Friday, November 10, 2017

Week dates, Ramas return to Ayodhya, His death - Notes from The Scientific Dating of the Ramayana and the Vedas

How was the planets named by our Rishis

The names given to the planets show how much advanced they were scientifically. Jupiter is called as Brihaspathi, which means biggest. Its other name Guru also means biggest. Actually if we see the sky we see Venus as the biggest, but our Rishis did not ascribe the name Brihaspathi to Venus because they knew that its not the biggest. Venus is the biggest so they named it Sukra meaning bright. Saturn was named as Sani or Manda because it moves slowly.

Thus the Rishis were really advanced in science . Therefore they knew that Sun was born first and then it give rise to planets. Rigveda also has considered how the Universe came into existense in famous Nasadiya Sukta. The concepts therein are really similar to the modern science of the late twentieth century.

They also knew the distances of planets from Sun. They knew that distance-wise the planets are in order Budha (Mercury), Sukra (Venus), Earth with its moon, Mangala (Mars), Brihaspathi (Jupiter), Sani (Saturn).

Seven Day
The seven day system is also mentioned in Atharva Veda, sloka 93:

  Aditya: somo boumyascha tada brihaspathi
  Bargava: shanaischaraschaiva ete saptadinadipa:

Mahabharata Adi parva 160/7 also has mentioned weekdays.

When Rama returned to Ayodhya
Rama won the war on 15th November 7292 BC in the evening of Phalguna Amavasya day. The next morning Rama may have celebrated the victory. This may be the reason why Indian people hoist the flags and enjoy the ceremonies on the very next day - Chaitra Sudha Pratipada.

Rama had left Ayodhya for forest life on Chaitra Sudha 9th day. He may have started counting the days from Chaitra full moon day. So he waited for a few days more and entered Bharadwaya Ashrama on Chaitra Vadya 5th day. This was 5th December 7292 BC. Rama spent that night in Bharadwaja Ashrama according to the wish of sage Bharadwaja and on Sunday the 6th December 7292 BC Rama entered Ayodhya.

How many years Rama ruled Ayodhya
Valmiki has not stated planetary positions at the time of Ramas death but states that he ruled for eleven thousand years. To understand the other meaning of 10000 or 11000 years what valmiki had meant we have to take a saying in mind.

"Ahareva samvatsara:"
In Mahabharata, Vana parva Bheeshma says "According to Dharmasastras as well in vedas on day and night is equal to one year"

Following this equation we can calculate that 11000 days means 31 lunar years or 30.11 solar years.

We have seen above that Sri Rama has started to rule in December 7292 BC. 31 years hence during December 7261 BC Sri Rama might have ascended to the Heaven at the age of 62 years.

Page 70-73

The above are excerpts taken from the book "The Scientific Dating of the Ramayana and the Vedas"

This article is part of Book review of the same, mentioned above.

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