T he desire to explore the unknown is what brings progress. I was posted in Rourkela for the second time in my career in the steel plant itself. This time I was older had a full fledged family and a beautiful bungalow with a large veranda open to the sky. The innumerable stars and constellations have always fascinated; the ancient civilizations have left indelible marks about their preoccupation with them. The stone Henge of England, the Mayan temples, the pyramids of Egypt etc were built on precise calculation of the movement of planets. The Dagon tribe of West Africa have worshiped Sirius A and its twin the invisible star Sirius B, for the past 5000 years. .... Only in 20th century did the modern civilization discover that this is true! All these information made me study astronomy in depth and space in general. Within a year I could identify about 100 stars with their name constellations and of course planets. More than 50% of the names were Arabic, since they were mariners and without knowledge of night sky they would be lost in the sea.
Astronomy and astrology are interlinked so I decided to master the latter as it is something I could practice after retirement. Astrology has two main parts one is Ganit i.e. calculation part and the other is the prediction part. Now of course the computers have taken up the former but the latter part which needs interpretation is still dependent on humans but which the fifth generation computers may take over.
I began when computers were not available so everything had to be done by hand- from ephemeris based on British Admiralty charts. The apparent movements of stars are not constant sometimes they are retrogate i.e. moving backwards, the sun’s speed around earth is not constant. The axis of the earth is shifting and equinox point is also shifting by 50 sec a year. The pole star is not exact north. Now we also know that sun is moving along with the planets in relation to the galaxy and the galaxies are exploding in different directions. All these mind boggling knowledge acquired today was probably not known to the early astronomers, but they had profound wisdom and with the limited know-how could predict future events.
Indian and Arabic astronomy is more than 3000 years and they may have borrowed knowledge from each other and Rishis like Bhrigu and Jaimini have written volumes in Sanskrit shlokas, which are being followed even today. One system ”Khana Bachan” in India is thought to be of Arabic origin brought by an Arabic wife. Due to change of religion and constant wars in the Middle East, North Africa and southern Europe many documents if any are lost forever. We know very little of Chinese or Vietnamese astrology.
I was interested in Palmistry from my school days. I learnt everything through three books - Cheiro, Benhams and St. German. Cheiro was a great palmist but the book of Benhams has more facts. The number of books dealing with astronomy is colossal and the original Sanskrit books need deep insight into the language. It is something like Nostradamus, who dictated in old French, and scores of French scholars are still interpreting and converting it into modern French! In palmistry you can predict broadly but astronomy can go to minute part of the time frame and is more accurate.
I began by learning how to cast a horoscope which is pure mathematics. It used to take a few hours but now it can be done in minutes by the computer! There are various schools and angles of Astrology- each more interesting than the other! Annual horoscope is an added chapter in my knowledge for the past decade.
Two systems Binsottary and Ashtottarry are followed in eastern India; one considers the duration of life to be of 120 years and other 108 years. Thus both have different dasa and antardasas; in one, the planet ketu is missing! Then the period of dasas like sun has 7 years; moon has 10 years etc are also different. The charts are cast in three different fashions which I am familiar with. According to Hindu astrology the day starts at sunrise but the English date changes at midnight. So there are a lot of discrepancies in predictions! Most of the village astrologers know only one system and predict without any doubt in their mind. My family astrologer had predicted my death on 10 Oct 2000, and I am still alive!
But with more knowledge you have more doubts. My knowledge is all from books and magazines, since I cannot have a proper guru due to positioning of ketu in the 9th house in my horoscope!
Astrology is vast subject it is not important whether you believe in it or not what is fascination is that it was developed by a set of people who did not have the modern gadgets or the modern information and yet produced fantastic results!
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