HEAVEN As with Time, Space Begins from a Fixed Point. Movement of A

CHAPTER FIVE HEAVEN As with time, space begins from a fixed point. Movement of a fixed point creates the perception of space in three dimensions, distance, area, and volume. Before Newton’s concept of gravity turned the conception of three dimensional space spherical, extent was conceived of as conical in shape. Starting with a single unit of earth, known at once either as a stone (M. čilaγun), grain, or a single atom, adding one unit after another continuously over duration fills space (M. čilügen) in the form of a pile (M. obo), which grows into a mountain. As such, earth is symbolized in Buddhist mathematics by a sacred mountain, Mt. Sumeru. Below the earth was the chaotic formless realm of water, comprised of individual drops (M. dusul), that dissolved into each other. Above was the dome of heaven, the firmament upon which order derives from chaos. By fixing a point of orientation the void is fastened with stars and space apportioned across the firmament. In a true or apparent system events and eventualities, be they in nature, civilization, or imaginary, are understood in relation to the heavens. Nothing occurs over a particular duration of time. Rather, everything is fixed in conjunction with celestial bodies at a given moment. For instance, associated with wealth, the nakshatra Revatī (M. Rivadi), ascendant at the time for spring planting, is known as the constellation that causes a handful of grain to fill one hundred silos (33v). With the naked eye people can see approximately 3000 stars (Sun 1997: 1). As was common in the ancient world, in the Manual the term odu(n) ‘star’ describes both the fixed stars as well as the sun, moon, and planets. The stars are divided into three divisions: those which circle the summit of the sacred Mt. Sumeru (Sümber aγula-yin orgil-iyar toγoriγči odun), those which circle the middle (dumda büküi-yi toγorin yabuγči odun), and those which circle its base (aγula-yin door-a toγorin yabuγči odun [32v]). This threefold division of the sky, which in the Manual is of Indian origin, is also found in both ancient Mesopotamia and China. The middle belt are the stars of the ecliptic; the stars circling the summit or Mt. Sumeru are the circumpolar stars; and the stars at the base of the mountain refer to the stars outside or south of the ecliptic (Koch-Westenholz 1995: 24; Needham, v. 3, 1959: 242-243, 255-257). HEAVEN 99 THE TWENTY-EIGHT NAKSHATRA ASTERISMS Mongolian naγšidar, via Uygur and Tocharian, derives from Sanskrit nakshatra. Often translated ‘lunar mansion’ for the affinity of their number with the lunar cycle, as their functions in Indian sources and elsewhere bear no particular relationship to the moon (nor apparently does the etymology of the term), the most appropriate translation is simply ‘asterism’ (Burgess 1859: 351).1 As previously mentioned, in the Manual there are twenty-eight nakshatra beginning with Kerteg (S. Kṛttikā), the Pleiades. The arrangement is noteworthy for its variance with nakshatra systems found in other sources, such as the Kālacakra and the Vaidūrya dkar po, the two main sources of classical Tibeto-Mongolian mathematics, and modern almanacs. The difference in nakshatra systems has its roots in India, where the nakshatra developed in variegated systems of 27 or 28 asterisms. In early Vedic period sources the nakshatra were 27 in number. The list of 28 is given for the first time at the beginning of the last millennium BC in the Atharvaveda and various Brāhmanas, when Abhijit, the star Vega in Lyra, was added (only to be subsequently dropped in Indian systems [Pingree 1963: 230]). The individual names of the nakshatra refer to a principal or junction star (yogatārā) among what is in most cases a group of stars. The actual nakshatra asterisms are of variable lengths along the celestial equator. Eventually, however, their position was rationalized to 27 units of 13°20'. This may have happened around 600 B.C., for the Vedanga Jyotisa refers to nakshatra divisions in the sky and not to the nakshatra stars (Krupp 1991: 208). This rationalization of the nakshatra became known as the ‘equal space’ system. Another form of rationalization were the ‘unequal space’ systems developed by famous Indian astronomers of antiquity, Garga and Brahmagupta (Stone 1981: 185; Schram 1995: 21). Regarding the change in order of the nakshatra from Kṛttikā, the Pleiades, to Aśvinī, junction star β Arietis, scholars have long held that this was due to Greek influence (Clerke 1911: 996a), though systems beginning with Kṛttikā (such as that found in the Ashtottari dasa) were maintained and even preferred to others in deference to ancient Vedic tradition, especially when it came to ritual practice (Stone 1981: 206; Richmond 1956: 77-78). While the historical change does perhaps reflect Greek influence, tied in is the assumption that not only did Indians not know of the precession of the equinoxes, but that the precession phenomenon was unknown in antiquity. For years historians of science maintained that it was Hipparchus (d. ca.127 BC) who discovered the precession of the equinoxes. However, as with so 1 The nakshatra are used predominately for solar astronomy but also for lunar divination (Kalinowski 1996: 80-81). .

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