Rashi mantra in the Vedanga Jyotisha is spurious!

October 4, 2009

Dear friends,

Kindly look at following statement of AKK carefully :

I had also gone through the complete VJ with an exhaustive Hindi

commentary by Dr. Suresh Chandra Mishra, Jyotishacharya, published by a

Daryaganj, Delhi, publisher in 2003. Dr. Mishra, after discussing

thoroughly the pros and cons, has said, without mincing any words, on

pages 51-52 of his commentary, " ...this shloka has been interpolated by

some good for nothing (the exact Hindi word used by Dr. Mishra is

" angadh " ---a humpty-dumpty " intellectual " ) person, and as such gives

very wrong results....There was nothing like a rashi of thirty degrees

in the Vedanga Jyotisha period, but even then this mantra talks of Mina

etc. rashis. Rashi

word has been used in an entirely different manner like parva-rashi,

bha-rashi etc in the VJ....This shloka has not even been numbered i.e.

it is without any number and Somakar (a commentator of repute in the

past) also has not commented on it " .

What is all the more surprising is that this spurious mantra, without

any number after the fourth mantra, occurs in the Yajush-Jyotisham and

not Rik Jyotisham! Yajush-Jyotisham is a much later work than the

Rik-Jyotisham and as per Dr. Mishra in his foreword, " There is an

unbroken tradition among the Vedic Brahmins

that those who know even ABC of jyotisha recite at least once the

Rik-Jyotisham everyday, like some Sukta etc. and it is revered like the

Rig-Veda itself. I must make it clear here that Yajush-Jyotisham is not

held in that high esteem at all nor is it recited daily " . Dikshit also

has said the same thing.

One person had made assertions without any proof and another had appreciated.

!)

Dr. Mishra obviously had not read that about the twelve divisions of the

ecliptic (or the Gopath) in the Rig Veda, which automaticaly means that each

division will be 30 degrees. In the Geocentric model it is the road by which the

Sun moves round the earth. In that model while the Sun moves the road does not

move. Any intelligent person will understand that. Had Dr. Mishra read it he

would have realised that the ecliptic has the 27 fixed Nakshatras in that and

that the 12 Rashi divisions accommodate the 27 fixed Nakshatras as shown in the

Vamana Purana.

2)

It appears that Dr. Mishra himself may be a good for nothing person if he is

challenging the writer of the Vedanga Jyotisha and we have also to remember that

the famous scholar Kuppanna Shastri also considers the Rashi verse to be very

useful and stated in his book that it is for this reason the verse is still

there. Obviously nobody had deleted it inspite of the severe onslaught from the

people who followed the Max Mullerian chronolgy, which was formulated around

1882 CE. According to Max Muller the date of Rigveda was around 1200 BCE and

all other ancient Indian shastras were considered to be quite some centuries

after that. That is why the scholars (Dixit was no exception) right from the end

of the nineteenth century got an impression that the Rashis could have been

borrowed from the Greeks. Later on David Pingree reinforced that conviction in

the unsuspecting Indian scholsrs. Any sensible person will not value the

date-related opinions of

those scholars influenced by the Max Mullerian chronology, howevermuch sincere

they might have been. As regards Dr. Mishra's qualification as Jyotishacharya

it is not relevant here as he might have passed some examination to get the

title Jyotishacharya but that does not entitle him to make any unsubstantiated

statement.

3)

The fact that Somakar had not commented on the Rashi verse does not mean that

the verse is redundant. If it was not required then Somakar would have said so.

AKK is not aware that Somakar had not commented on another verse also of the

Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha. This is not relevant to the presence of the verse in the

Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha.

4).

Dr. Mishra is obviously ignorant of the mention of the Rashis in the Puranas

(the fifth Veda)

5)

A de-numbered Rashi obviously will not have a number , wnich any intelligent

person will understand. Under the influence of Pingree some people thought that

the Rashis could not be there in Vedanga Jyotisha. As a mark of suspect they

have obviously removed its numbering but did not dare to remove the genuine

verse altogether.

6)

A look at the Sanskrit dictionary will show that the word Rashi means a group

and it can be used in that sense anywhere as and when applicable. If it is used

for Parva -Rashi etc. that does not mean that the Puranas were wrong in using

the word Rashi for designating the twelve Rashis. Only a unthinking person can

cook up such arguments.

7)

If the Rig Vedanga Jyotisha is considered more respectable than the

Yajur-Vedanga jyotisha then does i mean that the yYajur Vedanga Jyotisha is not

required? If that was so it would not have been a part of the Vedanga jyotisha

at all. Only a good for nothing person will give such hollow arguments. Whether

it is in high esteem or not as compared to the Rig Vedanga Jyotisha is not

relevant to the authenticity of the Rashi verse. Bringing such irrelevant point

for discussion itself points to a confused mind of the person bringing such

points.

Regards,

Sunil K. Bhattacharjya

--- On Sat, 10/3/09, jyotirved <jyotirved wrote:

jyotirved <jyotirved

Rashi mantra in the Vedanga Jyotisha is spurious!

hinducalendar

Cc: , hinducivilization , " subash

razdan " <subashrazdan

Saturday, October 3, 2009, 8:25 AM

Dear friends,

Jai Shri Ram!

In # No. 2807 of May 27, 09 of WAVES-vedic forum Shri Sunil Bhattacharjya had

quoted his mentor as saying " Some preliminary evidence to prove the existence of

Meshadi month names in Vedic period is given below) Take the Yajur Vedanga

Jyotisha text and read the 5th sloka. It reads as follows - Ye brihaspatina

bhuktva MEENAN prabbriti rasayaH te hritaH panchabhiryataH yaH seshaH sa

parigrihaH

(Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha - sloka 5)

[Take the sign count of Jupiter counting from Meena Rasi (Pisces Sign),

............. .......etc] I believe you have noticed the words 'Meenan prabhriti

RasayaH' [signs counted from Meena Rasi (Pisces Sign)]. That proves the

existence of signs like Meena, Mesha etc in Vedanga Jyotisha period. "

The name " Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha " itself is misleading! There is actually no

such workI The original work is titled Vedanga Jyotisham (VJ) by Lagadha. It

was later divided into two separate portions Rik Jyotisham and Yajush-jyotishm

(but not Rik-Vednga-Jyotisha or Yajur-Vedanga jyotisha)

I had already seen the translation/ commentary of the VJ by S. B. Dikshit in his

" Bharatiya Jyotisha Shastra " but he has not referred to any such mantra even in

an oblique manner. On the other hand, he has said on page 147 (English

translation) " The names of Rashis Mesha and others came into vogue at about 400

BS. The names of week days came into use before them, and have been borrowed

from foreign countries " . And Dikshit had written those words in 1896 AD,, i.e.

much before David Pingree!

I had also gone through the complete VJ with an exhaustive Hindi commentary by

Dr. Suresh Chandra Mishra, Jyotishacharya, published by a Daryaganj, Delhi,

publisher in 2003. Dr. Mishra, after discussing thoroughly the pros and cons,

has said, without mincing any words, on pages 51-52 of his commentary, " ...this

shloka has been interpolated by some good for nothing (the exact Hindi word used

by Dr. Mishra is " angadh " ---a humpty-dumpty " intellectual " ) person, and as such

gives very wrong results....There was nothing like a rashi of thirty degrees in

the Vedanga Jyotisha period, but even then this mantra talks of Mina etc.

rashis. Rashi word has been used in an entirely different manner like

parva-rashi, bha-rashi etc in the VJ....This shloka has not even been numbered

i.e. it is without any number and Somakar (a commentator of repute in the past)

also has not commented on it " .

What is all the more surprising is that this spurious mantra, without any number

after the fourth mantra, occurs in the Yajush-Jyotisham and not Rik Jyotisham!

Yajush-Jyotisham is a much later work than the Rik-Jyotisham and as per Dr.

Mishra in his foreword, " There is an unbroken tradition among the Vedic Brahmins

that those who know even ABC of jyotisha recite at least once the Rik-Jyotisham

everyday, like some Sukta etc. and it is revered like the Rig-Veda itself. I

must make it clear here that Yajush-Jyotisham is not held in that high esteem at

all nor is it recited daily " . Dikshit also has said the same thing.

All these anachronisms were pointed out to Shri Bhattacharjya vide # 5127 dt.

June 11 of abhinavagupta forum. But he inssited in several posts to Shri K. K.

Mehrotra of waves-vedic that he must see the edition that does not refer to

rashi mantra as spurious. Shri Bhattacharjya' s message No. # No. 26262 of June

25, of Shri Bhattacharjya in vedic_research_ institute reads, " INSA stands for

Indian national Science Academy. The Vedanga Jyotisha was published in their

" Indian Journal of History of Science, Vol.19, No. 4, Supplement. Their website

is www.insa.ac. in "

Shri Mehrotra had asked in #No. 5232 dt. June 26 of Abhinavagupta forum, " The

email address at which this post was sent to INSA does not exist and the mail

was received back. I, therefore, request Dr. Sunil Bhattacharjya again to give

the full address of the website wherefrom he is supposed to have downloaded the

Vedanga Jyotisha by Acharya Lagadha, with the fifth mantra showing Mina rashi " .

And this is what Shri Bhattacharjya had replied in the same post, " Shri

Mehrotra can contact Indian National Science Academy. Or he can place an order

on a bookseller for the book. If he thinks he must have the book let him get

it. "

It was clear from Shri Bhattacharjya' s messsages that he had the INSA edition

ofthe VJ edition with him, or had at least seen it and there was no doubt in his

mind that the fifth mantra in the Vedanga Jyotisha (Yajush-Jyotisham) of INSA

edition was not spurious but had been listeed as fifth mantra there.

Being out of print, I could not get this book anywhere. A friend of mine,

however, sent the complete electronic edition to me through email but he does

not want his name to be disclosed!

This work had been translated originally by Prof. T. S. Kuppanna Sastry in a

draft form and since it could not be published during his life time, it was

later checked for corrections and edited by Dr. K. V. Sarma of Kuppannaswamy

Research Institute, Madras, and published by Indian National Science Academy,

Delhi, a government body, in 1985.

To my amazement (amusement!) , from a perusal of this INSA work also I found

that the so called Rashi mantra is actually from Yajush-jyotisham and has been

referred to as a spurious mantra and is without any number in that work as well.

Let me quote the full text of the translator/commenta tor, Prof. T. S. Kuppanna

Sastry, on page 50 about the same, " This verse is patently an interpolation.

Firstly, it is unnumbered and found only in the Yajusha recension. Secondly,

the word rashi itself, meaning the division of the zodiac of 30° each, named

Mesha (Aries), Rishaba (Taurus) upto Mina (Pisces) is of foreign origin and came

to India only during first centuries AD along with Greek astrology. Upto and

including the time of last samhitas of the early centuries of BC the only

zodiacal signs known in India were the nakshatras divisions. The word Rashi

used in the VJ means only 'group', for example parva-rashi means a group of

fortnights and bha-rashi meaning the group of nakshatra segments " .

Prof. Sastry himself and the editor Dr. Sarma have given a list of manuscripts

they consulted. Those manuscripts are listed on pages 8-9 of the INSA work.

It was thus a puzzle for everybody including me as to how Shri Bhattacharjya had

said so authoritatively that the INSA edition had talked of the so called fifth

mantra in the VJ referring to Mina etc. rashis not being spurious!

The solution of the puzzle dawned on me with the " revelation " that Shri

Bhattacharjya is a " Parokshya-darshi " who claims to see things which others

miss! He must, therefore, have visualized this mantra in INSA edition as

original through his parokshya knowledge just as he claims to have " visualized "

: Mesha, Vrisha etc. Rashis--that also the so called nirayana ones---in the

Vedas through that very parokshya knowledge!

Anyway, I am enclosing five pages in pdf format---Preface, pages 8-9 and

50-51---and you can verify for yourself all the details.

It appears that parokshya knowledge means, therefore, something like

" somnambulism " , or even hallucination i.e seeing things which others can't

see! That is why Shri Bhattacharjya " saw " the fifth mantra in the INSA VJ

edition also as original instead of spurious!

It must also be put on record that since it is common knowledge by now that

Mesha, Vrisha etc. Rashis have been imported from Babylonia via Greece into

India around early centuries of CE, " Vedic astrologers " are thus themselves

trying to prove that the Vedas and the Vedanga Jyotisha etc. etc. are all post

CE works! They are thus doing an incalculable damage to the entire cultural

history of India, in their anti-Vedic efforts to prove that Mesha etc. Rashis

and Mangal, Shani etc. planets have been referred to in the Vedas---or the

Valmiki Ramayna etc., for that matter! And the more the " Vedic astrologers " and

" Vedic astronomers " continue their such efforts, the more damage they will go on

doing to the real Vedic cultural ethos and the more we will forget about Madhu,

Madhava etc. Vedic months and continue to celebrate Lahiri or Ramana or

Muladhara etc. Makara and Mesha Sankrantis etc.!

Jai Shri Ram.

A K Kaul

PS

If any owner/moderator of any forum so desires, the complete version of the VJ,

INSA edition (pdf) can be sent by email for uploading in his/her forum. There

are no copyright hassles.

AKK

October 4, 2009

Dear friends,

Jai Shri Ram!

Shri Bhattacharjya has said, " It appears that Dr. Mishra himself

may be a good for nothing person if he is challenging the writer of the

Vedanga Jyotisha and we have also to remember that the famous scholar

Kuppanna Shastri also considers the Rashi verse to be very useful and

stated in his book that it is for this reason the verse is still there.

Obviously nobody had deleted it in spite of the severe onslaught from

the people who followed the Max Mullerian chronology, which was

formulated around

1882 CE. "

There was absolutely no need for my friend Shri Bhattacharjya to eat

such a long yarn!

All that Shri Bhattacharjya wants to prove is that except for him and

some " Vedic astrologers " , all the scholars of India like S B Dikshit and

Dr. Kuppanna Shastry and Dr. Suresh Chandra Mishra and even Somakar or

even Gita Press translators of the Valmiki Ramayana etc. etc. were/are

good for nothing fellows and were/are influenced by Max Muller's

chronology!

Actually, it is the other way round! " Vedic astrologers " are themselves

enveloped in tamoguni budhih and that is why they twist everything the

way they want to! They thus read even dharmashastras upside down!

Example is better than precept! Shri Bhattacharjya has said, " Dr.

Mishra obviously had not read that about the twelve divisions of the

ecliptic (or the Gopath) in the Rig Veda, which automatically means

that each division will be 30 degrees. In the Geocentric model it is the

road by which the Sun moves round the earth. "

I am reminded of the tragic fate of Galileo of Galilee, who was made to

recant the Copernicus' Heliocentric theory by the Church there and say,

" The earth does not move round the sun "

The poor Galileo had to mutter silently, " et per se, it moveth " ( " It is

immaterial what I say, all the same, the earth does moves (round the

sun) " .

Besides, Shri Bhattacharjya says, " Which automatically means that

each division will be 30 degrees " ! In fact, the journey of the

sun/earth is through Vedic months which are not of " equal

divisions " of thirty days (degrees) each! It is only selfish

jyotishis like Bhattacharjya who transmute the months into twelve equal

divisions of the ecliptic!

If the VJ had intended to talk of Mesha etc. Rashis, it would not have

felt shy of listing rashi names like Mesha etc instead of or besieds

Tapah, Tapasya and Magha, Phalguna etc. months!

" Vedic astrologers " like Bhattacharjya want us to believe further that

the Vedic seers had no idea about the movement of the earth and planets

round the sun and believed in the Geocentric system like the Surya

Sidhanta by Maya the mlechha! Thus " Vedic astrologers " are

themselves belittling the Vedic seers! Even if, for the sake of

argument we agree that the Vedic seers had no such knowledge that the

solar system was heliocentric and not geocentric, why do " Vedic

astrologers " like Bhattacharjya calculate not only their own

" Vedic horoscopes " but even divinities like Shri Ram and Shri

Krishen etc. etc. from heliocentric data from JPL/NASA? They must

continue to prepare them from the SS or Grahalaghava---since we do not

have any " Vedic astronomy " works that talk of planets

vis-à-vis rashis prior to the Surya Sidhanta by Maya the mlechha!

Just see the irony! In spite of using heliocentric planetary data of

inanimate planets like Mars, Saturn etc. from JPL/NASA in their

unscientific and anti-Vedic charts, they call their predictive gimmicks

as " Vedic astrology " ! Heads I win and tail you lose! That is

the real tamoguni budhih!

Then again, as usual, Shri Bhattacharjya is quoting everything without

context and out of context! May be he is again visualizing everything

through his " parokshya knowledge "

And that reminds me that in spite of doing all this exercise, he has

yet to reply the point as to when the INSA edition of VJ refers to the

Rashi mantra as spurious, how and why did Shri Bhattacharjya advise Shri

K K Mehrotra to get that edition for verifying it himself that the

commentators/translators of that work had said that that mantra was not

spurious!

Why is Shri Bhattacharjya feeling shy of admitting that had seen it only

through his " parokshya knowledge " ---- a hallucination---i.e., something

contrary to the facts---just as he is seeing Mesha etc. rashis in the

Vedas! God only knows what other things he will visualize further

through his " parokshya knowledge " i.e., hallucinations! Better

beware!

Jai Shri Ram

A K Kaul

, Sunil Bhattacharjya

<sunil_bhattacharjya wrote:

>

> Dear friends,

>

> Kindly look at following statement of AKK carefully :

>

> I had also gone through the complete VJ with an exhaustive Hindi

> commentary by Dr. Suresh Chandra Mishra, Jyotishacharya, published by

a

> Daryaganj, Delhi, publisher in 2003. Dr. Mishra, after discussing

> thoroughly the pros and cons, has said, without mincing any words, on

> pages 51-52 of his commentary, " ...this shloka has been interpolated

by

> some good for nothing (the exact Hindi word used by Dr. Mishra is

> " angadh " ---a humpty-dumpty " intellectual " ) person, and as such gives

> very wrong results....There was nothing like a rashi of thirty degrees

> in the Vedanga Jyotisha period, but even then this mantra talks of

Mina

> etc. rashis. Rashi

> word has been used in an entirely different manner like parva-rashi,

> bha-rashi etc in the VJ....This shloka has not even been numbered i.e.

> it is without any number and Somakar (a commentator of repute in the

> past) also has not commented on it " .

>

> What is all the more surprising is that this spurious mantra, without

> any number after the fourth mantra, occurs in the Yajush-Jyotisham and

> not Rik Jyotisham! Yajush-Jyotisham is a much later work than the

> Rik-Jyotisham and as per Dr. Mishra in his foreword, " There is an

> unbroken tradition among the Vedic Brahmins

> that those who know even ABC of jyotisha recite at least once the

> Rik-Jyotisham everyday, like some Sukta etc. and it is revered like

the

> Rig-Veda itself. I must make it clear here that Yajush-Jyotisham is

not

> held in that high esteem at all nor is it recited daily " . Dikshit also

> has said the same thing.

>

> One person had made assertions without any proof and another had

appreciated.

> !)

> Dr. Mishra obviously had not read that about the twelve divisions of

the ecliptic (or the Gopath) in the Rig Veda, which automaticaly means

that each division will be 30 degrees. In the Geocentric model it is the

road by which the Sun moves round the earth. In that model while the Sun

moves the road does not move. Any intelligent person will understand

that. Had Dr. Mishra read it he would have realised that the ecliptic

has the 27 fixed Nakshatras in that and that the 12 Rashi divisions

accommodate the 27 fixed Nakshatras as shown in the Vamana Purana.

> 2)

> It appears that Dr. Mishra himself may be a good for nothing person

if he is challenging the writer of the Vedanga Jyotisha and we have also

to remember that the famous scholar Kuppanna Shastri also considers the

Rashi verse to be very useful and stated in his book that it is for

this reason the verse is still there. Obviously nobody had deleted it

inspite of the severe onslaught from the people who followed the Max

Mullerian chronolgy, which was formulated around 1882 CE. According to

Max Muller the date of Rigveda was around 1200 BCE and all other ancient

Indian shastras were considered to be quite some centuries after that.

That is why the scholars (Dixit was no exception) right from the end of

the nineteenth century got an impression that the Rashis could have

been borrowed from the Greeks. Later on David Pingree reinforced that

conviction in the unsuspecting Indian scholsrs. Any sensible person will

not value the date-related opinions of

> those scholars influenced by the Max Mullerian chronology, howevermuch

sincere they might have been. As regards Dr. Mishra's qualification as

Jyotishacharya it is not relevant here as he might have passed some

examination to get the title Jyotishacharya but that does not entitle

him to make any unsubstantiated statement.

> 3)

> The fact that Somakar had not commented on the Rashi verse does not

mean that the verse is redundant. If it was not required then Somakar

would have said so. AKK is not aware that Somakar had not commented on

another verse also of the Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha. This is not relevant

to the presence of the verse in the Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha.

> 4).

> Dr. Mishra is obviously ignorant of the mention of the Rashis in the

Puranas (the fifth Veda)

> 5)

> A de-numbered Rashi obviously will not have a number , wnich any

intelligent person will understand. Under the influence of Pingree some

people thought that the Rashis could not be there in Vedanga Jyotisha.

As a mark of suspect they have obviously removed its numbering but did

not dare to remove the genuine verse altogether.

> 6)

> A look at the Sanskrit dictionary will show that the word Rashi means

a group and it can be used in that sense anywhere as and when

applicable. If it is used for Parva -Rashi etc. that does not mean that

the Puranas were wrong in using the word Rashi for designating the

twelve Rashis. Only a unthinking person can cook up such arguments.

> 7)

> If the Rig Vedanga Jyotisha is considered more respectable than the

Yajur-Vedanga jyotisha then does i mean that the yYajur Vedanga Jyotisha

is not required? If that was so it would not have been a part of the

Vedanga jyotisha at all. Only a good for nothing person will give such

hollow arguments. Whether it is in high esteem or not as compared to the

Rig Vedanga Jyotisha is not relevant to the authenticity of the Rashi

verse. Bringing such irrelevant point for discussion itself points to a

confused mind of the person bringing such points.

>

> Regards,

>

> Sunil K. Bhattacharjya

--- On Sat, 10/3/09, jyotirved jyotirved wrote:

>

> jyotirved jyotirved

> Rashi mantra in the Vedanga Jyotisha is

spurious!

> hinducalendar

> Cc: , hinducivilization ,

" subash razdan " subashrazdan

> Saturday, October 3, 2009, 8:25 AM

>

Dear friends,

>

> Jai Shri Ram!

>

> In # No. 2807 of May 27, 09 of WAVES-vedic forum Shri Sunil

Bhattacharjya had quoted his mentor as saying " Some preliminary evidence

to prove the existence of Meshadi month names in Vedic period is given

below) Take the Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha text and read the 5th sloka. It

reads as follows - Ye brihaspatina bhuktva MEENAN prabbriti rasayaH te

hritaH panchabhiryataH yaH seshaH sa parigrihaH

>

> (Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha - sloka 5)

>

> [Take the sign count of Jupiter counting from Meena Rasi (Pisces

Sign), ............ .......etc] I believe you have noticed the words

'Meenan prabhriti RasayaH' [signs counted from Meena Rasi (Pisces

Sign)]. That proves the existence of signs like Meena, Mesha etc in

Vedanga Jyotisha period. "

>

> The name " Yajur Vedanga Jyotisha " itself is misleading! There is

actually no such workI The original work is titled Vedanga Jyotisham

(VJ) by Lagadha. It was later divided into two separate portions Rik

Jyotisham and Yajush-jyotishm (but not Rik-Vednga-Jyotisha or

Yajur-Vedanga jyotisha)

>

> I had already seen the translation/ commentary of the VJ by S. B.

Dikshit in his " Bharatiya Jyotisha Shastra " but he has not referred to

any such mantra even in an oblique manner. On the other hand, he has

said on page 147 (English translation) " The names of Rashis Mesha and

others came into vogue at about 400 BS. The names of week days came into

use before them, and have been borrowed from foreign countries " . And

Dikshit had written those words in 1896 AD,, i.e. much before David

Pingree!