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Question – 82
What other odd observation did Karna tell Krishna?
Answer:
Among the five astronomy observations, the second most
bizarre one, other than the shift in the mark on the moon, is about the planet
Mars. Karna said,
“The planet Angaāraka (Mars), wheeling, O slayer of
Madhu, towards the constellation Jyeṣṭha, approacheth towards Anurādha,
indicating a great slaughter of friends.” (MB: 5.141.8)
After Anusham (Anuradha), the star Jyeshtha comes. By
having said that Mars wheeled towards Anuradha from Jyeshtha, a retrograde
motion of the planet Mars is indicated. Almost all the Mahabharata researchers treated
it as retrogression without realising the fact that it cannot.
Why it cannot?
Because the month was Kartika which means the Sun was in
the sign of Scorpio. Anuradha and Jyeshtha are the stars located in Scorpio.
The verse shows that Mars was also present in Scorpio. As per the rule of
astronomy, Mars, an outer planet cannot retrograde in the sign where the sun is
also located. The retrogression of Mars begins only away from Sun – that is when
it transits 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th and
the 9th signs from the sun.
Retrogression can be explained by the following figure.
The sun is in the centre. The blue dots are the locations of the earth, and the
red ones are those of Mars. Note that Mars is on the side of the Sun and the
earth.
The earth is in the inner circle and the Mars in outer
circle. When they negotiate the curve, the earth in the inner circle will be
ahead of Mars in the outer circle. The resultant positions are shown on the
slide on our right. It shows that Mars seems to go backward as the earth takes
the lead but ultimately takes a forward course. This phenomenon known as
retrogression will happen when Mars is on the side of Sun and more so when it
is in the same sign as the sun is.
In Kartika it was
