महाभारत - काही नवीन विचार

As stated earlier, while the translation of the Mahabharat Shlokas by Shri. Oak is incorrect and the time frame for the event proposed by him becomes baseless, the translation by Dr. P. V. Vartak is correct. How to interpret Krittika going to Vana for Tapa? Does it mean that Summer solstice had moved near Krittika? Oak says that was the position long back in antiquity, 22000BC. It would happen again in AD 4000. So that cannot be the meaning. I am unable to offer any alternative interpretation of Krittika going to Vana for Tapa.

Other observation noted by Indra and mentioned to Skanda as causing him to worry is the fall of a nakshatra from the sky. The choice of Abhijit for this role seems unanimous. What is meant by fall from the sky? It should mean disappearing from the sky. This cannot happen for an observer in northern hemisphere, in northern India in particular with Latitudes around 25-30 degrees, in case of Abhijit, in those ancient days when he was not far from the north pole. At best it can mean disappearing below the horizon for a part of its journey around the north pole, every day-night. I therefore conjecture that Indra meant exactly that! ‘The star Abhijit which was once very close to north pole and was therefore always above the horizon has moved so far away from the pole that now for a part of its path, it actually goes below the horizon, it has fallen from the sky!’

Abhijit was closest to north pole around 11000BC, about 5 degrees away. By about 6000-6500BC, north pole had moved sufficiently away from Abhijit to make it dip below horizon. Timing of Indra-Skanda dialogue therefore is around then, in my opinion.

As I have mentioned in the earlier post, Abhijit has always been way far too distant from the ecliptic to have a place in the list of 27 nakshatras, which are strung along the ecliptic, more or less. It was simply the most important star in the sky besides the nakshatras, being pretty close to the north pole. My conjecture is that the Nakshatras were identified and named some time in the past when Abhijit was close to north pole, between 13000BC to 11000BC. When Indra points out that Abhijit has fallen from the sky, it was natural that it should no longer be counted along with the 27 nakshatras. At that time there appears to be no other big star close enough to the north pole. If there was one, it would have taken the place of Abhijit in the list of nakshatras! For example, around 0001AD, Indra could have proposed that Dhruva should be counted along with the Nakshatras. That did not happen but Dhruva’s status has indeed been recognized in our folklore.

About the rest of the points about Rohini and Dhanishtha in the quotation, my comments are as follows. Shri. Oak has examined four cases of a particular cardinal point near Dhanishtha and also later near Rohini, looking for movement of that cardinal point from Dhanishtha to Rohini. In fact, from his data it is seen that, due to precision phenomena, every cardinal point was first near Rohini and after abt. 7000 years, moved near Dhanishtha! If start of the year was from a particular CP to start with, it will take 19000 years for that CP to move from Dhanishtha to Rohini. That was not the problem faced by Indra. When Nakshatras were first identified and system of counting time got a frame of reference, around 13000BC ( when Abhijit was close to North Pole) as I conjecture, Summer Solstice was close to Dhanishtha and it was appropriate to count year start from Dhanishtha! Around 6000BC when Indra finds Abhijit fallen from sky, Summer Solstice had moved well away from Dhanishtha and no other CP was near it! On the other hand, Winter Solstice was still close to Rohini.

This is Indra’s problem. 1. Should the beginning of the year be shifted from Dhanishtha to Rohini i. e. from Summer Solstice to Winter Solstice and 2. What should be done with Abhijit? He asks Skanda to discuss this with Brahma. It looks like Brahma decided to give that honour to Krittika as winter solstice was closer to Krittika by 6000BC! Krittika was competing with Abhijit for this honour! No wonder Krittika was pleased and brightened up! Poor Abhijit got dropped from Nakshatras.

The picture shows the path of movement of Celestial North Pole over the sky. This will help explain some points above.

Tuesday, June 30, 2015

Fall of Abhijit

After explaining the Astronomical concepts etc. Shri. Oak has written a whole chapter on Abhijit with reference to a small quotation from Mahabharat before going on to write about Arundhati. I found several things wrong about what he has written and had exchange of e-mails with him, The subject is interesting and Shri. Oak’s comparison of the event with Roger Bacon writing to Pope asking for a calendar correction is novel and appropriate. My comments are as follows.

1. The Nakshatras identified by our ancestors, are all, more or less, strung along the Ecliptic, more or less, equidistant. This is consistent with their purpose of serving as a reference frame for marking the position of Sun, Moon and Planets from time to time, as they move along the ecliptic. There are 27 of them because moon completes a round in 27 days. Now the question is, where does Abhijit come in? It is a very prominent bright star but nowhere near the ecliptic. It is almost 60 degrees away and has always been so. How could it ever have been counted as a nakshatra? I conjecture that in the days when the Nakshatras were identified by our ancestors, the Celestial North pole was close to Abhijit and hence, along with the Nakshatras it was an excellent reference point for mapping. That is why, probably, it was counted along with 27 Nakshatras, as a मेरुमणि

2. The quotation from Mahabharat , ‘अभिजित्स्पर्धमाना ..’ has not been translated by Shri. Oak correctly at all. It actually talks about Krittika, younger sister of Rohini, competing with Abhijit and going to Vana for Tapa. (अभिजित्स्पर्धमाना, कन्यसी स्वसा, ज्येष्ठतां इच्छती, are all adjectives of देवी, i. e. कृत्तिका.) Shri. P. V. Vartak has in fact given a correct translation (in स्वयम्भु) and a fairly correct interpretation also. On the other hand, Shri. Oak has wrongly presumed the quotation to mean Abhijit, younger sister of Rohini competing with Rohini (for seniority) and going to Vana for Tapa. He ignores that Abhijit is a masculine name and can be Rohini’s brother but not sister! He interprets Abhijit moving very close to North Pole as going to Vana and performing Tapa! His whole explanation and effort to fix a time frame for the Event on this basis is therefore meaningless. Abhijit is not doing any Spardha. It has fallen from the sky.

3. ‘नक्षत्रं गगनात् च्युतं’ has been explained by him as ‘moving towards north pole.’ Abhijit getting close to North pole or remaining close to north pole cannot be interpreted as its FALL (च्युतम्) from the sky by any stretch of imagination as, near the north pole, it would be prominently visible and ‘steady’ too.

4. Shri. Oak also talks about Abhijit moving towards and away from the ecliptic, which is of course meaningless. What he obviously means is moving towards or away from the Equator. When I pointed this out, he admitted the error, very gracefully. But the paragraphs where this occurs need rewriting.

5. The reason for dropping Abhijit from list of nakshatras needs explanation based on interpretation of ‘च्युतम्’

6. Krittika must have, necessarily, always been included in list of nakshatras because if you leave out krittika, a big gaping gap along the ecliptic will remain between Bharani and Rohini. Why those wise men, who built the reference frame of nakshatras, would leave such a gap? Abhijit is nowhere near this gap by the way. To say, Abhijit was dropped and Krittika was included in its place in list of Nakshatras is meaningless.

In the next post, I will give my own interpretation of the Mahabharata Quotation.

Friday, June 26, 2015

When did the Mahabharata War Happen

The Title of the book is actually ‘When did the Mahabharata War Happen’ The sub-title is ‘The Mystery of Arundhati’ The earlier part of the book is about ‘Arundhati’ Shri. Oak has written a large no. of pages about Astronomical concepts which I found very interesting. Although I had studied a little Astronomy as a part of my Civil Engineering course my information had gone rusty and I had several dialogues with Shri. Oak on some of the concepts. He was very patient! Slowly I started getting a grasp, at least sufficiently, to start understanding the arguments in the book. A reader of his book will have to make quite some effort to grasp the concepts without which the subject matter of the book on ‘Arundhati’ cannot be appreciated. I will assume that the readers of the book and this blog have made that effort. From next post onward I will write about the subjects covered in the book.

Thursday, June 25, 2015

Epoch of Arundhati

I have not written anything new on this blog for a long time. Now I am in US and my Marathi volumes of Mahabharata are not available to me any more. I have also already covered subjects which had attracted me while I read the books. I am going to write some comments on a book by another person, Shri. Nilesh Oak. His book is in English and many of his readers may not be familiar with Marathi. So I am going to write in English. Timing of the Mahabharat war is the main topic of the book. My attention was drawn to Shri. Oak's book by one of the readers here, about 2 years back (or more) and I immediately contacted Shri. Oak. Most generously he made his book and other material available to me on my computer in PDF format. We have had many discussions and exchange of e-mails on various topics from his book and despite a big age-difference, have developed a great relationship of mutual respect. We have great differences in our views on some points! His book has received wide-spread attention. I have no platform to air my differences with him, so I intend to air them here in the next few posts. Hope my readers will be interested.

Tuesday, March 10, 2015

कृष्ण आणि पांडवांचे आयुर्मान

भारतीय युद्धानंतर पांडव व कृष्ण ३६ वर्षे जगले असे महाभारत म्हणते. त्यावेळी त्यांचे किती वय झाले होते? ते स्पष्ट्पणे लिहिलेले मला आढळले नाही. पण अंदाज बांधता येतो. युद्धसमयी अभिमन्यूचे वय २५ वर्षे असावे असे मी पूर्वीच्या एका लेखात म्हटले आहे. अर्जुनाचे सुभद्रेशी लग्न झाले तोवर तो किमान ३५ वर्षांचा झाला होता. कारण, लाक्षागृहातून सुटल्यावर काही वर्षे वनात व एक वर्ष एकचक्रा नगरीत गेलीं. द्रौपदीशी विवाह झाल्यावर २-३ वर्षातच त्याला घराबाहेर पडावे लागले. उलुपी, चित्रांगदे बरोबर २-३ वर्षे घालवून मग तो द्वारकेला गेला. तोवर तो सहजच ३५ वर्षांचा झाला होता. युद्धसमयीं त्यामुळे त्याचे वय ६० असले पाहिजे. त्यावर ३६ अधिक मोजले कीं त्याचे आयुष्य ९६ ते १०० ठरते. कृष्ण अर्जुनापेक्षा थोडासाच मोठा कारण तो भीमाच्या वयाचा. कृष्ण पांडवांचे आधीच थोडा काळ मृत्यु पावला तेव्हा त्याचेहि आयुष्य १०० चे जवळपासच म्हटले पाहिजे. श्री निलेश ओक यानी ते ११६ वर्षे होते असे म्हटले आहे ते पटत नाही कारण ते मानले तर युद्धसमयी अर्जुन, भीम, कृष्ण, दुर्योधन सर्व जवळपास ८० वर्षांचे तर कर्ण ८७-८८ वर्षांचा होता असे ठरते. अभिमन्यूच्या जन्माचे वेळी अर्जुन ५५ वर्षांचा मानावा लागतो. हे सर्व अवास्तव वाटते. पटते का पहा!

Saturday, March 7, 2015

कर्णाचा रथ चिखलात कां रुतला?

भारतीय युद्धामध्ये दोन्ही पक्षांकडून अनेक रथी-महारथी लढले. सतराव्या दिवसापर्यंत कोणाच्याही रथाचे चाक चिखलात रुतले नाही. सतराव्या दिवशी संध्याकाळी कर्णाच्या रथाचे चाक चिखलात रुतले. त्यानंतर अर्जुनाने त्याचा वध केला. कृष्णाने शिष्टाईच्या दिवशी परत जाताना कर्णाला म्हटले होते कीं आता पावसाळा संपला आहे, चिखलाचे नावहि नाही तेव्हा युद्धाला अनुकूल काळ आहे. प्रत्यक्षातहि कर्णाच्या एका अपवादाव्यतिरिक्त कृष्णाचे म्हणणे खरेच ठरले. कर्णाचा रथ कां रुतला या बद्दल माझा तर्क असा – अर्जुनाचे सारथ्य कृष्ण करत होता तर कर्णाचे, शल्य. कृष्ण अर्जुनाचा रथ नेहमीच अतिशय कौशल्याने चालवत होता. उदा. जयद्रथवधाचे दिवशी, अर्जुन द्रोणाचार्याशी लढत न बसतां पुढे निघून गेला. दुर्योधनाने द्रोणाला विचारले कीं असे कसे झाले? द्रोणाने म्हटले कीं कृष्ण रथ एवढ्या जोराने चालवतो कीं तो जाऊं लागल्यावर माझे बाणच त्याचेपर्यंत पोचेनात! असे इतरहि उल्लेख आहेत. शल्याचे कौशल्य कदाचित तुलनेने कमी पडत होते. दोन दिवस कर्ण-अर्जुन दोघांचे रथयुद्ध चालू होते. शत्रूला आपल्या रथाच्या अनुकूल बाजूला घेण्यासाठी दोन्ही सारथ्यांच्या आपल्या रथाच्या विशिष्ट हालचाली, डाव, प्रतिडाव चालले असणार. कृष्णाने हळूहळू शल्याला कुरुक्षेत्रातील उताराच्या, पाणथळ भागाकडे खेचले व त्याची हालचालींची जागा (maneuvering space) कमी करत आणली, अखेर चिखलभागापासून शल्य दूर राहू शकला नाही. व कर्णाच्या रथाचे चाक रुतले! कृष्णाच्या सारथ्यकौशल्याचा हा परिणाम होता. कृष्णाला दैवी गुण चिकटवणे मला मुळीच मान्य नाही. पण त्याच्या सारथ्यकौशल्याला दाद देणे योग्यच आहे.

Monday, February 23, 2015

बर्‍याच काळानंतर आज पुन्हा या ब्लॉगवर काही लिहायला बसलो आहे. खरे तर बराच काथ्याकूट करून झाला आहे त्यामुळे पुनरुक्ति अनेकवार झाली आहे. नवल म्हणजे अजूनहि या ब्लॉगला वाचक भेटताहेत व पसंतीच्या ई-मेलहि येतात. हल्ली भारतात असल्यामुळे पुन्हा महाभारत हाताशी आहे.काही कारणामुळे पुन्हा थोडे वाचलेहि जात आहे. त्यात नजरेला आलेली एक शंका वाचकांसमोर ठेवत आहे. कृष्ण हा पांडवांचा कैवारी, सल्लागार, आणि मित्र. द्रौपदी आणि कृष्ण यांचे भावा-बहिणीचे नाते आदर्श मानले जाते. असे असताना युद्धाच्या अखेरच्या दिवशी जो भीषण संहार अश्वत्थाम्याने पांचाल शिबिरात रात्री घडवून आणला त्याबद्दल एक शंका मनात येते. अठराव्या दिवशी दुर्योधन भीमाच्या गदाप्रहाराने जखमी होऊन पडला व तो आता मरेलच याची खात्री वाटल्यामुळे त्याला तसेच टाकून पांडव, कृष्ण, सात्यकी व पांचालवीर शिबिराकडे परतले. युधिष्ठिराने कृष्णाला म्हटले कीं सर्व कौरवांचा निःपात झाला, दुर्योधनहि मरणासन्न आहे हे वर्तमान धृतराष्ट्राला कळवण्याचे काम तूच कर कारण त्याच्या रागाला तोंड द्यायची आमची तयारी नाही. कृष्णाने ते काम केले. परतल्यावर त्याने पांडव व सात्यकी याना सल्ला दिला की आजची रात्र तुम्ही शिबिरात राहू नका. असा सल्ला कां दिला याचा खुलासा महाभारतात नाही. अश्वत्थामा, कृप व कृतवर्मा वाचले आहेत व पळून गेले आहेत हे पांडव व कृष्ण याना ठाउक होते. असे मानले जाते कीं अश्वत्थामा पित्याच्या वधामुळे धृष्टद्युम्नावर फार रागावलेला आहे त्यामुळे तो काहीतरी आतताई कृत्य करील या भीतीने कृष्णाने पांडवाना तो सल्ला दिला आणि त्या सल्ल्यामुळे पांडव वांचले! सर्वच गोष्टींचे श्रेय कृष्णाला देणारे याचेहि श्रेय कृष्णाला देतात. मात्र यामुले अनेक प्रष्न उभे राहतात! १. कितीहि थकले-भागले असले तरी, पाडव, सात्यकी, कृष्ण शिबिरात असते तर अश्वत्थाम्याची काहीहि करण्याची हिम्मतच झाली नसती. तो त्याना घाबरत होता असा उल्लेखच आहे! मग शिबिरात सावध राहाण्याचा सल्ला देण्याऐवजी बाहेर रहाण्याचा सल्ला कसा दिला गेला? २. शिबिरात पांडव, कृष्ण, सात्यकी नाहीत हे अश्वत्थाम्याला कसे कळले? ३. पांडवाना बाहेर काढले पण द्रौपदीच्या पांच पुत्राना मात्र पांचालशिबिरातच राहूं दिले! त्यांच्या सुरक्षिततेची काळजी वाटली नाही? ४. स्वतःच्या बहिणीचा पुत्र अभिमन्यु मारला गेला होता पण त्याची पत्नी गर्भवती होती. द्रौपदीपुत्र जिवंत राहिले असते तर पांडवांच्या पश्चात प्रतिविंध्याकडे राज्य गेले असते अभिमन्युपुत्राकडे नव्हे! हे कृष्णाला नको होते कीं काय? एक दुष्ट शंका! ५. सर्व वनवास-अज्ञातवासाचा काळ अभिमन्यु द्वारकेला होता पण द्रौपदीपुत्र द्रुपदापाशी होते. त्यांच्यावर पांचालांचे,धृष्टद्युम्नाचे संस्कार प्रबळ झाले होते. आता पांडव कुरुराज्याचे सत्ताधीश झाले असते पण त्यांच्यावरहि पांचालांचे वजन जास्त राहिले असते. कृष्णाला हे नको होते कीं काय? ६. कृष्ण हा पक्का राजकारणी आहे. पांचालांचा प्रभाव वाढू नये असा प्रयत्न त्याने करणे असंभव नाही. प्रत्यक्षात, हस्तिनापुराचे राज्य पांडवांनंतर अभिमन्युपुत्र परिक्षिताकडे गेले व इंद्रप्रस्थाचे राज्य कृष्णाच्या नातवाकडे गेले असे महाभारत म्हणते! वाचकाना काय वाटते ते त्यानी अवश्य कळवावे.