The date of the Mahabharata war is centred around three research questions:
I.
Why did Bhishma, an adept in calculation
of Time that he exhibited in deriving the exact duration of Pandavas’ exile, fail
to know the date of Uttarayana (winter solstice) at the time of his fall forcing
him to wait for more than a month?
II.
The month of waiting appearing to be an
Adhika Maasa from the textual description, how could an Adhika Maasa be possible
at that time (Maagha month) when the earth was passing through the perihelion, faster
than normal?
III.
Did the earth-moon system suffer a terrible
cosmic impact, given the fact that Vyasa referred to Amavasya (no-moon) on the
13th tithi and a change in the mark on the face of the waning moon?
The
key to all these three questions lying with the 3rd question – that can
be cross-checked by scientific records - I sent a paper to Academia Letters
fulfilling the requirement of adding a case study or an idea to a previously published research paper (word limit 1600). Since I already zeroed in on Piora Oscillation
coming close to the traditional Mahabharata date (3136 BCE), I went through all
the papers and zeroed in on Mr. Joachim Seifert’s paper on climatic pattern in
Mid-Holocene and sent my paper to Academia Letters.
I
am glad that it was approved by 19 scholars, including Mr. Seifert who did
concur with a cosmic impact in the year 3136 BCE. His review is re-produced
below. In my interactions with him I came across the graphs in support of this
as also another impact in the year 3101 BCE, that finds mention in Mahabharata
and Srimad Bhagavatam in the words of Yudhishthira seeing ‘nimittas’ seven
months after Krishna left this world. This makes the traditional date of Mahabharata
all the more water-tight.
He also opines that the presumed shift in the position of the binary Alcor- Mizar (Arundhati- Vasishtha) was due to the rattling of the earth by the impact. He cites a proxy for this in the records of Canterbury Monks in 1178 CE.
The year of Mahabharata, being pivotal to building up
the chronology of the later history of India and inseparably intertwined with
the start of Kali Yuga in 3101 BCE that is well established by thousands of
inscriptions and continuing to be in use for all religious purposes and by scores
of Hindus throughout India, I consider that I am humbly paying back my debt to the
Rishis and the Itihasa of Mahabharata by validating the date and getting the
date vindicated by science.
May the
Paramaatman take this forward to a logical conclusion.
Click HERE to read the paper.
I have also re-produced here the reviews by eight scholars who didn’t find merit in the paper. This is to maintain transparency to inform the public the two sides of opinion so that they can come to an informed conclusion on the validity of the traditional date of the Mahabharata war (3136 BCE) Wherever required I am incorporating their suggestions.
Approvals:
I express my sincere thanks to all the 19 scholars who have approved my paper. By their approval they have contributed immensely to the re-establishment of this ancient Itihasa of this land as a non-faltering and true account of the Rishi, Veda Vyasa who had given the world's first accurate eye-witness account of the cosmic impact.
1.
Gonzalo Linares Matás, University of
Oxford
2.
Trevor Palmer, Nottingham Trent
University
3.
Aliyu Adamu, Author, NIPES Journal of Science and Technology Research
4.
Дмитрий Ключарев
5.
Erick Pajares G., CEO,
Biosphere Group -Think Tank on Sustainable Futures Research
6.
D. S. J. Mylne
7.
Steven Gullberg, University
of Oklahoma
8.
Julian West, mythsarehistory.com
9.
Mauro Cavalcanti
10.
Joachim Seifert (whose research is the basis of my paper)
11.
Nathalie Gontier, Universidade de Lisboa, Centro de Filosofia das Ciências, Director AppEEL
12. Paul Dunbavin, Author, www.third-millennium.co.uk
13.
Raj Bhat, Banaras Hindu University
14.
Prof. Dr. Emin Taner ELMAS,
Igdir University
15.
Narayanan V Bhattathiri, Former
Senior Research Fellow, International School of Dravidian Linguistics
16.
Vladan Celebonovic, University of
Belgrade, Serbia
17.
Manish Pandit, University of
Birmingham
18.
Thomas F.King, University of California Riverside
19.
Jhonny Casas, Universidad Central de Venezuela
Review by Mr. Joachim Seifert
This paper of Mr. Saranathan is excellent and very important to clarify
effects and aftermaths of meteor impacts on Earth. As papers of Seifert and
Lemke, see refs., part 1 to 8, always outline, is that all meteor impacts on
Earth were followed by a substantial descent in global temperatures. The
cause of this, as quick hint, is that Earth or the Earth-Moon gravitational
system moves, after a meteor hit, out of the x-y-ecliptic, where the
gravitational pull is strongest, somewhat into the z-dimension, half above and
half below the ecliptic in its orbit around the Sun - a skewed Earth orbit with
reduced gravitational pull. This leads to an enlargement of the Earth orbit,
longer distances to the Sun and a subsequent drop in global temperatures. We
must therefore see a substantial temperature drop after this meteor impact in
3136 BC. Lets consult GISP2 in Greenland, the version of borehole temperatures:
Starting out at 3,400 BC, with a borehole temp at -31.30 C, temps increase
toward the Piora interval to 3210 BC, to the time of the Andaman meteor impact,
to -30.0 C. This first Piora Andaman impact lowered the temp to -30.40 C at
3160 BC. From there on, temps recovered to -30.25 C, when this,
now the second impact, at Hastinapura, struck at 3136 BC (excellent time research
of the author). This event struck the Moon, with fragments reaching Earth, as
described. There is no impact crater on Earth necessary, since the unit
Earth-Moon-system went into the colder z-space dimension. The temperature drop
starts exactly at impact year 3136 BC from -30.25 C down to -30.37 C in 3100 BC, about a third
of the Andaman meteor temp drop. The Piora cold
event did not stop here: After a warming 3100-3035 BC, the third meteor struck,
the Morasko event in Poland, which lowered global temperatures again and the fourth,
the largest impact, prolonged the cold in 2920 BC, the Burckle impact - the
cold and dry period until the deepest point at 2800 BC. This Piora strikes and
the drought Burckle event wiped out the Harrappan and Jemdet Nasr cultures. Historical
observations of this Hastinapura impact event, the location and its exact
dating now provides a face to this second Piora impact event, the other three
already described in the literature. Very important is
the following: The historical observation plus the necessarily commencing
temperature drops are just 2 proxies for the impact. All impacts (about 25 in
the Holocene) are characterized by a number of other proxies: Flood-drought
history, iron oxide- hematite (the iron meteorite losing mass), titan, 15-N,
NO2, 14-C, 10-Be, fire history, non-volcanic dust history in polar ice or bore
cores, the IntCal13 tree ring calibration analysis and various others. As a
rapid and easy glimpse onto IntCal13 for everyone: The meteor/fragments
entering the Earth atmosphere, at 2000-3000 C, produce different radioactive
substances, 14-C with the longest life for detection, in plant uptake of CO2
through trees. The increased 14-C-content in the air is demonstrated in
IntCal13, by sharp descent from peaks. IntCal13 covers tree trunk 14-C on a
global scale. Therefore: Print out the respective IntCal13 graph from 2050
-4050 BC and identify the sharp calibration drops, caused by meteor produced
14-C. Here you will observe the Hastinapura 14-C drop, as well as the the three
others, the Andaman, Morasko and the ultra-large Burckle drop for the Piora
time span. All other proxies for the more that 20 impact events will be
demonstrated in future papers. This
Hastinapura paper closes one more gap in meteor impact science and we should be
grateful to the author having consulted the ancient literature for historical
eyewitness reports and also for focussing onto the astronomical side of this
important impact event.
****
Rejections:
Eight
reviewers did not approve the paper for publication. Their names are not
disclosed, but their comments were shown to me. I am posting them all here. I will
be addressing relevant issues raised by them in the comment section of the
paper soon, for the benefit of everybody. For instance, the 1st review
questions the feasibility of the calendar date to pinpoint the date of the
comet hit on Beta Cancri (Pushya). We maintain a calendar for too long, at
least for a known period of 5122 years since Kali Yuga began. I will place on
record the feasibility of deriving the exact dates.
Review 1:
“The
core idea that the memory of cosmic impact events could have been contained in
certain human records or traditions is viable. However, there is no way that
the lunar mansions, the star Beta Cancri or specific calendar dates were
possible around 3200 BC. The Mahabharata was written at a much later date. If
such a cosmic impact had occurred, memories of it may have been preserved in
oral tradition and contributed to the Mahabharata narrative at a much later
time. Such details could not, however, have been recorded so accurately at the
time of the events themselves.
Phrases
like 'solar insolation' do not inspire much confidence in the scientific part
of the argument.
In
order to salvage this idea, it would be good to quote the pertinent passages
from the Mahabharata, or at least some key passages, to address the issues
identified above and to be much more cautious about the conclusion.”
Review 2:
“The
idea that cosmic impacts cause changes in climate as well as in the human
history is not a new one, but it has started to take more attention recently.
The author does apply this idea, using hindu written sources as ancillary
evidence.
However,
the paper needs more work in its supporting references. Recent bibliography
(e.g. Bobrowsky & Rickman (2007): Comet/Asteroid Impacts and Human Society)
as well some of the older works by Masse, will help in the point.
The
reference to the lunar meteorite "storm" is well chosen, but this
event was dated 800 million years ago. Are there geological evidence of such
events in the historical times?
A
cross check with the impact database will show that there are no discovered
impact craters for that particular period (of course, the relevant impact
crater may still be undiscovered). Cross checking with other primary sources of
the era, may come up with similar phenomena in other civilizations. These would
be a major evidence for the author's hypothesis.
So,
at the moment, I cannot recommend the paper for publication, but I would
reconsider it if more evidence is provided.”
Review 3:
“This
is pseudoscience, commingling religious text with factual history. This is
another push by the current Indian government to miseducate the masses.”
Review 4:
“The
concept that a swarm of comet debris may have hit the earth about 3200 BC is
not new. See for instance:
Baillie,
M. 2007. The case for significant numbers of extraterrestrial impacts through
the late Holocene. Journal of Quaternary Science, v. 22, pp. 101–109. or other
contributions from the Holocene Impact Working Group.
Mahabharata
has been often misused by cherry-picking scattered verses in order to create
the description of a single catastrophic event, such as an atomic explosion.
This letter gives the impression of doing the same because it does not quote
the verses precisely. Moreover it is hard to believe that the trajectory of the
Moon could have been affected to the extent and in the way reported by the
letter.
Moreover,
the number of issues raised cannot be adequately argued and supported by
references within the number of words allowed by academia letters”
Review 5:
“The
paper is very speculative and does not give reference to the original text.
1.
It claims dates for Mahabharata in 3100 BC which is too early by conventional
standards.
2,
It is not clear that a meteor shower that can create enough impact to change EOO
would only have such a limited impact on weather - that too in Europe when the
event is supposed to have happened in the Arabian sea.
3
The Arabian see itself is not visible from Kurukshetra where the war is said to
have happened.
4.
References to Harappa are wrong in that they are not from any accepted
narrative of the Harappan Civilization and the reference to a website is not
reliable.
5.
The said descriptions in Mahabharata are vaguely referenced (in the 10th book)
and there is not way of reliably verifying the claim.
All
in all the paper is simply a speculation based on unreliable claims, and
inconsistent with a lot of data and generally accepted timeline of events.”
Review 6:
“This
article is almost ready for preprint publication. I would like to privately
suggest to the author that they need to mention more Bibliographical references
within the first two pages of this article. And cross compare as to why and how
specifically may have caused a Cosmic impact described in the Hindu Epic
Mahabharata cause the Piora Oscillation. First explaining how and why this
applies in hypothetical terms an next how an why the bibliographical references
support this a a preliminary theory as well. Once this is done I would
recommend for publication in "Academia Letters".”
Review 7:
“I
think this is a good and interesting paper, but I here are some little problems
I saw:
If
you have section headings in the middle it would be less jarring to have one at
the beginning and end, too.
I
would like to see more pictures, maybe a diagram of the orbits of the objects
and changes in axis tilt.
"the
ark of noah", not "the noah of ark"
"crater"
not "carter"
Several other typos show a need for proofreading, and I recommend a look at the formatting in your bibliography, too.
Review 8:
“The
Mahabharata comes (earliest) from Vedic times, which start (earliest) 1500 BC.
How to explain the gap of at least 1500 years? This is too much. The idea of
such impacts itself is very very speculative, not enough substance. In sum, it
is pseudoscience.”
