Horoscope ! Which timings? Indian or American?

by Mr. Sunder Rajan

Mararshi Bharadvaja (father or ancestor of Dronacharya) as mentioned in the Ramayana may not be the the author of Amshu-bodhini or Yantra Sarvasva (as there is no corroborative or contemporary reference to it in the Ramayana or subsequent texts.)

Some major and minor Indian works have been written by lesser known people (who themselves were stalwarts), but chose to attribute the text to known personalities for the sake of social acceptance.. and on the other hand, there are great authors whom people do not even know of.. for example Nandhi, Swetakethu, Kanadha, Bodhayana etc have made great contributions but are totally unknown. It will be definitely interesting to explore these personalities sometime (when there is sufficient time and interest.)

Astronomy vs Astrology: Astronomy is the objective study of the Heavenly bodies while Astrology is a subjective study (of the cosmos relation to a particular life form.) Some people are confused about preparing Jathakams for kids born in Northamerica (whether to take Daylight savings into consideration or not etc.) Just imagine the earth as a 'flat earth model'.. at any given moment, the horoscope of a person born ANYWHERE on earth will be exactly the same.. i.e. A person born in California at 1.00 AM PST will be the same as a person born at 1:30 PM IST. (The major chart positions will be the same, but minor ones like navamsa or sthaana bhala etc may differ slightly.)

Maintaining astral records of a birth: Why do Indians make horoscopes when a baby is born? Well, the recording of a 'jathakam' or 'horoscope' for tracking a person's birth date is much more reliable than an 'english date of birth'!! Reason?? Let's say a birth certificate says, 1st January, 1970... and a martian finds this, say 10000 years from now.. the number 1970 will mean nothing to them.. 1970 from what? On the other hand, if the same martian finds a chart (Sun in this position, moon in this position, Jupiter there, mars here etc..) The placement of the heavenly bodies will chart back to a unique date and time in the past (provided the martian knows how to calculate these position ;))

What is the scoop on ABHIJIT or VEGA ?

By Sunder Rajan

What is the scoop on ABHIJIT or VEGA?:

Traditionally, the Indian Zodiac has 27 stars (Aswini, our own Bharani, Krithika, Rohini etc..) But this was not always so... according to Indian astronomers, the Zodiac had 28 stars...

In the Mahabharata - in the Vana Parva (230:8-11) - there is a conversation between Indra and Skandha. Skandha states that Abhijit (Vega in english) 'fell off the Zodiac path!!!!'  For a long time, this was ridiculed by the 'rationalists' of the day - laughing at the idea that a star can 'fall' :)

We now know that Vega did move away from the Zodiac (moon's path) sometime between 23,000 BC and 12,000 BC. This 'move' is because of the earth's axis shift.

What is interesting here is not the conversation itself.. The earth's axis does not tilt in one day or even in one (human) generation. It is very interesting to note that our ancestors had observed the skies, and passed it on to the next generation by word of mouth (remember, we had no scripts for a long time) and this went on for at least few thousand years, until someone jotted it down in the Mahabharatha.

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On another note, did you know that 1000 years before Copernicus, Aryabhatta had mentioned that the earth goes around the sun, in 365.25 days - in anelliptical orbit(!!!!), and also calculated the Siderial rotation? :) Or that the Rigveda (according to Saayana bhashya) mentions the Speed of Light to be 186500 miles per second? :)

Did you know Ancient Indian astronomers also said that the earth does not go around the sun in one 'full ellipse' like Ramsharma sir would draw on the board.. but it goes around in a spiral (never coming back to the same point it started..:) can you figure out why...?