, i.e., historic texts and that there are in addition, a host of supporting texts in the form of Puranas. Ignoring the fact that Bharata has its own sense of history and the purpose of history, which differs
from their own concept of history, the scholars have systematically misrepresented the chronology of Bharata"

"Krshna?s mission for peace is so important that astronomical events in reference to that mission
are recorded.
(i) Krshna leaves for Hastinapura in the maitri muhurta in the month of Kartika on the day of Revati nakshatra.
(ii) On the way he halts at a place called Vrkasthala and reaches Hastinapura on the day of Bharani nakshatra
(iii) The meetings and discussions for peace go on till the day of Pushya nakshatra, when Duryodhana rejects all offers of peace. War becomes imminent.
(iv) Krshna leaves Hastinapura on the day of Uttara Phalguni. Karna
accompanies him in his chariot and has a long conversation with him.
(v) During the conversation Karna describes some omens he has seen that indicate a great harm to the Kuru family which include the following: shani is afflicting Rohini, angaraka has performed a retrograde motion before reaching Jyeshtha and is prograde again having past Anuradha, the moon had lost all its luster on the full moon of Kartika and a solar eclipse would appear to take place next new moon day.
(vi) At the end of the conversation, Krshna sends a message to Bhishma and Drona through Karna that seven days from that day there is going to be an Amavasya at Jyeshtha and that war rituals be started on that day. This must be the Amavasya that Karna refers to as the eclipse day."

"Even Bhagavata Purana acknowledges that although Kaliyuga had already started, because of the presence of Krshna, Kali?s effect had been
controlled. The full power of Kali became effective only with the departure of Krshna...
Thus there is no conflict with the war occurring in 3067 BCE and the
reckoning of Kaliyuga from 3102 BCE."

"One consequence of the mix up of the names of Ashokaditya of the Guptas with Ashoka of the Mauryas is the misdating of Buddha. According to Puranic evidence, there had expired 1500 years after Pariksit, when Mahapadmananda was coronated. Between Pariksit and the Nandas, there were three royal dynasties, Brhadratha, Pradyota and Sisunaga families. The Nandas who ruled Magadha for 100 years, were followed by Mauryas, Sunga, Kanva and Andhras. Candragupta founded the Mauryan dynasty with the help of Canakya. His son was Bimbisara and grandson was Ashokavardhana. The Maurya- s ruled for a total of 316 years and
were replaced by the sunga-s. The Kanva-s who succeeded the Sunga-s were themselves supplanted by the Andhra-s, who ruled for a total of 506 years. Then followed the reign of srigupta-s for a period of 245 years. This age has been termed the ?Golden Age? in the history of
Bharata. It is Samudragupta of the srigupta dynasty who was known as ?Ashokaditya Priyadarsin? The ?Inscriptions of Ashoka? belong to this Gupta emperor and not to Ashoka Maurya , who came to power after 218 years after Buddha.
Buddha was the son of King Suddhodana who was the 23rd king of the Ikshvaku dynasty and Puranic-records point to 1807 BCE as the date of attaining nirvana by Buddha. Just as in the case of Krshna, it appears that his date of birth is calculated after determining the date of parinirvana (final departure). Buddha?s nirvana Kota Venkatachelam has determined that Buddha?s nirvana occurred on the vaishakha Purnima, on March 27, 1807 BCE. Simulations show that astronomically this is indeed the situation as shown in Figure 16. Many other scholars also agree as to the date of Buddha?s nirvana."

"According to it shankara was born in the year Nandana of Kaliyuga
2593 (509 BCE) in the month of vishakha...The Figure 21 shows a star map for April 5, 509 BCE and it is easily seen that tithi, lagna, nakshatra and the positions of the planets are exactly as described in the horoscope."


"The Western historians have tried to identify Kanishka era with 78 CE in their attempt to deny historicity of the... but based on the list from Rajataraangini, Kanishka?s date would be 1298 BCE."

The details of the arguments for these assertions can be found in the above-mentioned online text, which I will state the title here again: Astronomical dating of events from Indian history from the following website:

http://www.ancientindianastrology.com/cmsa/


Max M?ller was a hired agent for the British East India Company, to help subjugate the Indian, just as the Europeans were subjugated some centuries or millenium prior.

http://www.stephen-knapp.com/recent_res ... _river.htm

Here is another example of the distortions of Indian history:

"As regards the date of [Varaha Mihira's] birth, it is a great pity that such great writers as Sir William Hunter, Dr. Bhular, H. Kern, Colebrooke, Bentley, Wilford, Wilson, Cunningham, Weber, Lassen, Maxmuller, Hall, San Julien, Reinauld and other Orientalists have fallen into the greatest blunder in determining his age while Varaha Mihira himself says in his Brihat Samhita Chapter 13 verses 3 and 4 thus:

Aseen makhasu munayaha
Sasathi prithvim
Yudhistaray nrupathau
Shadvika panchadviyuta
Sake tasyaragnasya

N. Chidambara Iyer a fairly good astronomer and mathematician who has translated Brihat Samhita and Brihat Jataka some 55 years ago thus translates this stanza: 'During the reign of Yudhistira 2,526 years before the commencement of Vikrama Saka the Seven Rishis were at the constellation of Magha or Regulus. The rishis take a period of 100 years to go over each of the twenty-seven asterisms rising in the North East. The rishis are Marichi, Vasishta, Angirasa, Atri, Pulastya, Pulaha and Krathu.'

Chidambara Iyer exceeded the limits of a faithful translator by putting in the word Vikrama Saka which is not in the original text. The meaning of the original stanza is clearly this: If we add 2,526 years to the present Saka which Varaha Mihira has not named, Yudhistira Saka will be obtained. Now the question is what was the Saka prevalent at that time? Collateral authorities have completely affirmed that Mihiracharya was given the title of Varaha or Wild Boar, the emblem of Vikrama's Royalty by the great Emperor Vikramaditya himself, as will be made plain in the subsequent chapters. Since Yudhistira Saka is to be obtained by adding 2,526 to the present Saka obtaining at the time of Mihira, it cannot refer to Vikrama as that Saka came into existence after some decades of Mihira's composition" (Life of Varaha Mihira by B. Suryanarain Rao).


One of the primary purposes for these "your ancestors were ignorant apes" assertions is solely to destroy people's cultural and ethnic identity in order to create one vast homogenous underclass of serfs and slaves and a new social order. This is nothing new and has been happening for millennia. For example: "But thus shall you deal with them; you shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their [sacred] groves, and burn their graven images with fire" (Deuteronomy 7.5) - The following verse mentions ruling over all of the people of the earth after their identity is destroyed in that verse. This is a violation of the UN mandate on Indigenous People's Rights and all humans are indigenous, therefore all humans have the Natural Human Right to their own cultural and ethnic identity and history.

"They mixed us up with [Westerners]. They took away our language. They took our kids away to schools and wouldn't let them learn about the old culture. They herded us onto reservations and rewarded Indians who acted just like [Westerners]. They created a generation of Indians who didn't even know who they were" (Neither Wolf Nor Dog).

Kent or Dan wrote: But it did something worse, too. It took away all of our history from before the time you came here to our country. It's like before you came here, we didn't exist. You won't believe anything we tell you unless you can dig up some pot or an arrowhead. Then you put it in a lot of machines and put chemicals on it so you can know when it was made, and then you can say, 'Now we know about it, Now we know what happened.' Then the man who did the tests writes down what he found out and other people write down what they think about what he found out, and you call that history.

'I can come to you and tell you what my grandfathers told me, and that's not history unless the chemicals told you the same things. I can even tell you about power, like wipoye, the medicine bag, or how one becomes a double woman - but I wouldn't - and you would just say that is a story.

'See, none of what we know is history to you. Our sacred stories are just legends to you. The powers we were given by our ancestors you think are superstitious. The responsiblities, too. None of that is real in your history.

'All it really means is there wasn't anyone with a book writing things down. It doesn't matter that when your people came with books and wrote things down, they wrote lies. Once it was down then it was truth. Then there was history. The elders used to say, 'Wasichu builds his house on lies.'

That's what they meant.'

-Neither Wolf Nor Dog

"People living in countries at points diametrically opposite to where the sun is first seen rising will see the sun setting, and if a straight line were drawn from a point where the sun is at midday, the people in countries at the opposite end of the line would be experiencing midnight. Similarily, if people residing where the sun is setting were to go to countries diametrically opposite, they would not see the sun in the same condition" Srimad Bhagavatam 5.21.8-9).

Even if we had no evidence of ancient beliefs, which we do, we can use inference and contemplate things like sailors seeing mountains or high towers and such from the ocean and seeing the curvature of the earth, or lunar eclipses which reveal the earth's shadow as curved.

"At a lunar eclipse the Moon enters the shadow of the earth, and at a solar eclipse she enters the Sun's disc. That is the reason why the lunar eclipse does not begin at the western limb, nor the solar one at the eastern limb" (Brhat Samhita 5.. This was written by Varahamihira who was likely from around 2000 years ago according to B S Rao.

We could do like Eratosthenes did to verify the ancient Egyptian teaching of the size of the circumference of the earth and test this ancient teaching like he did.

In studying the history of science, in the West and in the East, I have noticed numerous discrepancies between the two. Western history always starts like, so-and-so was the first to measure the speed of light, or the first to measure the circumference of the earth, while in reality these things were done by previous peoples or learned from previous peoples, but this is never acknowledged by the ravening beast of Western History which devours everything in its path.

The Surya Siddhanta lists the diameters of the planets, and that text also states:

"O Maya, hear attentively the excellent knowledge of the science of astronomy which the Sun himself formerly taught to the great rshis in each of the yugas.

I teach you the same ancient science...But the difference between the present and the ancient works is caused only by time, on account of the revolution of the yugas."

The Sun is referred to as the atma or center or soul in various ancient texts, and it is also said to support the other planets, but as astrologers we know why the geocentric version was used: because we do not live on the Sun...

Rather than try to destroy people's identity by referring to their history as mythology we could contemplate whether there are scientific truths or any type of truths behind mysterious statements about reality which sound strange or "superstitious" initially, especially when wrong translations are used such as 'cows' for something with an entirely different (and more than one) meaning.

This thread has gone wildly off topic and is turning not only tiresome but rather unpleasant. I don't want to have to lock it, but I will if I have to.

Questioning mainstream scholarship is fine as such, and sometimes necessary; but it should be done in a nuanced and objective manner, and preferably with a modicum of respect for the enormous amount of work and sheer volume of knowledge represented by generations of committed scholars, not to mention their personal integrity. No conspiracy theories, please.

While it is certainly true that many academics may have strong incentives not to rock the boat of their respective disciplines, it is also a fact that academics by and large are a self-willed lot and that scholarship advances in part by constant questioning and re-evaluation. The belief that any academic discipline would not by now have moved away from assumptions made in the 19th century, unless those assumptions had stood up against repeated attacks, is na?ve indeed.

Martin Gansten wrote:

The belief that any academic discipline would not by now have moved away from assumptions made in the 19th century, unless those assumptions had stood up against repeated attacks, is na?ve indeed.

Yes. I feel the attempt to frame the debate in this way would be quite bizarre.

I also dont see it as my personal role to defend the reputation of numerous scholars and historians. As Martin has suggested scholarship is not immutable and with thorough research existing theories can be properly critiqued.

Reducing this to some kind of intellectual duel /last man standing scenario between a couple of members here will generate more heat than light. While I do believe many of the Hindutva arguments are spurious and agenda driven debating these controveries further here would take us even further off topic. I would be happy to have any of my comments deemed off topic by Martin deleted here to bring this thread back on focus.

There is no denying the issue of Indian chronology has became controversial and hotly disputed due to the activities of Hindutva campaigners (mostly non-academics) which actually makes it very difficult to discuss such topics here in a calm, respectful manner.

In my view the most useful thing we can do for members here is propose articles or books worth reading. Perhaps a thread devoted to such historical resources and article links might be an idea?

I support the principle of intellectual free enquiry. I think people should be encouraged to make their own minds up on such topics through their own research. However, its important we spend the necessary time reading about all available perspectives rather than just building up one sided arguments. Perhaps we can all find some common ground on that point at least?

Mark

To return to the original topic: It seems to be clear by now that, even in very old texts, there are sometimes 27 nakshatras and sometimes 28. The astronomer Achar argues in the Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies that 27 was the original number, while Asko Parpola in his "Deciphering the Indus Script" argues for 28.

I suggest that with so much debate continuing among academic specialists, we are unlikely to conclusively settle the issue here.

Kenneth Johnson wrote:

To return to the original topic: It seems to be clear by now that, even in very old texts, there are sometimes 27 nakshatras and sometimes 28. The astronomer Achar argues in the Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies that 27 was the original number, while Asko Parpola in his "Deciphering the Indus Script" argues for 28.

I suggest that with so much debate continuing among academic specialists, we are unlikely to conclusively settle the issue here.

Thanks Ken,

Is this variation in interpretation related to references with/without Abhijit?

We seem to see this ambiguity regarding the exclusively astrological texts on the Nakshatras that have been preserved (such as the ??rd?lakar??vad?na).

You have commented on this issue in your article on the ??rd?lakar??vad?na entitled: The Legend of the Southern Cross, Early Writings on the Nak?atras from the ??rd?lakar??vad?na

http://kennethjohnsonastrology.com/main ... ern-cross/

You state:

The work usually lists twenty-eight nak?atras rather than twenty-seven, for it usually (though not always) includes Abhijit, which is something of a mystery.

Abhijit is included in all the earliest lists of the nak?atras (including Atharva Veda 19.7); in the beginning, there were clearly twenty-eight lunar mansions rather than the current twenty-seven.

Abhijit?s importance to the early nak?atra tradition is critical. In the Mah?bh?rata, the great king and exemplar of the dharma, Yudhi??hira, is born in the muh?rta or hour of Abhijit. Why was Abhijit left out of the later nak?atra count? No one really knows. Mah?bh?rata 3.37.219.7-10 reads: ?The Goddess Abhijit, the younger sister of Rohi?? and her rival, has gone to the forest to mortify herself, for she wishes to be the eldest?. Now a constellation has dropped from heaven.? Abhijit is the star Vega, hence nowhere near the ecliptic and not on the path of the planets and the luminaries.

I assume you have revised your take on this subject in the light of more recent research by Achar which does seem to have muddied the waters somewhat. I take it you relying more on Asko Parpolo's interpretation of the ancient texts when you wrote that piece?

In any case, regarding the early astrological use of the Nakshatras we no longer need to rely on the ??rd?lakar??vad?na as our sole reference. Clearly one text could have had certain idiosyncracies due to later interpolation. However, Bill Mak's research on several Jyotisa texts preserved in China seems to support the view that 28 nakshatras (not 27) were used in astrological work. At least by the early centuries of the common era.

Mark

When I stay that we are unlikely to be able to settle the issue, I am simply acknowledging the fact that the historical record is, as you say, "muddied," and that it is hard to draw firm conclusions from the contradictory sources.

Personally, I still tend to lean toward 28. I haven't really revised my opinion, but, as you have pointed out, it's not just a question of a single text or a single scholar. Articles have been written supporting both positions. I do feel that the weight of the argument is somewhat stronger in favor of 28.

Varuna 2 wrote:

The reason I call Western versions of Indian history a myth is because this is what contemporary Western academics call everyone else's history (including oftentimes their own ancestor's history).

When I referred to the "fraudulent foundation" of Western versions of Indian history I did not mean it was necessarily motivated by malintent on everyone's part, only that zero evidence was used to establish the vedic period and that period has not moved since then, but when evidence is brought up suggesting a large error thet evidence is reviled as 'not evidence' or motivated by evil.

I would encourage people to read the Indian academic literature insofar as their own 'history of science', and Indian archeology, from Indian perspectives. There are discrepancies. Nevermind the traditional teachings.

I think your tendency to represent this debate as one between western scholarship vs Indian academics is deeply misleading.

Some of the strongest modern advocates of a modified migration theory from central Asia and opponents of the idea of a 'Vedic Harappan culture ' theory were Indian academics from the Hindu community.

In particular we have highly respected modern historians of the ancient period such as Romila Tharpar, Ram Sharan Sharma and Dwijendra Narayan Jha. All Indian and all originate from a Hindu religious background.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romila_Thapar

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ram_Sharan_Sharma

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwijendra_Narayan_Jha

These Indian academics disputed the extremely ancient chronology for the Vedic era proposed by Hindutva activists. This would apply to the kind of timelines you have proposed here for the Vedic texts.

Equally, there are western writers like David Frawley that could be described as on the extreme end of a Hindutva position. Moreover, one of the leading scholars criticising the Aryan migration theory and supporting the indigenous Aryan hypothesis is the Belgian academic Koenraad Elst. Although it is true that his view is not representative of western scholarship as a whole.

Still, I hope I have demonstrated we need to avoid over simplistic generalizations based on ethnic background. This debate is not about a 'clash of cultures' as you typify it but rather competing theories of Indian history.

Having said that this debate has assumed a degree of politicization in India due to the way many Indians see these theories shaping a sense of national and religious identity.

Mark

Before Martin locks this thread I would like to publicly apologize to Ken for my rudeness and disrespectful reply which I deleted entirely and replaced with a better response. You misunderstood my intent Ken, I was not intentionally insulting you originally (but I worded it wrongly) and I was trying to keep you out of mine and Mark's neverending locking of horns. But when you stepped in the ring and suggested I insulted you I gave you the dosage meant for my fight with Mark.

I respect you as a gentle respectful Sanskrit scholar Ken, and I do not want to argue with you about anything, and my only problem with your presentation is that you suggest anyone who does not agree with the Western academic position is a far right nationalist (presumably evil, typically). I have noticed how offended certain people (from the greater bharata region) have been on this forum when this is how things are portrayed. Not to mention the UN mandate on Indigenous People's Rights.

This is not a black and white issue to me, of either the naksatras (and vedas) date to 3000 years ago or the vedas date to 12000 years ago.

To return to the topic of this thread and conveniently also illustrate that the Indian academic world allows very different portrayals from what we see in the West, allow me to quote one article that is relative to this thread and a theory from an Indian which acknowledges influences outside of India but nevertheless dates a text to older than the Western dating of the rg veda (said to be the oldest Hindu literature).

"The Vedanga Jyotisa of 1400 BC reduced the number of naksatras from 28 to 27 for mathematical reasons and gave the definition of naksatras as an arc of 13 1/3 degrees on the ecliptic. In doing so Abhijit naksatra was dropped, original Abhijit was called Sravana was called Dhanistha and other naksatras readjusted as shown by the author.

Jain astronomers used the principles of the Vedanga Jyotisa for making the calendar with the difference that they counted the naksatras from Sravana instead of Dhanistha of the Vedanga Jyotisa. The puts the epoch of Jain astronomy around 500 BC. In those days there was much exchange of ideas between the Indian and Babylonian astronomers. In particular Indians came to know of the Babylonian zodiacal constellations (sidereal rasis) and there was a need to lock the 12 rasis with the 27 naksatras prevalent in India." - Abhyankar

Notice the attribution to another culture for an idea, but the dating of this astrology text is older than the alleged age of the rg veda! I have seen the Vedanga Jyotisha dated anywhere from 1800-1400 BCE based on the astronomy information it contains.

The above quote is from an article which is listed as the 7th article down at this link:

http://insaindia.org/comijhs2.php

Here is another article by the same author associated with further articles dealing with the astronomy and calendrical aspects of vedic astrology:

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1998BASI...26...61A

I still believe the Adityas are relevant here too, though.

Therefore, this argument is not as black and white to me personally, as it is portrayed in the Western academic world.

I still take Ken's position that it is premature to decide confidently that 27 or 28 is older than the other, rather there could have been parallel traditions.

Varuna 2

I take Ken's position that it is premature to state confidently that 27 or 28 is older than the other.

A wise move to now back our resident authority. After Ken's explanation of the current academic state of play I would have to agree too. My original view had been mostly based on Ken's article cited above anyway! So I suppose we have got to the point that title of this thread requires a question mark.

Still, I would remind you that all the existing astrological texts passed down to us (as opposed to ancient Vedic scriptures) seem to strongly favour 28 nakshatras rather than 27. I see no response on that issue.

Varuna 2 wrote:

The Vedanga Jyotisa of 1400 BC reduced the number of naksatras from 28 to 27 for mathematical reasons and gave the definition of naksatras as an arc of 13 1/3 degrees on the ecliptic. In doing so Abhijit naksatra was dropped, original Abhijit was called Sravana was called Dhanistha and other naksatras readjusted as shown by the author.

Ok good find. I think I was the one that highlighted this article a while back in a thread entitled the Jain Nakshatras here. Yes, the dating is very different from scholarship I have seen. There seems to be a current grouping of Indian researchers on Indian astronomy that go along with this dating too. You could add to this argument the research of Sajjan Singh Lishk and S.D. Sharma on Jaina astronomy. They follow a similar dating for The Vedanga Jyotisa.

I would suggest that the difference here can, at least in part, be explained by the fact that western scholarship tends to focus on what is the assumed date for the latest , formulation of the text passed down to us. In contrast these writers seem to focus on the earliest possible Vedic origin of the text. It is rather disconcerting though that all these writers uncritically assume the entire text we now know as the the Vedanga Jyotisa has passed down to us without any interpolations , accretion, or omission from 1400BCE!

I think there is genuine uncertainty in the dating of this text. I also think the dating of Vedic texts is open to some debate too. However, there is a qualitative difference between the ambiguity on the chronology of this text, or the idea some of the Vedas could be a few hundred yeas older, and the suggestion the Vedas date from several thousand years BCE or that they are concurrent with the high point of the Harappan culture. That kind of typical Hindutva argument raises problems of a completely different order of magnitude.

Continuing the theme of differing chronology I note Sajjan Singh Lishk and S.D. Sharma state in their article 'Post-Vedanga Pre-Siddhantic Indian Astronomy' that the Siddhantic era of Indian astronomy dates from the 3rd-4th century. Conventionally, this is dated with Aryabhata in the late 5th century CE. Unfortunately, the authors of this article dont inform us how they reached this conclusion.

Varuna 2 wrote:

Jain astronomers used the principles of the Vedanga Jyotisa for making the calendar with the difference that they counted the naksatras from Sravana instead of Dhanistha of the Vedanga Jyotisa. The puts the epoch of Jain astronomy around 500 BC. In those days there was much exchange of ideas between the Indian and Babylonian astronomers. In particular Indians came to know of the Babylonian zodiacal constellations (sidereal rasis) and there was a need to lock the 12 rasis with the 27 naksatras prevalent in India." - Abhyankar

The second part of this quote seems to heavily reflect the ideas of David Pingree. He was a strong supporter of Babylonian influence around this time and the possibility of contacts between India and Persia/Babylonia.

Generally, this interpretation is rather out of favour amongst academics today and Pingree's suggestion of Babylonian influence has been criticised by current authorities such as Yukio Ohashi. Still, I note academics on Mesopotamian history still often support Pingree's theory on the dissemination of Babylonian astronomy to India in this period. The idea is certainly a possibility. This might explain why the rasi never had hellenistic root names in India unlike many of the house terms. It hints that the idea of rasi may have a slightly older pedigree in India than the period of hellenistic influence in India. This doesn't mean I am coming round to David Frawley's theory that the rasi originated in the ancient Vedas!

However, the idea that the 27 nakshatras were 'locked' to the 12 sidereal signs around 500BCE is certainly very different! With no disrespect to these authors I would say their suggested dating for this process has been overtaken by new research. In particular, their assumption of such an early date for the combination of nakshatras with rasi cakra seems very hard to reconcile with the discovery of dated Jyotisa texts in China. Exact datings have always been the plague of Indian astrological history. However, as Bill Mak suggests the preserved Jyotisa texts in China are a 'time capsule' of the development of Indian Jyotisa. We now know that early astrological texts seem to work with the 28 nakshatras alone without the rasi cakra. This trend carries on for hundreds of years into the common era.

Mark

Mark wrote:Still, I would remind you that all the existing astrological texts passed down to us (as opposed to ancient Vedic scriptures) seem to strongly favour 28 nakshatras rather than 27.

The other way around, surely?

Generally, this interpretation is rather out of favour amongst academics today and Pingree's suggestion of Babylonian influence has been criticised by current authorities such as Yukio Ohashi. Still, I note academics on Mesopotamian history still often support Pingree's theory on the dissemination of Babylonian astronomy to India in this period. The idea is certainly a possibility. This might explain why the rasi never had hellenistic root names in India unlike many of the house terms. It hints that the idea of rasi may have a slightly older pedigree in India than the period of hellenistic influence in India. This doesn't mean I am coming round to David Frawley's theory that the rasi originated in the ancient Vedas!

The question of origins may be more complex than we imagine. The Parpola brothers at U. of Helsinki are Simo (an Assyriologist) and Asko (a Sanskritist). They have drawn attention to the maritime trade between Sumer and the Indus Valley (called Meluhha in the Sumerian records and, according to Asko, probably derived from a Dravidian word meaning "elevated place," which rather nicely describes some of the important features of monumental architecture in the Indus).

Their contention is that ideas and mythologies as well as trade goods were exchanged between the two cultures, and that similar themes can be found in both mythologies, including themes that appear in both the mythology of the nakshatras and in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

The thesis is set forth in Simo Parpola's "Garment of Sky," very difficult to find but perhaps available through abebooks or alibris.

In brief, the argument is that astronomical knowledge and associated myths were being exchanged at a very early period.

Mark wrote:

Still, I would remind you that all the existing astrological texts passed down to us (as opposed to ancient Vedic scriptures) seem to strongly favour 28 nakshatras rather than 27.

Martin Gansten wrote:

The other way around, surely?

No. I was discussing the earliest astrological texts featuring the nakshatras that have survived from the early centuries CE. Unless of course one wants to make a case that the ancient Vedic texts are indeed astrological and mainly focused on 27 nakshatras.

I did state that qualification a few times in the thread before so I didn't see the necessity to offer that caveat again. However, leaving that clarification out this time does seem to have created some confuision regarding my meaning.

As I have stated a few times already here I am deriving my view from Bill Mak's recent research of Jyotisa texts preserved in China.

Here is the thread where I highlighted this important research:

http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=7645

Sadly, that thread doesn't seem to have generated much interest on the forum despite the profound significance of Bill Mak's ground breaking work on these texts.

Mark