Bhishma said that he waited for 58 days to leave this earth,
while Krishna mentioned 56 days. To know when exactly the first day of the
58-day period commenced, let me construct the tithi-star alignment from the
known factor. The known factor is Magha Shukla Ashtami coinciding with Rohini when
Bhishma left his mortal coils. To recap the verses discussed in Part
4, Uttarayana started after the completion of Saptami in Shukla Paksha of
Magha (13-153-28) and the moon was in Rohini at the time of sunrise on that day
(12-47-3).[1] From
that day let me list out the days on the reverse till the first day. (Figure 1)
Fig 1: 58 days of Bhishma Nirvana with star-tithi
The biggest revelation of this reverse counting is that 58
or 56 day period did
not begin on the 10th day of the war when Bhishma fell.
It started from the beginning of the war. The number of days listed here pertains
to solar risings (solar days). Bhagavad Gita was rendered on the 2nd
day in this table. Krishna
having killed Bhishma on that day, the remaining days turned out to be only 56!
1. The first day falls in Pushya month. This concurs with my
derivation done in previous parts that the war started in Pushya month. It didn’t start in Margashira or in Kartika.
2. The Full-Moon occurred in the beginning of this list of
days concurring with Drona’s mention of the lunar eclipse rising with horns pointing downwards.
3. The counting of Bhishma’s waiting period includes the
entire war period. This is close to the count-down that started
from the time of Gitopadesa that
was interpreted from Krishna’s version in Part
22.
2. Points of non-synchronization.
1. Shukla
Ekadasi, the traditional date of Gita Jayanti comes within
the initial period of this data.
2. The 18
day war period doesn’t synchronize with the date
after Shukla Ekadasi (Gita Jayanti).
3. Paurnami
coincides with Mrigashirsha in the above table (Fig 1) whereas it
should have been on Punarvasu.
The non-synchronisation is due to the variance of tithi-star
alignment.
The moon makes 62 synodic revolutions
and 67 star rounds in the 5 year Yuga. As a result the moon takes 1.028 tithi
to
cross a star.[2]
The tithi exceeds the star such that the
tithi and the star do not match. The 1st day of the war is
reproduced here from Fig 1 of Part
19 to show that Rohini coincided with Shukla
Dwadasi (Figure 2), but in the hand-made list
(Figure 1) Rohini coincided with Shukla Caturdasi!
Fig 2: The first day of the war
The presence of two tithis seen in the above simulation is a
case of Tithi
Dvayam. This is to imply that there was tithi-solar day mismatch
and star-solar day mismatch within the 58 day reverse data.
The re-aligned Tithi-nakshatra- month
for the first few days covering the 18 day Mahabharata period is
produced below. It perfectly concurs with Mahabharata version of Shravana
nakshatra when Balarama returned. Shravana was at
sun rise on the 19th day when the mace- fight took place.
This re-alignment is done in Figure 3 by matching Rohini- Mrigashirsha with
Shukla Dwadasi (S-12) –Trayodasi (S-13) as noticed in the simulator.
Fig 3: The war period synchronized with star-tithi
The above table incorporating the re-aligned tithi-
nakshatra perfectly matches with the 3rd day Full moon (lunar eclipse), the
fall of Bhishma on the 10th day (when he started lying down on the arrow
bed) and the Gada Yuddha
in Shravana that coincided with the end of Balarama’s pilgrimage.
On the day
of Bhishma’s fall the star was Hasta that matches with the simulation though
it shows Shashthi tithi still
running then (Figure 4)
Fig 4: The day of fall of
Bhishma
Earlier I pointed out 12 hour difference between the actual time at the end of the tithi
(and the lunar eclipse) on the 3rd day of the war
and the simulated version, caused by an anomaly in the speed of moon. By that
difference, it is theorized that Shashthi almost ended at the time of Bhishma’s
fall, followed by Saptami.
1. The rationale of Krishna’s 56 days:
Starting from the day after Gitopadesa (when Krishna claimed he killed Bhishma) Bhishma lived for 56 days as per the table in Figure 1. A counter to this may be quoted from the verses uttered by Krishna at the cremation of Bhishma.[3] The Goddess of river Bhagirathi (Ganga), the mother of Bhishma was grief stricken at the death of her son Bhishma. Krishna consoled her by telling that Bhishma was not killed by anyone! He remained alive till he decided to cast off his body. This seems to run contradictory to Krishna’s claim during Vishvarupa that it was he who killed Bhishma. Since Bhishma was invincible until he decided to write on his own his time of death, Krishna’s words make better sense that the countdown for Bhishma Nirvana started at the time of Vishvarupa.
- If we count from the first day of
the war, Rohini was at sunrise. On the day of Uttarayana when Bhishma left
it was again Rohini. In between only 54 stars had passed. Therefore Bhishma’s count
was not star-based.
- If we count the tithis, there are 57 tithis starting
from the night of Shukla Ekadasi, on the day of Gitopadesa till the night of Magha Shukla
Saptami.
- If we count the tithis from the
previous night when Pushya Shukla Dasami was running, there are 58 tithis. Starting the count from that time is
justifiable on an important
war-related activity.
- Bharani was the star of the day then. Bharani is very well known
for doing war- commencement Homa (Rana yajna)!
- There is ample evidence in Tamil literature for symbolically starting the war on Bharani day by
offering sacrifices to Pishaca (vampire) on that day. A separate
literature called ‘Bharani’
literature is found in Tamil exclusively on war feats of the kings.
The Chola King Kulottunga I’s Kalinga war was
written as ‘Kalingatthu Bharani’
(The Bharani of Kalinga) in the form of a conversation among the vampires
waiting for food, i.e. the bodies of the dead soldiers. Yet another
popular Bharani in Tamil was on Daksha’s yajna,
known as ‘Dakka Yāga Bharani’
(The Bharani of Daksha). This tradition, popular in the past must have
been followed in any war including the Mahabharata war.[4]
The commencement of the war occurring closer to Bharani strengthens
this view. A huge battle such
as the Bharata war must have been fixed on a day designated for starting
with the war-yajna and that day is Bharani.
- Based on this, the re-aligned initial
days of the war is shown in Figure 5.
Fig 5: The days before the war began
Bhishma as the chief
Commander must have participated in Bharani Homa and was present in the war
field right from the night of Shukla Dasami. Counting from that tithi, he slept in the war field for 58 tithis (till Magha
Shukla Saptamī) enduring the hardships of the war field.
An overwhelming
revelation is that the waiting period covered the entire war
period.
The tithi-star-month alignment does not support
the counting of Bhishma’s waiting period
from the 10th
day of the war.
The next issue pertains to what happened after Krishna asked Bhishma to impart knowledge to the Pandavas. As per the time-line deciphered so for,
* the coronation took place on Magha Shukla Dwitīya.
* Krishna and the Pandavas met Bhishma on Magha Shukla
Tritiya.
Only four days were left for the Uttarayana day designated
by Bhishma himself.
For how many days Bhishma imparted the knowledge?
More importantly on which day
Bhishma delivered the “Vishnu
Sahasranama” – the thousand names of Vishnu that continues to be
recited reverentially till date?
What are the
evidences from the Mahabharata giving us the answers for these?
(To be continued)
[1]
Gita Press Edition
[2] No
of synodic revolutions in 5 years = 62 (62 x 30 = 1860 tithi)
No of sidereal revolutions of the moon = 67 (67 x 27 =
1809 stars)
1809 stars = 1860 tithis, therefore 1 star = 1860 /
1809 = 1.028 tithi
[3]Mahabharata:
13- 154- 29 to 31
[4]
Stealing the cattle as a prelude to attack a country and war dances were common
throughout Bharatavarsha. They are incorporated as war traditions in the Tamil
Grammar work called “Tol Kappiyam.” Bharani yajna was part of that tradition.
Therefore it is presumed that Mahabharata war started with Bharani Yajna.
Sacrifices were made at that yajna. Folklore in Tamil refers to Iravan, born to
Ulupi and Arjuna as the person sacrificed at this yajna done before the war.
However Mahabharata does not support this view but describes Iravan’s fight and
his death on the 8th day of the war.
