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    "num": 47,
    "slug": "49-xvii-the-zodiac-and-its-antiquity-647",
    "title": "XVII. THE ZODIAC AND ITS ANTIQUITY ... 647",
    "of": 48,
    "words": 10870,
    "text": "## XVII. THE ZODIAC AND ITS ANTIQUITY ... 647\n\n\nThe Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 1, bk 3, ch 17\n\n###### The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol.\n1\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 647 ASTROLOGY A SCIENCE.\n\n[[This page continued from previous section]]\n\n##### XVII.\n\"THE ZODIAC AND ITS ANTIQUITY.\"\n\n\"**A**LL men are apt to have a high conceit\nof their own understanding, and to be tenacious of the opinions\nthey profess,\" said Jordan, justly adding to this -- \"and\nyet almost all men *are guided by the understandings of others*,*\nnot by their own; *and may be said more truly to adopt, than\nto beget, their opinions.\"\n\nThis becomes doubly true in the matter of scientific opinions\nupon hypotheses offered for consideration -- the prejudice and\npreconceptions of \"authorities,\" so called, often deciding\nupon questions of the most vital importance for history. There\nare several such predetermined opinions among our learned Orientalists,\nyet few are more unjust or *illogical *than the general\nerror with regard to the antiquity of the Zodiac. Thanks to the\nhobby of some German Orientalists, English and American Sanskritists\nhave accepted Professor Weber's opinion that the peoples of India\nhad no idea or knowledge of the Zodiac prior to the Macedonian\ninvasion, and that it is from the Greeks that the ancient Hindus\nimported it into their country. We are further told, by several\nother \"authorities,\" that no Eastern nation knew of\nthe Zodiac before the Hellenes kindly acquainted their neighbours\nwith their invention. *This*,* *in the face of the\n*Book of Job*,* *declared, even by themselves, to\nbe the oldest in the Hebrew canon, certainly prior to Moses, and\nwhich speaks of the *making *\"of Arcturus, Orion,\nand Pleiades (*Ash*,* Kesil*,* *and\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 648 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\n*Cimah*)* *and the chambers of the South\" (ix.\n9); of Scorpio and the *Mazzaroths *-- the TWELVE SIGNS\n(xxxviii., 31, 32), which words, if they mean anything, imply\nknowledge of the Zodiac even among the nomadic Arabic tribes.\nThe *Book of Job*,* *they say, precedes Homer and\nHesiod by at least one thousand years -- the two Greek poets having\nthemselves flourished some eight centuries before the Christian\nera (!!). One who prefers, by the bye, to believe Plato, who shows\nHomer flourishing far earlier, could point to a number of Zodiacal\nsigns mentioned in the *Iliad *and the *Odyssey*,*\n*in the Orphic poems, and elsewhere. But since the cock-and-bull\nhypothesis of some modern critics to the effect that neither Orpheus,\nnor yet Homer and Hesiod, ever existed, it would seem time lost\nto mention these Archaic authors at all. The Arabian *Job *will*\n*suffice; unless, indeed, his volume of lamentations, along\nwith the poems of the two Greeks, adding to them those of Linus,\nshould now be also declared to be the patriotic forgery of the\nJew Aristobulus. But if the Zodiac was known in the days of Job,\nhow could the civilized and philosophical Hindus have remained\nignorant of it?\n\nRisking the arrows of modern criticism -- rather blunted by misuse\n-- the reader may be made acquainted with Bailly's learned opinion\nupon the subject. Inferred speculations may be shown to be erroneous.\nMathematical calculations stand on more secure grounds. Taking\nas a starting point several astronomical references in *Job*,*\n*Bailly devised a very ingenious means of proving that the\nearliest founders of the science of the Zodiac belonged to an\nantediluvian, primitive people. The fact that he seems willing\nto see in Thoth, Seth, and in *Fohi *(of China), some of\nthe Biblical patriarchs, does not interfere with the validity\nof his proof as to the antiquity of the Zodiac.* Even accepting,\nfor argument's sake, his cautious 3700 years **B.C**. as the\ncorrect age of the science, this date proves in the most irrefutable\nway that it was not the Greeks who invented the Zodiac, for the\nsimple reason that they did not yet exist as a nation thirty-seven\ncenturies **B.C**. -- not as an *historical *race admitted\nby the critics, at any rate. Bailly then calculated the period\nat which the constellations manifested the atmospheric influence\ncalled by Job \"sweet influences of the Pleiades\"** (in\nHebrew, *Chimah*,* *see* Job xxxviii. *31);\nof the *Cesil *(Orion); and that of the *desert *rains\nwith reference to *Scorpio*,* *the eighth constellation;\nand found that in presence the eternal conformity of those divisions\nof the zodiac and names of the planets applied in the same order\neverywhere and always; and in presence of the impossibility of\nattributing it all to chance and *coincidence*,\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n** Astronomie Antique.*\n\n** The *Pleiades*,* *as all know, are the seven\nstars beyond the Bull, which appear at the beginning of spring.\nThey have a very occult meaning in the Hindu esoteric philosophy,\nand are connected with *sound *and other mystic principles\nin Nature.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 649 THE ZODIAC IN THE BIBLE.\n\n\"which never creates such similarities,\" there must\nbe allowed for the zodiac a great antiquity indeed. (See *Astronomie\nAntique*,* *pp. 63 to 74.)\n\nAgain, if the Bible is supposed to be an authority on any matter\n(and there are some who still believe so, whether from Christian\nor Kabalistical considerations), then the zodiac is clearly mentioned\nin II Kings, xxiii. 5. Before the \"book of the law\"\nwas \"found\" by Hilkiah, the high priest (xxii.), the\nsigns of the zodiac were known and worshipped. They were held\nin the same adoration as the sun and moon, since the \"priests,\nwhom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense . . . unto\nBaal, to the sun, moon, and to the planets, and to all the host\nof heaven,\" or the *twelve signs *or* constellations*,*\n*as the marginal note in the English Bible explains (see II.\nKings xxiii. 5), had followed the injunction for centuries. They\nwere stopped in their idolatry only by King Josiah, 624 years\nB.C.\n\nThe Old Testament is full of allusions to the twelve zodiacal\nsigns, and the whole scheme is built upon it -- heroes, personages,\nand events. Thus in the dream of Joseph, who saw eleven \"stars\"\nbowing to the *twelfth*,* *which was *his *\"star,\"\nthe zodiac is meant. The Roman Catholics have discovered in it,\nmoreover, a prophecy of Christ, who is that twelfth star, they\nsay, and the eleven apostles; the absence of the twelfth being\nalso regarded as a prophetic allusion to the treachery of Judas.\nThe twelve sons of Jacob are again a reference to the same, as\njustly pointed out by Villapandus (*Temple de Jerusalem*,*\n*Vol. **II.,** p. 2nd part, chap. xxx). Sir James Malcolm,\nin his *History of Persia *(ch. vii.), shows the *Dabistan\n*echoing all such traditions about the Zodiac. He traces the\ninvention of it to the palmy days of the golden age of Iran, remarking\nthat one of the said traditions maintains that the genii of the\nplanets are represented under the same shapes and figures they\nhad assumed, when *they showed themselves to several holy prophets*,*\n*and have thus led to the establishment of the rites based\non the Zodiac.\n\nPythagoras, and after him Philo Judaeus, held the number 12 as\nvery sacred. \"The dodecahedron is a PERFECT number.\"\nIt is the one among the signs of the Zodiac, Philo adds, that\nthe sun visits in twelve months, and it is to honour that sign\nthat Moses divided his nation into twelve tribes, established\nthe twelve cakes (Levit. xxiv., 5) of the *shewbread*,*\n*and placed twelve precious stones around the *ephod *of\nthe pontiffs. (See *De Profugis.*)\n\nAccording to Seneca, Berosus taught prophecy of every future event\nand cataclysm by the Zodiac; and the time fixed by him for the\nconflagration of the world (*pralaya*),* *and another\nfor a deluge, is found to answer to the time given in an ancient\nEgyptian papyrus. It comes at every renewal of the cycle of the\nsidereal year of 25,868 years. The names of the Akkadian months\nwere called by, and derived from, the\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 650 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nnames of the signs of the Zodiac, and the Akkadians themselves\nare far earlier than the Chaldaeans. Mr. Proctor shows, in his\n*Myths and Marvels of Astronomy*,* *that the ancient\nastronomers had acquired a system of the most accurate astronomy\n2,400 years **B.C.**; the Hindus date their Kali Yug from a\ngreat periodical conjunction of the planets thirty-one centuries\n**B.C**.; and, withal, it is the Greeks belonging to the expedition\nof Alexander the Great, who were the instructors of the Aryan\nHindus in astronomy!\n\nWhether the origin of the Zodiac is Aryan or Egyptian, it is still\nof an immense antiquity. Simplicius (**VI**th cent. **A.D**.)\nwrites that he had always heard that the Egyptians had kept astronomical\nobservations and records for the last 630,000 years. This statement\nappears to frighten Mr. G. Massey, who remarks on this in his\n*Natural Genesis *(318)* *that \"if we read\nthis number of years by the month which Euxodus said the Egyptians\ntermed a year, *that *would still yield the length of two\ncycles of precession (or 51,736 years).\" Diogenes Laertius\ncarried back the astronomical calculations of the Egyptians to\n48,863 years before Alexander the Great (*Proem*, 2)*.\n*Martianus Capella corroborates the same by telling posterity\nthat the Egyptians had secretly studied astronomy for over 40,000\nyears, before they imparted their knowledge to the world (*Astronomy\nof the Ancients*,* *Lewis, p. 264).\n\nSeveral valuable quotations are made in the *Natural Genesis\n*with the view of supporting the author's theories, but they\njustify the teaching of the *Secret Doctrine *far more.\nFor instance, Plutarch is quoted from his* Life of Sulla*,*\n*saying: \"One day when the sky was serene . . . a sound\nwas heard in it . . . of a trumpet, so loud, shrill and mournful,\nthat it affrighted . . . the world. The Tuscan sages said that\nit *portended a new race of men*,* and a renovation\nof the world; for they affirmed that there were eight several\nkinds of men*,* *all being different in life and manners,\nand that *Heaven had allotted each its time*,* which\nwas limited by the circuit of the great year*\"* *(25,868\nyears).\n\nThis reminds one strongly of our seven races of men, and of the\neighth -- the \"animal man\" -- descended from the later\nThird Race; as also of the successive submersions and destruction\nof the continents which finally disposed of almost the entire\nbulk of that race.\n\n\"The Assyrians,\" says Iamblichus, \"have not only\npreserved the memorials of seven and twenty myriads of years (270,000\nyears) as Hipparchus says they have, but likewise of the whole\napocatastases and periods of the seven rulers of the world.\"\n(Proclus, in *Timaeus*, b. I.) This is the calculation\nof the *Esoteric Doctrine*,* *as approximately as\nit can be. For 1,000,000 of years are allowed for our present\nRoot-race (the Fifth), and about 850,000 years since the submersion\nof the last large island (part of the Continent), the Ruta of\nthe Fourth Race, or the Atlanteans;\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 651 THE JEWISH PATRIARCHS ZODIACAL SIGNS.\n\nwhile Daitya, a small island inhabited by a mixed race, was destroyed\nabout 270,000 years ago, during the glacial period or thereabouts\n(*vide *Book II.). But the Seven Rulers, or the seven great\nDynasties of the *divine *kings belong to the traditions\nof every great people of antiquity. Wherever twelve are mentioned,\nthese are invariably the 12 signs of the zodiac.\n\nSo patent is the fact, that the Roman Catholic writers -- especially\namong the French Ultramontanes -- have tacitly agreed to connect\nthe twelve Jewish Patriarchs with the *signs *of the Zodiac.\nThis is done in a kind of prophetico-mystic way, which would sound\nto pious and ignorant ears like a portentous sign, a tacit divine\nrecognition of the \"chosen people of God,\" whose finger\nhas purposely traced in heaven, from the beginning of creation,\nthe numbers of these patriarchs. For instance, these writers (De\nMirville among others) recognise curiously enough all the characteristics\nof the 12 signs of the Zodiac, in the words addressed by the dying\nJacob to his Sons, and in his definitions of the future of each\nTribe. (*Vide Genesis*,* ch. xlix.*)* *Moreover,\nthe respective banners of the same tribes are claimed to have\nexhibited the same symbols and the same names as the signs, repeated\nin the 12 stones of the *Urim *and* Thummim*,*\n*and on the 12 wings of the cherub. Leaving the proof of exactitude\nin the alleged correspondence to the said mystics, it is as follows:\nMan, or the *Aquarius*,* *is in the sphere of Reuben,\nwho is declared as \"unstable as water\" (the *Vulgate\n*has it, to be \"*rushing *like water,\"; *Gemini*,*\n*in the strong fraternal association of Simeon and Levi; *Leo*,*\n*in that of Judah, \"the strong Lion\" of his tribe,\n\"the lion's whelp\"; the *Pisces*,* *in\nZabulon, who \"shall dwell at the haven of the sea\";\n*Taurus*,* *in Issachar, because he is \"a strong\nass couching down,\" etc., and therefore associated with the\nstables; Virgo-*Scorpio*,* *in Dan, who is described\nas \"a serpent, an adder in the path that biteth,\" etc.;\n*Capricornus *in Naphtali, who is \"a hind (a deer)\nlet loose\"; *Cancer*,* *in Benjamin, for he\nis \"*ravenous*\";* Libra*,* *the\n\"Balance,\" in Asher, whose \"bread shall be fat\";\n*Saggitarius *in Joseph, because \"his bow abode in\nstrength.\" To make up for the *twelfth* sign,*\nVirgo*,* *made independent of *Scorpio*,*\n*is Dina, the only daughter of Jacob. (See *Genesis xlix.*)*\n*Tradition shows the *alleged *tribes carrying the\n12 signs on their banners. But the Bible is, besides these, full\nof theo-cosmological and astronomical symbols and personifications.\n\nIt remains to wonder, and query -- if the actual, living Patriarch's\ndestiny was so indissolubly wound up with the Zodiac -- how it\nis that after the loss of the ten tribes, ten signs out of the\ntwelve have not also miraculously disappeared from the sidereal\nfields? But this is of no great concern. Let us rather busy ourselves\nwith the history of the Zodiac itself.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 652 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nNow the reader may be reminded of some opinions expressed on the\nsubject by several of the highest authorities in Science.\n\nNewton believed the invention of the Zodiac could be traced as\nfar back as the expedition of the Argonauts; and Dulaure fixed\nits origin at 6,500 years **B.C**., just 2,496 years before\nthe creation of the World according to the Bible chronology.\n\nCreuzer believes it very easy to show that most of the theogonies\nare intimately connected with religious calendars, and point to\nthe Zodiac as their prime origin -- if not identical with the\nZodiac known to us now, then something very analogous to it. He\nfeels certain that the Zodiac and its mystic relations are at\nthe bottom of all the mythologies, under one form or the other,\nand that it had existed in the old form for ages before; owing\nto some singular co-ordination of events, it was brought out in\nthe present defined astronomical garb. (*Creuzer*,*\n*Book **III**., page 930.)\n\nWhether \"the genii of the planets\" (our Dhyan Chohans\nof supra-mundane spheres) showed themselves to \"holy prophets\"\nor not, as claimed in the *Dabistan*,* *it would\nseem that great laymen and warriors were favoured in the same\nway in days of old, when astrological *magic* and* theophania\n*went hand in hand in Chaldea. For Xenophon, no ordinary man,\nnarrates of Cyrus, that at the moment of his death that king was\ngiving ardent thanks to gods and heroes, for having *so often\n*instructed him *themselves *about the *signs *in\nheaven, [[*ev ouraniois semeiois*]] (*Cyropedie*,*\n*\"Ant. du Zodiaque.\")\n\nUnless the science of the zodiac is supposed to be of the highest\nantiquity and universality, how account for its signs being traced\nin the oldest theogonies? Laplace is said to have felt struck\nwith amazement at the idea of the days of Mercury (Wednesday),\nVenus (Friday), Jupiter (Thursday), Saturn (Saturday), and others\nbeing related to the days of the week in the same order and with\nthe same names in India as in Northern Europe. \"Try, if you\ncan, with the present system of *autochthonous *civilizations,\nso much in fashion in our day, to explain how nations with no\nancestry, no traditions or birthplace in common, could have succeeded\nin inventing a kind of celestial phantasmagoria, a veritable *imbroglio\n*of sidereal denominations, without sequence or object, having\nno figurative relation with the constellations they represent,\nand still less, *apparently*,* *with the phases\nof our terrestrial life they are made to signify,\" had there\nnot been a *general *intention and a *universal *cause\nand belief, at the root of all this? (*Pneumatologie*,*\n*Vol. **IV**., p. 61.) Most truly has Dupuis asserted the\nsame: \"Il est impossible de decouvrir le moindre trait de\nressemblance entre les parties du ciel et les figures que les\nastronomes y ont *arbitrairement *tracees, et de l'autre\ncote;* le hazard est impossible*,\"* *he says.\n(*Origine des Cultes*,* *\"Zodiaque.\")\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 653 THE SIGN OF JONAS.\n\nMost certainly chance is \"*impossible.*\"*\n*There is no \"chance\" in Nature, wherein everything\nis mathematically co-ordinate and mutually related in its units.\n\"Chance,\" says Coleridge, \"is but the pseudonym\nof God (or Nature), for those particular cases which He does not\nchoose to subscribe openly with His sign manual.\" Replace\nthe word \"God\" by that of *Karma *and it will\nbecome an Eastern axiom. Therefore, the *sidereal *\"prophecies\"\nof the zodiac, as they are called by Christian mystics, never\npoint to any one particular event, however solemn and sacred it\nmay be for some one portion of humanity, but to ever-recurrent,\nperiodical laws in nature, understood but by the Initiates of\nthe sidereal *gods *themselves.\n\nNo occultist, no astrologer of Eastern birth, will ever agree\nwith Christian mystics, or even with Kepler's mystical astronomy,\nhis great science and erudition notwithstanding; simply because,\nif his premises are quite correct, his deductions therefrom are\none-sided and biassed by Christian preconceptions. Where the latter\nfinds a prophecy directly pointing at the Saviour, other nations\nsee a symbol of an eternal law decreed for the actual manvantara.\nWhy see in the *Pisces *a direct reference to Christ --\none of the several world-reformers, a Saviour but for his direct\nfollowers, but only a great and glorious Initiate for all the\nrest -- when that constellation shines as a symbol of all the\npast, present, and future Spiritual Saviours who dispense light\nand dispel mental darkness? Christian symbologists have tried\nto prove that it was that of Ephraim (Joseph's son), the *elect\n*of Jacob, that therefore, it was at the moment of the Sun\nentering into the sign of the Fish (*Pisces*)* *that\n\"the Elect Messiah, the [[*Ichthus*]] of the first\nChristians, had to be born. But, if Jesus of Nazareth was that\nMessiah -- was he really born at that \"moment,\" or was\nhe made to be so born by the adaptation of theologians, who sought\nonly to make their preconceived ideas fit in with sidereal *facts\n*and popular belief? Everyone knows that the real time and\nyear of the birth of Jesus are totally unknown. And it is the\nJews, whose forefathers have made the word *Dag *signify\nboth \"fish\" and \"Messiah,\" who, during the\nforced development of their rabbinical language, are the first\nto deny this Christian claim. And what of the further facts that\nBrahmins also connect *their *\"Messiah,\" the\neternal Avatar Vishnu, with a *fish *and the Deluge, and\nthat the Babylonians made of their *Dag*-*On*,*\n*equally a fish and a Messiah, the Man-Fish and Prophet?\n\nThere are those learned iconoclasts among Egyptologists, who say\nthat \"when the Pharisees sought a '*sign from heaven*'*\n*Jesus said, '*there shall no sign be given but the sign\nof Jonas*'* *(Mat. xvi. 4). . . . . The sign of Jonas\nis that of the Oan or fishman of Nineveh. . . . . Assuredly there\nwas no other sign than that of the Sun reborn in *Pisces. *The\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 654 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nvoice of the Secret Wisdom says those who are looking for signs\ncan have no other than that of the returning fish-man Ichthys,\nOannes, or Jonas -- who could not be made flesh.\"\n\nIt would appear that Kepler maintained it as a positive *fact*\nthat, at the moment of the \"incarnation,\" all the planets\nwere in conjunction in the sign of *Pisces*,* *called\nby the Jews (the Kabalists) the \"constellation of the Messiah.\"\n\"It is in this constellation,\" he averred, \"that\nwas placed the* star of the Magi.*\"* *This\nstatement, quoted by Dr. Sepp (*Vie de notre Seigneur Jesus\nChrist*, Vol. I. p. 9), emboldened him to remark that \"all\nthe Jewish traditions while announcing that *star*,*\n*that *many nations *have seen,\"(!)* added that\n\"it would absorb the *seventy planets *that preside\nover the destinies of various nations on this globe.\"** \"In\nvirtue of those natural prophecies,\" explains Dr. Sepp, \"it\nwas written in the stars of the firmament that the Messiah would\nbe born in the lunar year of the world 4320, in that memorable\nyear when the entire choir of the planets would be feasting its\njubilee.\"\n\nThere was indeed a rage, at the beginning of the present century,\nfor claiming from the Hindus restoration of an alleged robbery\nfrom the Jews of their \"gods,\" patriarchs, and chronology.\nIt was Wilford who had recognized Noah in Prithee and in Satyavrata,\nEnos in Dhruva, and even Assur in Iswara. Yet, after being residents\nfor so many years in India, some Orientalists, at least, ought\nto have known that it was not the Hindus alone who had these figures,\nor who had divided their great age into four minor ages. Nevertheless\nwriters in the *Asiatic Researches *indulged in the most\nextravagant speculations.\n\n\"Christian theologians think it their duty to write against\nthe long periods of Hindu chronology,\" argues very pertinently\nS. A. Mackey, the Norwich \"philosopher, astronomer, and shoemaker.\"\n\"But when a man of learning crucifies the names and numbers\nof the ancients, and wrings and twists them into a form which\nmeans something quite foreign to the intention of the ancient\nauthors; but which, so mutilated, fits in with the birth of some\nmaggot pre-existing in his own brain with so much exactness that\nhe pretends *to be amazed *at the discovery, I cannot think\nhim quite so pardonable\" (*Key of Urania*)*.*\n\nThis is intended to apply to Captain (later Colonel) Wilford,\nbut the\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Whether many nations have seen that identical star, or not,\nwe all know that the sepulchres of \"the three Magi,\"\nwho rejoice in the quite *Teutonic *names of Kaspar and\nMelchior, Balthazar being the only exception, and the two having\nlittle of the Chaldean ring in them -- are shown by the priests\nin the famous cathedral of Cologne, where the Magian bodies are\nnot only supposed, but firmly believed to have been buried.\n\n** This tradition about the *seventy planets *that preside\nover the destinies of nations, is based on the occult cosmogonical\nteaching that besides our own septenary chain of world-planets,\nthere are many more in the solar system.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 655 CHALDEO-JUDEAN GODS.\n\nwords may fit more than one of our modern Orientalists. The former\nwas the first to crown his unlucky speculations in Hindu chronology\nand the Puranas by connecting the 4,320,000 years with biblical\nchronology, simply dwarfing the figures to 4,320 years (the supposed\nlunar year of the Nativity), and Dr. Sepp has simply plagiarized\nthe idea from this gallant officer. Moreover, he persisted in\nseeing in them Jewish property, as well as a Christian prophecy,\nthus accusing the Aryans of having helped themselves to Semitic\nrevelation, whereas it was the reverse. The Jews, moreover, need\nnot be accused of despoiling the Hindus, of whose figures Ezra\nprobably knew nothing. They had evidently and undeniably borrowed\nthem from the Chaldeans, along with their gods. Of the 432,000\nyears of the Chaldean divine Dynasties* they made 4,320 lunar\nyears from the world's creation to the Christian era; as to the\nBabylonian and Egyptian Gods, they transformed them as quietly\nand modestly into Patriarchs. Every nation was more or less guilty\nof such refashioning and adaptation of a Pantheon (common once\nto all) of universal, into national, tribal gods and Heroes. It\nwas their property in its new Pentateuchal garb, and no one of\nthe Israelites has ever forced it upon any other nation -- least\nof all upon Europeans.\n\nWithout stopping to notice this very unscientific chronology more\nthan is necessary, we may make a few remarks that may be found\nto the point. These figures of 4,320* lunar *years of the\nworld (in the Bible the *solar *years are used) are not\nfanciful, as such, even if their application is quite erroneous;\nfor they are only the distorted echo of the primitive esoteric,\nand later on Brahminical doctrine concerning the Yugas. A \"Day\"\nof Brahma equals 4,320,000,000 years, as also a \"Night\"\nof Brahma, or the duration of Pralaya, after which a *new ***S**UN\nrises trium-\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Every scholar is aware, of course, that the Chaldeans claimed\nthe same figures (432) or (432,000) for their divine dynasties\nas the Hindus do for their Mahayuga, namely, 4,320,000. Therefore\nhas Dr. Sepp, of Munich, undertaken to support Kepler and Wilford\nin their charge that the Hindus had borrowed them from the Christians,\nand the Chaldeans from the Jews, who, as claimed, expected their\nMessiah in the lunar year of the world 4,320!!! As these figures,\naccording to ancient writers, were based by Berosus on the 120\nSaroses -- each of the divisions meaning six neroses of 600 years\neach, making a sum total of 432,000 years -- they do not thus\nappear peremptory. But the pious professor of Munich undertook\nto explain them in *the correct way. *He claims to have\nsolved the riddle by showing that \"the saros being composed\naccording to Pliny of 222 synodial months, to wit, 18 years 6/10,\"\nthe calculator naturally fell back into the figures \"given\nby Suidas,\" who affirmed that the 120 saroses made 2,222\nsacerdotal and cyclic years, which equalled 1,656 solar years.\"\n(*Vie de Notre Seigneur Jesus Christ*,* Vol. II.*,*\np.* 417.)\n\nSuidas said nothing of the kind, and, if he had, he would prove\nlittle, if anything, by it. The *neroses and saroses *were\nthe same thorn in the side of *uninitiated *ancient writers,\nas the apocalyptic 666 of the \"great Beast\" is in that\nof the modern, and they have found their unlucky Newtons as the\nlatter figures have.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 656 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nphantly over a *new manvantara*,* *for the septenary\nchain it illuminates. The teaching had penetrated into Palestine\nand Europe centuries before the Christian era (see *Isis Unveiled*\n**II. **132), and was present in the minds of the Mosaic Jews,\nwho based upon it their small cycle, though it received full expression\nonly through the Christian chronologers of the Bible, who adopted\nit, as also the 25th of December, the day on which all the *solar\n*gods were said to have been incarnated. What wonder, then,\nthat the Messiah was *made *to be born \"the *lunar\n*year of the world 4,320?\" The \"Son of Righteousness\nand *Salvation*\"* *had once more arisen and\nhad dispelled *pralayic *darkness of chaos and *non*-*being\n*on the plane of our objective little globe and chain. Once\nthe subject of the adoration was settled upon, it was easy to\nmake the supposed events of his birth, life, and death, fit in\nwith the Zodiacal exigencies and old traditions, though they had\nto be somewhat remodelled for the occasion.\n\nThus what Kepler said, as a great astronomer, becomes comprehensible.\nHe recognised the grand and universal importance of all such planetary\nconjunctions, \"each of which\" -- as he has well said\n-- \"is a *climacteric *year of Humanity.\"* The\nrare conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars has its significance\nand importance on account of its *certain great results *--*\n*in India and China as much as it has in Europe for the respective\nmystics of all those countries. And it is certainly no better\nnow than a mere assumption to maintain that nature had only Christ\nin view, when building her (to the profane) fantastic and meaningless\nconstellations. If it is claimed that it was no hazard that could\nlead the archaic architects of the Zodiac, thousands of years\nago, to mark with the asterisk (*a*) the figure of *Taurus*,*\n*with no better or more valid proof of it being *prophetic\n*of the *Verbum *or Christ than that the *aleph*\nof *Taurus *means \"the ONE\" and the FIRST, and\nthat Christ was also the *alpha *or the ONE, then this\n\"proof\" may be shown strangely invalidated in more than\none way. To begin with, the Zodiac existed before the Christian\nera, at all events; further, all the Sun-gods had been mystically\nconnected with that constellation (Taurus) -- Osiris, for instance\n-- and were all called by their respective votaries \"the\nFirst.\" Then the compilers of the mystical epithets given\nto the Christian Saviour, were all more or less acquainted with\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The reader has to bear in mind that the phrase \"climacteric\nyear\" has more than the usual significance, when used by\nOccultists and Mystics. It is not only a critical period, during\nwhich some great change is periodically expected, whether in human\nor cosmic constitution, but it likewise pertains to spiritual\nuniversal changes. The Europeans called every 63rd year \"the\ngrand climacteric,\" and perhaps justly supposed those years\nto be the years produced by multiplying 7 into the odd numbers\n3, 5, 7 and 9. But *seven *is the real scale of nature,\nin Occultism, and 7 has to be multiplied in quite a different\nway and method, unknown as yet to European nations.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 657 THE DRAGON AND THE BULL.\n\nthe significance of the Zodiacal signs; and it is easier to suppose\nthat they should have arranged their claims so as to answer the\nmystic signs, than that the latter should have shone as a prophecy\nfor one portion of humanity, for millions of years, taking no\nheed of the numberless generations that had gone before, and those\nto be born hereafter.\n\n\"It is not simple chance,\" we are told, \"that has\nplaced in certain spheres, on a throne, the head of that bull\n(*Taurus*),* *trying to push away with the *ansated\ncross *on its horns, a *Dragon; *the more so, since\nthis constellation of *Taurus *was called '*the great\ncity of God *and *the mother of revelations*,'*\n*and also '*the interpreter of the divine voice*,'*\n*the *Apis pacis *of* *Hermoutis, in Egypt,\nwhich (as the *patristic *fathers would assure the world)\npreferred oracles that related to the birth of the Saviour\"\n(*Pneumatologie*,* *iv., 71).\n\nTo this theological assumption there are several answers. *Firstly*,*\n*the* *ansated Egyptian cross, or *tau*,*\n*the Jaina cross, or Swastica, and the Christian cross have\nall the same meaning. *Secondly*,* *no peoples or\nnations except the Christians gave the significance to the Dragon\nthat is given to it now. The serpent was the symbol of **W**ISDOM;\nand the Bull (*Taurus*)* *the symbol of physical\nor terrestrial *generation. *Thus* *the latter,\npushing off the Dragon, or *spiritual*,* *Divine\nWisdom, with the *Tau*,* *or Cross -- which is esoterically\n\"the foundation and framework of all construction\" --\nwould have an entirely *phallic*,* *physiological\nmeaning, had it not still another significance unknown to our\nBiblical scholars and symbologists. At any rate, it shows no special\nreference to the *Verbum *of St. John, except, perhaps,\nin a general sense. The *taurus *(which, by the way, is\nno *lamb*,* *but a bull) was sacred in every Cosmogony,\nwith the Hindus as with the Zoroastrians, with the Chaldees as\nwith the Egyptians. So much, every schoolboy knows.\n\nIt may perhaps help to refresh the memory of our Theosophists\nby referring them to what was said of the Virgin and the Dragon,\nand the universality of periodical births and re-births of World-Saviours\n-- solar gods -- in* Isis*,* ***II.**, 490, with\nreference to certain passages in Revelations.\n\nIn 1853, the *savant *known as Erard-Mollien read before\nthe Institute of France a paper tending to prove the antiquity\nof the Indian Zodiac, in the signs of which were found the root\nand philosophy of all the most important religious festivals of\nthat country, the origin of which religious ceremonies goes back\ninto the night of time at least 3,000 **B.C**., as the lecturer\ntried to demonstrate. The Zodiac of the Hindus, he thought, was\nfar anterior to the Zodiac of the Greeks, and differed from it\nin some particulars vastly. In it one sees the *Dragon *on\na tree, at the foot of which the \"Virgin,\" *Kanya*-*Durga*,*\n*one of the most ancient goddesses, is placed on a *lion\n*dragging after him the *solar *car. \"This is\nthe reason why,\" he added, \"this Virgin *Durga *is\nnot the simple *memento *of\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 658 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nan astronomical fact, but verily the most ancient divinity of\nthe Indian Olympus. She is evidently the same of whom all the\nSibylline books spoke, those works that have been the source of\nthe inspiration of Virgil; the virgin whose return was prophesied\nas a sign of universal renovation. . . . . And why,\" he added,\n\"when we see to this day, the months named after the deity-names\nof this solar Zodiac by the Malayalim-speaking people of southern\nIndia -- why should that people have abandoned their ancestral\nZodiac to burden themselves with that of the Greeks? Everything\nproves, on the contrary, that these zodiacal figures have been\ntransmitted to the Greeks by the Chaldees, who got them from the\nBrahmans.\" (*See Recueil de l*'*Academie des Inscriptions*,*\n*1853*.*)\n\nBut all this is very poor testimony. Let us remember, however,\nalso that which was said and accepted by the contemporaries of\nVolney, who, in his \"Ruins of Empires,\" p. 360, remarks\nthat as *Aries *was in its fifteenth degree 1447 **B.C**.,\nit follows that the first degree of \"Libra\" could not\nhave coincided with the Vernal equinox more lately than 15,194\nyears **B.C**., to which, if you add 1,790 years since Christ,\nit appears that 16,984 years have elapsed since the origin of\nthe *Zodiac.*\n\nDr. Schlegel, moreover, in his *Uranographie Chinoise *assigns\nto the Chinese Astronomical Sphere an antiquity of 18,000 years.\n(*Vide* pp. 54, 196, *et seq.*)\n\nNevertheless, as opinions quoted without adequate proofs are of\nlittle avail, it may be more useful to turn to scientific evidence.\nM. Bailly, the famous French astronomer of the last century, Member\nof the Academy, etc., etc., asserts that the Hindu systems of\nastronomy are by far the oldest, and that from them the Egyptians,\nGreeks, Romans, and even the Jews derived their knowledge. In\nsupport of these views he says --\n\n\"The astronomers who preceded the epoch 1,491 are, first,\nthe Alexandrian Greeks; Hipparchus, who flourished 125 years before\nour era, and Ptolemy, 260 years after Hipparchus. Following these\nwere the Arabs, who revived the study of astronomy in the ninth\ncentury. These were succeeded by the Persians and the Tartars,\nto whom we owe the tables of Massireddin in 1269, and those of\nUlug-beg in 1437. Such is the succession of events in Asia as\nknown prior to the Indian epoch 1491. What, then, is an epoch?\nIt is the observation of the longitude of a star at a given moment,\nthe place in the sky where it was *seen*,* *and\nwhich serves as a point of reference, a starting-point from which\nto calculate both the past and future positions of the star from\nits observed motion. But an epoch is useless unless the motion\nof the star has been determined. A people, new to science and\nobliged to borrow a foreign astronomy, finds no difficulty in\nfixing an epoch, since\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 659 BAILLY'S CONCLUSIONS.\n\nthe only observation needed is one which can be made at any moment.\nBut what it needs above all, what it is obliged to borrow, are\nthose elements which depend on accurate determination, and which\nrequire continuous observation; above all, those motions which\ndepend on time, and which can only be accurately determined by\ncenturies of observation. These motions, then, must be borrowed\nfrom a nation which has made such observations, and has behind\nit the labours of centuries. We conclude, therefore, that a new\npeople will not borrow the epochs of an ancient one, without also\nborrowing from them the 'average motions.' Starting from this\nprinciple we shall find that the Hindu epochs 1491 and 3102 could\nnot have been derived from those of either Ptolemy or Ulug-beg.\"\n\nThere remains the supposition that the Hindus, comparing their\nobservations in 1491 with those previously made by Ulug-beg and\nPtolemy, used the intervals between these observations to determine\nthe \"average motions.\" The date of Ulug-beg is too recent\nfor such a determination; while those of Ptolemy and Hipparchus\nwere barely remote enough. But if the Hindu motions had been determined\nfrom these comparisons, the epochs would be connected together.\nStarting from the epochs of Ulug-beg and Ptolemy we should arrive\nat all those of the Hindus. But this is not the case. Hence foreign\nepochs were either unknown or useless to the Hindus.*\n\nWe may add to this another important consideration. When a nation\nis obliged to borrow from its neighbours the methods or the average\nmotions of its astronomical tables, it has even greater need to\nborrow, besides these, the knowledge of the inequalities of the\nmotions of the heavenly bodies, the motions of the apogee, of\nthe nodes, and of the inclination of the ecliptic; in short, all\nthose elements the determination of which requires the art of\nobserving, some instrumental appliances, and great industry. All\nthese astronomical elements, differing more or less with the Greeks\nof Alexandria, the Arabs, the Persians and the Tartars, exhibit\nno resemblance whatever with those of the Hindus. The latter,\ntherefore, borrowed nothing from their neighbours.\n\nCondensing Bailly's remarks, he comes to the following conclusions:\n--\n\nIf the Hindus did not borrow their epoch, they must have possessed\na real one of their own, based on their own observations; and\nthis must be either the epoch of the year 1491 after, or that\nof the year 3102 before our era, the latter preceding by 4592\nyears the epoch 1491. We have to choose between these two epochs\nand to decide which of them is based on observation. But before\nstating the arguments which can and must\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* For a detailed scientific proof of this conclusion, see page\n121 of Mr. Bailly's work, where the subject is discussed technically.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 660 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\ndecide the question, we may be permitted to make a few remarks\nto those who may be inclined to believe that it is modern observations\nand calculations which have enabled the Hindus to determine the\npast positions of the heavenly bodies. It is far from easy to\ndetermine the celestial movements with sufficient accuracy to\nascend the stream of time for 4592 years, and to describe the\nphenomena which must have occurred at that period.\n\nWe possess to-day excellent instruments; exact observations have\nbeen made for some two or three centuries, which already permit\nus to calculate with considerable accuracy the average motions\nof the planets; we have the observations of the Chaldeans, of\nHipparchus and of Ptolemy, which, owing to their remoteness from\nthe present time, permit us to fix these motions with greater\ncertainty. Still we cannot undertake to represent with invariable\naccuracy the observations throughout the long period intervening\nbetween the Chaldeans and ourselves; and still less can we undertake\nto determine with exactitude events occurring 4592 years before\nour day. Cassini and Maier have each determined the secular motion\nof the moon, and they differ by 3m. 43s. This difference would\ngive rise in forty-six centuries to an uncertainty of nearly three\ndegrees in the moon's place. Doubtless one of these determinations\nis more accurate than the other; and it is for observations of\nvery great antiquity to decide between them. But in very remote\nperiods, where observations are lacking, it follows that we are\nuncertain as to the phenomena. How, then, could the Hindus have\ncalculated back from the year 1491 **A.D**. to the year 3102\nbefore our era, if they were only recent students of astronomy?\n\nThe Orientals have never been what we are. However high an opinion\nof their knowledge we may form from the examination of their Astronomy,\nwe cannot suppose them ever to have possessed that great array\nof instruments which distinguishes our modern observatories, and\nwhich is the product of simultaneous progress in various arts,\nnor could they have possessed that genius for discovery, which\nhas hitherto seemed to belong exclusively to Europe, and which,\nsupplying the place of time, causes the rapid progress of science\nand of human intelligence. If the Asiatics have been powerful,\nlearned and wise, it is power and time which have produced their\nmerit and success of all kinds. Power has founded or destroyed\ntheir empires; now it has erected edifices imposing by their bulk,\nnow it has reduced them to venerable ruins; and while these vicissitudes\nalternated with each other, patience accumulated knowledge; and\nprolonged experience produced wisdom. It is the antiquity of the\nnations of the East which has erected their scientific fame.\n\nIf the Hindus possessed in 1491 a knowledge of the heavenly motions\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 661 THE BEGINNING OF KALI-YUG.\n\nsufficiently accurate to enable them to calculate backwards for\n4,592 years, it follows that they could only have obtained this\nknowledge from very ancient observations. To grant them such knowledge,\nwhile refusing them the observations from which it is derived,\nis to suppose an impossibility; it would be equivalent to assuming\nthat at the outset of their career they had already reaped the\nharvest of time and experience. While on the other hand, if their\nepoch of 3102 is assumed to be real, it would follow that the\nHindus had simply kept pace with successive centuries down to\nthe year 1491 of our era. Thus, time itself was their teacher;\nthey knew the motions of the heavenly bodies during these periods,\nbecause they had seen them; and the duration of the Hindu people\non earth is the cause of the fidelity of its records and the accuracy\nof its calculations.\n\nIt would seem that the problem as to which of the two epochs of\n3102 and 1491 is the real one ought to be solved by one consideration,\nviz., that the ancients in general, and particularly the Hindus,\ncalculated, and therefore observed, eclipses only. Says Bailly:\n--\n\nNow, there was no eclipse of the sun at the moment of the epoch\n1492; and no eclipse of the moon either 14 days before or after\nthat moment. Therefore the epoch 1491 is not based on an observation.\nAs regards the epoch 3102, the Brahmins of Tirvalour place it\nat sunrise on February 18th. The sun was then in the first point\nof the Zodiac according to its true longitude. The other tables\nshow that at the preceding midnight the moon was in the same place,\nbut according to its average longitude. The Brahmins tell us also\nthat this first point, the origin of their Zodiac, was, in the\nyear 3102, 54 degrees behind the equinox. It follows that the\norigin -- the first point of their Zodiac -- was therefore in\nthe sixth degree of Libra.\n\nThere occurred, therefore, about this time and place an average\nconjunction; \"and indeed this conjunction is given in our\nbest tables: La Caille's for the sun and Maier's for the moon.\"\nThere was no eclipse of the sun, the moon being too distant from\nher node; but fourteen days later, the moon having approached\nthe node, must have been eclipsed. Maier's tables, used without\ncorrection for acceleration, give this eclipse; but they place\nit during the day when it could not have been observed in India.\nCassini's tables give it as occurring at night, which shows that\nMaier's motions are too rapid for distant centuries, when the\nacceleration is not allowed for; and which also proves that in\nspite of the improvement of our knowledge we can still be uncertain\nas to the actual aspect of the heavens in past times.\n\nTherefore we believe that as between the two Hindu epochs, the\nreal one is the year 3102, because it was accompanied by an eclipse\nwhich could be observed, and which must have served to determine\nit. This\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 662 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nis a first proof of the truth of the longitude assigned by the\nHindus to the sun and the moon at this instant; and this proof\nwould perhaps be sufficient, were it not that this ancient determination\nbecomes of the greatest importance for the verification of the\nmotions of these bodies, and must therefore be borne out by every\npossible proof of its authenticity.\n\nWe notice, first, that the Hindus seem to have combined two epochs\ntogether into the year 3102. The Tirvalour Brahmins reckon primarily\nfrom the first moment of the Kali-Yug; but they have a second\nepoch placed 2d. 3h. 32m. 30s. later. The latter is the true astronomical\nepoch, while the former seems to be a civil era. But if this epoch\nof the Kali-Yug had no reality, and was the mere result of a calculation,\nwhy should it be thus divided? Their calculated astronomical epoch\nwould have become that of the Kali-Yug, which would have been\nplaced at the conjunction of the sun and the moon, as is the case\nwith the epochs of the three other tables. They must have had\nsome reason for distinguishing between the two; and this reason\ncan only be due to the circumstances and the time of the epoch;\nwhich therefore could not be the result of calculation. This is\nnot all; starting from the solar epoch determined by the rising\nof the sun on February 18th, 3102, and tracing back events 2d.\n3h. 32m. 30s., we come to 2h. 27m. 30s. a.m. of February 16th,\nwhich is the instant of the beginning of Kali-Yuga. It is curious\nthat this age has not been made to commence at one of the four\ngreat divisions of the day. It might be suspected that the epoch\nshould be midnight, and that the 2h. 27m. 30s. are a meridian\ncorrection. But whatever may have been the reason for fixing on\nthis moment, it is plain that were this epoch the result of calculation,\nit would have been just as easy to carry it back to midnight,\nso as to make the epoch correspond to one of the chief divisions\nof the day, instead of placing it at a moment fixed by the fraction\nof a day.\n\n2nd. The Hindus assert that at the first moment of Kali-Yug there\nwas a conjunction of all the planets; and their tables show this\nconjunction while ours indicate that it might actually have occurred.\nJupiter and Mercury were in exactly the same degree of the ecliptic;\nMars being 8 [[degrees]] and Saturn 17 [[degrees]] distant from\nit. It follows that about this time, or some fourteen days after\nthe commencement of Kali-Yug, the Hindus saw four planets emerge\nsuccessively from the Sun's rays; first Saturn, then Mars, then\nJupiter and Mercury, and these planets appeared united in a somewhat\nsmall space. Although Venus was not among them, the taste for\nthe marvellous caused it to be called a general conjunction of\nall the planets. The testimony of the Brahmins here coincides\nwith that of our tables; and this evidence, the result of a tradition,\nmust be founded on actual observation.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 663 THE EYE OF TAURUS.\n\n3rd. We may remark that this phenomenon was visible about a fortnight\nafter the epoch, and exactly at the time when the eclipse of the\nmoon must have been observed, which served to fix the epoch. The\ntwo observations mutually confirm each other; and whoever made\nthe one must have made the other also.\n\n4th. We may believe also that the Hindus made at the same time\na determination of the place of the moon's node; this seems indicated\nby their calculation. They give the longitude of this point of\nthe lunar orbit for the time of their epoch, and to this they\nadd as a constant 40m., which is the node's motion in 12d. 14h.\nIt is as if they stated that this determination was made 13 days\nafter their epoch, and that to make it correspond to that epoch,\nwe must add the 40m. through which the node has retrograded in\nthe interval.\n\nThis observation is, therefore, of the same date as that of the\nlunar eclipse; thus giving three observations, which are mutually\nconfirmatory.\n\n5th. It appears from the description of the Hindu Zodiac given\nby M. C. Gentil, that on it the places of the stars named \"The\nEye of Taurus\" and the \"Wheat-ear of Virgo,\" can\nbe determined for the commencement of the Kali-Yug.\n\nNow, comparing these places with the actual positions, reduced\nby *our* precession of the equinoxes to the moment in question,\nwe see that the point of origin of the Hindu Zodiac must lie between\nthe fifth and sixth degree of Libra. The Brahmins, therefore,\nwere right in placing it in the sixth degree of that sign, the\nmore so since this small difference may be due to the proper motion\nof the stars which is unknown.\n\nThus it was yet another observation which guided the Hindus in\nthis fairly accurate determination of the first point of their\nmovable zodiac.\n\nIt does not seem possible to doubt the existence in antiquity\nof observations of this date. The Persians say that four beautiful\nstars were placed as guardians at the four corners of the world.\nNow it so happens that at the commencement of Kali Yug, 3000 or\n3100 years before our era, the \"Eye of the Bull\" and\nthe \"Heart of the Scorpion\" were exactly at the equinoctial\npoints, while the \"Heart of the Lion\" and the \"Southern\nFish\" were pretty near the solstitial points. An observation\nof the rising of the Pleiades in the evening, seven days before\nthe autumnal equinox, also belongs to the year 3000 before our\nera. This and similar observations collected in Ptolemy's calendars,\nthough he does not give their authors, these observations, which\nare older than those of the Chaldeans, may well be the work of\nthe Hindus. They are well acquainted with the constellation of\nthe Pleiades, and while we call it vulgarly the \"Poussiniere\"\nthey name it: *Pillaloo*-*codi *--* *the\n\"Hen and chickens.\" This name has therefore, passed\nfrom people to\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 664 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\npeople, and comes to us from the most ancient nations of Asia.\nWe see that the Hindus must have observed the rising of the Pleiades,\nand have made use of it to regulate their years and their months;\nfor this constellation is also called Krittika. Now they have\na month of the same name, and this coincidence can only be due\nto the fact that this month was announced by the rising or setting\nof the constellation in question. But what is even more decisive\nas showing that the Hindus observed the stars, and in the same\nway that we do, marking their position by their longitude, is\na fact mentioned by Augustinus Riccius that, according to observations\nattributed to Hermes, and made 1,985 years before Ptolemy, the\nbrilliant star in the Lyre and that in the Heart of the Hydra\nwere each seven degrees in advance of their respective positions\nas determined by Ptolemy.\n\nThis determination seems very extraordinary. The stars advance\nregularly with respect to the equinox; and Ptolemy ought to have\nfound the longitudes 28 degrees in excess of what they were 1985\nyears before his time. Besides, there is a remarkable peculiarity\nabout this fact; the same error or difference being found in the\npositions of both stars; therefore the error was due to some cause\naffecting both stars equally. It was to explain this peculiarity\nthat the Arab Thebith imagined the stars to have an oscillatory\nmovement, causing them to advance and recede alternately.\n\nThis hypothesis was easily disproved; but the observations attributed\nto Hermes remained unexplained. Their explanation, however, is\nfound in Hindu Astronomy. At the date fixed for these observations,\n1985 years before Ptolemy, the first point of the Hindu Zodiac\nwas 35 degrees in advance of the equinox; therefore the longitudes\nreckoned for this point are 35 degrees in excess of those reckoned\nfrom the equinox. But after the lapse of 1985 years the stars\nwould have advanced 28 degrees, and there would remain a difference\nof only 7 degrees between the longitudes of Hermes and those of\nPtolemy, and the difference would be the same for the two stars,\nsince it is due to the difference between the starting-points\nof the Hindu Zodiac and that of Ptolemy, which reckons from the\nequinox. This explanation is so simple and natural that it must\nbe true. We do not know whether Hermes, so celebrated in antiquity,\nwas a Hindu, but we see that the observations attributed to him\nare reckoned in the Hindu manner, and we conclude that they were\nmade by the Hindus, who, therefore, were able to make all the\nobservations we have enumerated, and which we find noted in their\ntables.\n\n6th. The observation of the year 3102, which seems to have fixed\ntheir epoch, was not a difficult one. We see that the Hindus,\nhaving once determined the moon's daily motion of 13deg. 10m.\n35sec., made\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 665 HINDU ASTRONOMICAL METHODS.\n\nuse of it to divide the Zodiac into 27 constellations, related\nto the period of the moon, which takes about 27 days to describe\nit.\n\nIt was by this method that they determined the positions of the\nstars in this Zodiac; it was thus they found that a certain star\nof the Lyre was in 8h. 24m., the Heart of the Hydra in 4d. 7h.,\nlongitudes which are ascribed to Hermes, but which are calculated\non the Hindu Zodiac. Similarly, they discovered that the \"Wheatear\nof Virgo\" forms the commencement of their fifteenth constellation,\nand the \"Eye of Taurus\" the end of the fourth; these\nstars being the one in 6d. 6h. 40m., the other in 1d. 23h. 20min.\nof the Hindu Zodiac. This being so, the eclipse of Moon which\noccurred 14 days after the Kali Yug epoch, took place at a point\nbetween the \"Wheat Ear\" of Virgo and the star [[ ]]\nof the same constellation. These stars are very approximately\na constellation apart, the one beginning the fifteenth, the other\nthe sixteenth. Thus it would not be difficult to determine the\nmoon's place by measuring her distance from one of these stars;\nfrom this they deduced the position of the sun, which is opposite\nto the moon, and then, knowing their average motions, they calculated\nthat the moon was at the first point of the Zodiac according to\nher average longitude at midnight on the 17th-18th February of\nthe year 3,102 before our era, and that the sun occupied the same\nplace six hours later according to his true longitude; an event\nwhich fixes the commencement of the Hindu year.\n\n7th. The Hindus state that 20,400 years before the age of Kali\nYug, the first point of their Zodiac coincided with the vernal\nequinox, and that the sun and moon were in conjunction there.\nThis epoch is obviously fictitious;* but we may inquire from what\npoint, from what epoch, the Hindus set out in establishing it.\nTaking the Hindu values for the revolution of the sun and moon,\nviz., 365d. 6h. 12m. 30s., and 27d. 7h. 43m. 13s., we have --\n\n20,400 revolutions of the sun = 7,451,277d. 2h.\n\n272,724 revolutions of the moon = 7,451,277d. 7h.\n\nSuch is the result obtained by starting from the Kali Yuga epoch;\nand the assertion of the Hindus, that there was a conjunction\nat the time stated, is founded on their tables; but if, using\nthe same elements, we start from the era of the year 1491, or\nfrom another placed in the year 1282, of which we shall speak\nlater, there will always be a difference of almost one or two\ndays. It is both just and natural, in verifying the Hindu calculations,\nto take those among their elements which give the same result\nas they had themselves arrived at, and to set out from that one\namong their epochs which enables us to arrive at\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Why it should be \"fictitious\" can *never *be\nmade plain by European scientists.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 666 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nthe fictitious epoch in question. Hence, since to make this calculation\nthey must have set out from their real epoch, the one which was\nfounded on an observation and not from any of those which were\nderived by this very calculation from the former, it follows that\ntheir real epoch was that of the year 3102 before our era.\n\n8th. The Tiravalore Brahmins give the Moon's motion as 7d. 2h.\n8m. on the movable Zodiac, and as 9d. 7h. 45m. 1s. as referred\nto the equinox in a great period of 1,600,984 days, or 4,386 years\nand 94 days. We believe this motion to have been determined by\nobservation; and we must state at the outset that this period\nis of an extent which renders it but ill suited to the calculation\nof the mean motions.\n\nIn their astronomical calculations the Hindus make use of periods\nof 248, 3,031, and 12,372 days; but, apart from the fact that\nthese periods, though much too short, do not present the inconvenience\nof the former, they contain an exact number of revolutions of\nthe moon referred to its apogee. They are in reality mean motions.\nThe great period of 1,600,984 is not a sum of accumulated revolutions;\nthere is no reason why it should contain 1,600,984 rather than\n1,600,985 days. It would seem that observation alone must have\nfixed the number of days and marked the beginning and end of the\nperiod. This period ends on the 21st of May, 1282, of our era\nat 5h. 15m. 30s. at Benares. The moon was then in apogee, according\nto the Hindus,\n\nand her longitude was ... 7d. 13h. 45m. 1s.\n\nMaier gives the longitude as ... 7d. 13h. 53m. 48s.\n\nAnd places the apogee at ... ... 7d. 14h. 6m. 54s.\n\nThe determination of the moon's place by the Brahmins thus differs\nonly by nine minutes from ours, and that of the apogee by twenty-two\nminutes, and it is very evident that they could only have obtained\nthis agreement with our best tables and this exactitude in the\ncelestial positions by observation. If then, observation fixed\nthe end of this period, there is every reason to believe that\nit determined its commencement. But then this motion, determined\ndirectly, and from nature, would of necessity be in close agreement\nwith the true motions of the heavenly bodies.\n\nAnd in fact the Hindu motion during this long period of 4,883\nyears, does not differ by a minute from that of Cassini, and agrees\nequally with that of Maier. Thus two peoples, the Hindus and the\nEuropeans, placed at the two extremities of the world, and perhaps\nas distant by their institutions, have obtained precisely the\nsame results as regards the moon's motions; and an agreement which\nwould be inconceivable, if it were not based on the observation\nand mutual imitation of nature. We must remark that the four tables\nof the Hindus are all copies of the same Astronomy. It cannot\nbe denied that the Siamese tables existed\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 667 THE ARYAN HINDUS VINDICATED.\n\nin 1687, when they were brought from India by M. de la Loubere.\nAt that time the tables of Cassini and Maier were not in existence,\nand thus the Hindus were already in possession of the exact motion\ncontained in these tables, while we did not yet possess it.* It\nmust, therefore, be admitted that the accuracy of this Hindu motion\nis the point of observation. It is exact throughout this period\nof 4,383 years, because it was taken from the sky itself -- and\nif observation determined its close, it fixed its commencement\nalso. It is the longest period which has been observed and of\nwhich the recollection is preserved in the annals of Astronomy.\nIt has its origin in the epoch of the year 3102, B.C., and it\nis a demonstrative proof of the reality of that epoch.\n\nBailly is referred to at such length, as he is one of the few\nscientific men who have tried to do full justice to the Astronomy\nof the Aryans. From John Bentley down to Burgess' \"Surya-Siddhanta,\"\nnot one astronomer has been fair enough to the most learned people\nof Antiquity. However distorted and misunderstood the Hindu Symbology,\nno Occultist can fail to do it justice once that he knows something\nof the Secret Sciences; nor will he turn away from their metaphysical\nand mystical\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The following is an answer to those men of science who might\nsuspect that our Astronomy was carried to India and communicated\nto the Hindus by our Missionaries. 1st. Hindu astronomy has its\nown peculiar forms, characterized by their originality; if it\nhad been our astronomy translated, great skill and knowledge would\nhave been needed to disguise the theft. 2nd. When adopting the\nmean movement of the moon, they would have adopted also the inclination\nof the ecliptic, the equation of the sun's centre, the length\nof the year; these elements differ completely from ours, and are\nremarkably accurate as applying to the epoch of 3102; while they\nwould be exceedingly erroneous if they had been calculated for\nlast century. 3rd, finally, our missionaries could not have communicated\nto the Hindus in 1687 the tables of Cassini, which were not then\nin existence; they could have known only the mean motions of Tycho,\nRiccioli, Copernicus, Bouilland, Kepler, Longomontanus, and those\nof the tables of Alphonso. I will now give a tabular view of these\nmean motions for 4383 years and 94 days: --\n\nTable. ------------- Mean Motion. --- Difference from Hindu.\n\nAlphonso ..............9d 7h 2m 47s ... - 0h 42m 14s\n\nCopernicus .......... 9d 6h 2m 13s .... - 1h 42m 48s\n\nTycho .................. 9d 7h 54m 40s .. + 0h 9m 39s\n\nKepler ................. 9d 6h 57m 35s .. - 0h 47m 26s\n\nLongomontanus ... 9d 7h 2m 13s .... - 0h 42m 48s\n\nBouilland ............. 9d 6h 48m 8s .... - 0h 58m 53s\n\nRiccioli ................ 9d 7h 53m 57s .. + 0h 8m 56s\n\nCassini ................ 9d 7h 44m 11s ... - 0h 0m 50s\n\nIndian .................. 9d 7h 45m 1s\n\nNone of these mean motions, except Cassini's, agrees with that\nof the Hindus, who therefore, did not borrow their mean motions,\nsince their figures agree only with those of Cassini, whose tables\nwere not in existence in 1687. This mean motion of the moon belongs,\ntherefore, to the Hindus, who could only have obtained it by observation.\"\n-- Bailly's \"*Traite de l*'*Astronomie Indienne\net Orientale.*\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 668 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\ninterpretation of the Zodiac, even though the whole Pleiades of\nRoyal Astronomical Societies rise in arms against their mathematical\nrendering of it. The descent and re-ascent of the Monad or Soul\ncannot be disconnected from the Zodiacal signs, and it looks more\nnatural, in the sense of the fitness of things, to believe in\na mysterious sympathy between the metaphysical soul and the bright\nconstellations, and in the influence of the latter on the former,\nthan in the absurd notion that the creators of Heaven and Earth\nhave placed in heaven the types of twelve vicious Jews. And if,\nas the author of *The Gnostics *asserts, the aim of all\nthe Gnostic schools and the later Platonists \"was to accommodate\nthe old faith to the influence of Buddhistic theosophy, the *very\nessence of which was that the innumerable gods of the Hindu mythology\nwere but names for the ***E**NERGIES *of the\nFirst Triad in its successive ***AVATARS** *or manifestations\nunto man*,\"* *whither can we turn to trace these\ntheosophic ideas to their very root -- better than to old Indian\nwisdom? We say it again: archaic Occultism would remain incomprehensible\nto all, if it were rendered otherwise than through the more familiar\nchannels of Buddhism and Hinduism. For the former is the emanation\nof the latter; and both are children of one mother -- ancient\n*Lemuro*-*Atlantean Wisdom.*\n\n-------\n\n[[This page continued in next section]]\n\nNext Section\n\nContents",
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