Skyscript Astrology Forum

Recently I got very interested in finding out what Nakshatras had to offer, for all planets not just the moon.

I got surprised to find out that the only traditional book that makes predictions based on planets in 4 Nakshatra padas was Ravana Samhita, thought to be written by Ravana himself. I read a few translated chapters for 6 Nakshatras and got very impressed. Some of them were spot on in my chart. Sadly, I found only these 6 nakshatra translations on the net.

Have the forum members read Ravana Samhita? Do you think it is value addition in jyotish?

For those who wonder about the origin of Bepin Behari's interpretations of the nakshatras, I was a conslutant to David Frawley for Myths and Symbols as well as the managing editor of Vols 1 and 2 of Behari's other work.

Bepin Behari came from a family with close connections to early Theosophists such as Olcott, Ledbetter, and Hodgson. His own personal teacher was Hodgson. He was aware of the fact that Dane Rudhyar also had a Theosophical background, and he had a respect for Western astrology which took him to Rudhyar as a source for some of his general philosophical ideas. All of this information was conveyed to me through personal correspondence with Mr. Behari during the time that I acted as his US editor. His interpretations of the nakshatras were far from traditional and based largely upon the contemporary esoteric writers and philosophies noted above.

The earliest clear mention of the nakshatras is Atharva Veda 19.7. All 28 nakhsatras are listed with their contemporary names -- Abhijit is on the list, and those who assert that Abhijit is a recent development related solely to muhurtha have clearly never seen the AV.

I have in my possession a work entitled Shardulakarnavadana. Because the text is largely Buddhist, it has been ignored by Hindu scholars. The love story that forms the bulk of the text was turned into a dance-drama by India's Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore; it is thanks to this fact that we have a critical edition in Sanskrit. These astrological portions of the book are clearly Hindu -- they seem at times to be a kind of manual for purohitam or "house priests." The astrological portions, originally Hindu, were simply inserted into the Buddhist text. Most of it is devoted to muhurtha, which is normal, as electional typically precedes natal astrology. Pingree dates the text to the beginning of the Christian era.

No zodiacal signs are mentioned. The whole book is "nakshatras only." There is, however, a section on "birth in the nakshatras," which is the earliest such chapter I have been able to locate. My own translation can be found on my website http://kennethjohnsonastrology.com. It is entitled "Legend of the Southern Cross," which is what Shardulakarnavadana actually means. Not only is Abhijit present, it is considered one of the most important nakshatras.

In the Mahabharata, it is said that Yudhisthira was born under Abhijit, again stressing its importance. Elsewhere, the Mahabharata states that the sister Abhijit became jealous of her sibling Rohini and retired to the forest to become an ascetic, abandoning the world of the sky.

The next earliest text on birth in the nakshatras is probably the Vrddha Yavanajataka by Minaraja. This text is over a thousand pages long in the Sanskrit original and has never been translated. Valerie Roebuck translated the chapter on nakshatras, however. Minaraja's interpretation of c. 325 CE bears little resemblance to the Shardulakarnavadana of some 300 years earlier, and by the time of Minaraja we have lost Abhijit altogether. Minaraja's interpretations are much closer to those of Varaha Mihira in the Brhat Jataka -- and VM may have been basing his own chapter on Minaraja. Interestingly enough, Minaraja has a separate chapter for women born under particular nakshatras, now being studied by Ms. Ronnie Gale Dreyer as part of her MA program in Eastern Studies at Columbia.

Finally we get to Varaha Mihira c. 550 CE. Everything after that seems to be based on his work. There is no chapter on "birth in the nakshatras" in Parasara, and I do not regard Parasara as a trustworthy source in any case, as the text was clearly tampered with rather badly in the mid-19th century.

So Behari's work should be considered unique unto itself, inspired as much by contemporary Western esoterica as it was by ancient sources.

If you really want to know about nakshatras, study muhurtha. The signs of the zodiac play only a minor role in this art; the nakshatras still take pride of place. If you are not in the mood to tackle the Kalaprakashika or Muhurtha Chintamani, you can easily acquire Ernst Wilhelm's book on classical muhurtha, which is as thorough, detailed, and clear as anyone could hope for.

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Ken, thanks so much for the historical background of the nakshatras, and for filling in the details on Bepin Behari's view of the mansions. I never tuned in very well to Behari's writings, so am happy to know more about his Theosophical background. It's getting more and more difficult to separate the ancient teachings of India's astrology from modern overlays. Of course many of the zodiac basics were imported from the west anyway. This is an interesting study in itself.

It does seem that the mansions are useful mainly for muhurta. I enjoyed reading "Legend of the Southern Cross." I'm always happy when I come across translations of the older writings. But I've always wondered about the expression of the nakshatra stars now that some of them are out of alignment in the 27 mansion scheme.

For example, we know that Arcturus, Swathi's star, is in the same longitude as Spica so is now located in Chitra rather than our modern mansion of Swati. Why do all the modern mansion/nakshatra books place Arcturus in Swati? And what does this mean about the interpretation of that mansion? Likewise there are other misplaced nakshatra stars in the 27 mansion scheme.

Yes, Therese, it is true that the longitude of some important nakshatra stars is a bit "off."

However, al-Biruni, in his summary of Jyotish at the end of his book on India, remarks that he encountered two different ways in which astrologers noted the nakshatras: One of them was by way of 13.20 degrees, just as in contemporary Jyotish.

But al-Biruni also met astrologers who just marked the nakshatras visually, by naked eye astronomy, with no regard for degrees. This is probably the more ancient way of doing it. It is even possible that Abhijit was tossed out because 27 mansions made a better fit with the 360-degree Babylonian circle.

In fact, some stars have changed over time. The lunar mansion of Ardra is now marked by Betelgeuse, though there is some compelling evidence from the Aitareya Brahmana that Ardra was associated with Sirius in the earliest days.

A number of public buildings have been found in the Indus Valley which seem to be orientated to the risings and settings of Aldebaran (Rohini) and Antares (Jyeshta) at the vernal equinox c. 3000 BC. This would seem to indicate that the nakshatra stars have been important for a long, long time and that the calendar of India has been oriented to the vernal equinox for an equally long time.

If so, the original process of observing the nakshatras would have been solely by way of naked eye astronomy, as the Babylonians had not yet fully developed their sexagesimal system of mathematics or their 360-degree circle.

The archaic nature of the nakshatras can be seen in my translations -- note that the lists all begin with Krittika, which would have been the vernal equinox point around 2400 BC. For some reason, they never adjusted the nakshatras to arrive at a Bharani beginning, even though the vernal equinox would have been in Bharani when that text (the Shardulakarnavadana) was written. After the introduction of the Greek zodiac, they began their count with Ashvini, seemingly in order to harmonize their indigenous system more closely with the Greek zodiac and its 0 Aries beginning.

In Answer to Varuna's criticisms:

I have practiced Jyotish since 1987, so can hardly be regarded as a strict tropicalist. Neither am I prepared to "stand on a soapbox" as we say in an American idiom, as I find both systems work well as long as we remain with the rules that apply to each system rather than attempting to mix them.

You do a disgrace to the memory of the great scholar David Pingree by suggesting cultural bias and even egotistical prejudice on his part. Many of my friends went to visit him at his office at Brown Univ, primarily with the goal of dicussing Hellenistic astrology. Instead, he wandered off topic, again and again, to India -- always in terms of the deepest affection and love. Of the many languages he spoke, Sanskrit was his first love, and he often wrote that no one could understand the history of astronomy unless they understood India. Fervid attempts by Vedic fundamentalists to discredit him are simply libelous in that regard. I have heard him accused of "hating India" simply because he did not buy into the revisionist (and intensely nationalist) notion that India originated everything at some mystical date thousands of years ago, and that the entire historical record is therefore a pack of lies.

I tend to come across two different attitudes: The Vedic attitude is that all astrology was "revealed" in India thousands and thousand of years ago, and thus all historical records to the contrary are falsifications created in an attempt to discredit India. I also come across the attitude of the Hellenists, who refuse to admit any inventiveness or originality whatsoever on the part of Sanskrit astrologers, and if confronted with something outside their knowledge, will spend days searching for any reference, no matter how trivial, that seems to point to a Greek rather than Sanskrit original for a particular doctrine.

Both of these extreme positions obscure a long and complex process of cultural interchange and syncretism which has been going on since the inhabitants of the Indus were listed as "visitors from Meluha" on the cuneiform tablets of Dilmun. This process of cultural interchange still goes on. After all, Alan Leo's "re-invention" of Western astrology c. 1890 was based largely on his time spent in India; some of his interpretations are simply Jyotish transferred to a tropical zodiac. Before Leo's time, the Eighth House was NEVER called the house of sex. This interpretation seems to be based onLeo's brief and cursory studies of Tantra, which he appears to have misunderstood rather drastically.

So I don't want to reduce discussions to the absurd by taking a fundamentalist stance for either tropical or sidereal, Western or Vedic. The wanderings of astrology along the old Silk Road constitute a cultural exchange of the most complex and important nature.

The entire reason that I went back to school for an MA when I was already in my 50s and majored in Sanskrit was in hopes of collecting previously unkown and untranslated texts (I have four or five now) and to translate at least parts of them in an attempt to shed a bit of light on the actual processes of cultural exchange inherent in the history and dissemination of astrology.

Sincerely,

Ken Johnson

Kenneth Johnson wrote:

In fact, some stars have changed over time. The lunar mansion of Ardra is now marked by Betelgeuse, though there is some compelling evidence from the Aitareya Brahmana that Ardra was associated with Sirius in the earliest days.

Actually Betelgeuse is now in Mrigasirsha (mansion of Mars) along with other bright stars of Orion. Ardra has only the feet of the Gemini twins. A number of ancient nakshatra stars are more than "a bit off" in relation to the 27 mansions. So my question remains as to how ruling deities and characteristics of the ancient nakshatra stars are to be applied in today's practice of astrology?

I question if those who write today's astrology books ever studied a map of the sky based on the ecliptic (or observed the sky itself) and noted the actual position of the nakshatra stars in relation to today's mansions and signs of the zodiac? (Problems of the actual identification of nakshatra stars are mentioned in Surya Siddhanta, p. 210 in the Burgess translation (Delhi: Indological Book House, 1977).

This is not to denigrate your book, Ken, which is the text I recommend to anyone who asks about India's lunar mansions. But today's 27 mansions are not the ancient nakshatras. That's the point I am trying to make, because there is a fundamental problem involved in the actual use of the ancient nakshatra stars. Should the supposed influence of the ancient stars even extend beyond their immediate location?

Then exactly what are today's lunar mansions? Are they actually an entirely unique lunar zodiac with specific meanings and application? Should their symbolism match the primary stars within the boundaries of each mansion rather than artificially pinning ancient star meanings on to each mansion? Should each ancient nakshatra star be interpreted only in its actual location, no matter which modern mansion the star falls in when measured in ecliptic longitude? I believe these are important questions that (as far as I know) no one has researched or even thought about.

Then the 27 mansions have become aligned with the navamsas making four "quarters" in each mansion. The navamsa division certainly has nothing to do with ancient nakshatra stars.

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Somewhat off-topic, and very briefly:

Kenneth Johnson wrote:Alan Leo's "re-invention" of Western astrology c. 1890 was based largely on his time spent in India; some of his interpretations are simply Jyotish transferred to a tropical zodiac. Before Leo's time, the Eighth House was NEVER called the house of sex.

I wasn't aware that Leo had spent time in India; is that mentioned in his wife's biography of him? In any case, as far as I know there is no justification in any Sanskrit text either for connecting the eighth house with sex. It is connected with the sexual organs (just as in the west), but not with the act of coitus, which is assigned to the seventh house.

I also wondered about Leo's time spent in India. I did a search and found Kim Farnell's biography of Leo on Skyscript. In part:

"...The court case may have been instrumental in prompting the Leo's trip to India later that year. As all good theosophists would, they joined the then president of the Theosophical Society, Annie Besant, at the Society's headquarters in Adyar, Madras.
(...)
"The Leos returned to India in 1911, returning on 5 May with Annie Besant and Krishnamurti. They were the first to join the new theosophical organisation that revolved around Krishnamurti, The Order of the Star in the East..."

http://www.skyscript.co.uk/Alan_Leo.html
A list of sources is given at the end of the article, which is quite long.

This is in answer to Therese.

I think the mansions have to be linked with the actual stars, as these are "myths in the sky." Tying them to the actual zodiac will, or course, produce the precessional changes you mention, but perhaps this is why al-Biruni is so careful to mention that some astrologers just tracked the mansions by "naked eye astronomy" rather than relying on the zodiacal divisons of 13.20 degrees.

Consider Rohini and Jyestha. One is the goddess as nymph, the other is the goddess as crone. Both stars are red, and stand in opposition to each other. In ancient times, Rohini, the youthful one, seems to have been associated with the vernal equinox, when the days begin to grow longer (and "growth" is one possible nuance of the word rohini itself). As it says in the Mahabharata: "There was a time when Rohini was the beginning of the nakshtras." Likewise, they had the Crone Goddess Jyeshta at the autumn equinox, when the days grow shorter. This is a myth in the sky, and it is based upon the physical properties and the appearance of these two stars, Aldebaran and Antares.

Another example: Go out and take a look at the sky in the winter. First, you will see Aldebaran rise. After her comes Orion. While Orion is "the cosmic man" in both Egypt (Osiris) and India (Prajapati), what Westerners see as Orion's bow and arrow was seen as his out-stretched arm in India. This relates to the myth of how the god Prajapati chased his daughter Rohini (Aldebaran) through the sky, consumed with lust, reaching out towards her. The gods decided to destroy the world-maker Prajapati so as to prevent the world-shattering crime of incest. So the next thing rising after Orion is Sirius. This is Shiva (Rudra) the Destroyer, and he will shoot his arrow right through the middle of Prajapati (the arrow is Orion's belt).

So how can the meanings of Rohini (Aldebaran), Mrigashira (Prajapati) and Ardra (Shiva the Destroyer) be separate from the way we actually visualize them in the sky? Sure, a star may end up a tiny bit off the actual zodiacal boundaries of the mansion, but it is the meaning, the visual experience of sky, that prevails.

While some, like Schmidt, may argue that the Hellenistic texts are technical manuals altogether and contain no myth (and I am not sure I entirely agree with him on that point), the same cannot be said for the nakshatras. These are stories in the sky. If the computer program says that the Moon is in Rohini, I may not know for sure if the slow movement of the stars has led her to cross the "official" boundaries (I met some old Hawaiians who held up one finger next to a star and said, "In 72 years it will have crossed this finger, and our children will need to know about in order to navigate properly"), but I will take it for granted that the actual myth of the Red Goddess and her love affairs is the relevant theme here, and I will not worry too much if Aldebaran (the physical appearance of Rohini) is a bit off the mark.

In questions which seem to be a conflict between myth and math, I guess you could say that I am clearly on the side of myth.

And in reply to Martin, it is most definitely true that no classical Sanskrit text connects the 8th with sex. Also correct that it is the 7th. 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.

Actually, the 8th is never associated with sex in Hellenistic or medieval astrology either, and to the best of my knowledge does not even appear in Western astrology until Alan Leo. I did not mean to imply that he was relying upon standard Jyotish interpretations of the 8th House as somehow related to sex -- there were no such standard interpretations.

He knew just enough about Tantra to confuse some of its major premises. By associating sexual orgasm with "death of the ego personality," or as the French would say, "le petit mort," he came to think that sex and death should be in the same place.