Distance from Sun to Earth in RgVeda

[Usha Sanka]

​Namaste

Just wanted to share this interesting piece of information.

-itthaM vinItA

उषा

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Idea about Distance from Sun to Earth in RgVeda-

Perhaps, the great Indian talents in the Vedic age
had the knowledge of the speed of light.
G.V.Raghavrao in his book quotes a verse from
Rigveda (I, 50-4) Yojananam Sahasta Dwe Dwe Shate
Dwe Cha Yojane Aken Nimishardhena Krammana
Namostute. In this verse, the author pays respects to
the one (the reference is to the sun light) who moves
2202 yojans in half nimish. Yojan is a quite common
unit in India, it means 4 kose, each kose measuring
8000 British yards and each yard measuring 0.9144 m.
The definition of the time unit nimish can be found in
Shrimadbhagwat 11-3 to 10) where it is mentioned
that 15 nimishas make 1 kashta, 15 kashtas make one
laghu, 30 laghus make 1 muhurta and 30 muhurtas
make 1 diva-ratri. A diva-ratri is, of course, a
day-night which is 24 hours in modern language. When
you convert 2202 yojans per half nimish into SI units,
it turns out to be 3.0 x 10 8 m/s up to two significant
digits, a value quite accurate as we know it today.

​from--Pg 444
CONCEPTS OF PHYSICS
[PART 1]
H C VERMA, PhD
Department of Physics
IIT, Kanpur
Published by
BHARATI BHAWAN (Publishers & Distributors)
4271/3 Ansari Road, Daryaganj, NEW DELHI 110 002
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Mantra reference-
तथा च स्मर्यते योजनानां सहस्रं द्वे द्वे शते द्वे च योजने एकेन निमिषार्धेन क्रममाण नमोऽस्तुते॥ सायण ऋृग्वेद भाष्य 1.50.4

----------------------
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayana

Given that a yojana was equivalent to about 8 km and a nimesha to about 106.7 ms[citation needed], Sayana's approximation to the speed of light comes to about 330000 km/s, which is only 10% higher than the actual value of c as determined by modern scientific experiments.

Computer scientist and Indologist historian Subhash Kak describes that the Vayu Purana (ch. 50) has a similar passage, where the "speed of the Sun" is exactly 1/18th of Sayana's value. He claims that although a "rationalist" may dismiss the proximity of Sayana's value to the physical constant as simply coincidence, there is evidence of "scientific foreknowledge" in the ancient Indian vedas.[3]

​----------------------

This page has some more details-

​

http://hindi.speakingtree.in/spiritual-blogs/seekers/science-of-spirituality/content-357632

--

"-यद्गत्वा न निवर्तन्ते तद्धाम परमं मम"

[Sivasenani Nori]

It is actually Sayanacarya who quotes this, (qualifying it as तथा च स्मर्यते). Please see the first two lines of commentary on 1,50.4 in the attached page.

Regards

N. Siva Senani

--
निराशीर्निर्ममो भूत्वा युध्यस्व विगतज्वरः।। (भ.गी.)
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[Dmitri Semenov]

Given the numbers, yojana=29260.8m, nimesha=426ms; which give speed of light ~ 302500km/s.

[sunil bhattacharjya]

Interestingly, the "Hanuman Chalisha", a 16th century work, also gave the distance between the Earth and the Sun correctly and that was much before the same was found out by modern science.

Regards,

Sunil KB

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[Usha Sanka]

Thank you for this information along with the reference.

I shall try to inform the same to the publishers of that popular Physics text book - to add the detail.

One more place, has the same information. A verse from the साम्बकृता-द्वादशार्यासूर्यस्तुतिः says-

निमिषार्धेनैकेन द्वे च शते द्वे सहस्रे द्वे।

क्रममाण योजनानां नमोस्तु ते नलिननाथाय।।

-may be this wok was after Sayana. 

dhanyAsmi. 

[sunil bhattacharjya]

Dear friends,

The verese in hanuman Chalisha is as follows:
जुग सहेस जोजन पैर भानु |
लिन्यो ताहि मधुर फल जणू ||


Jug ot yuga is 12,000
Sahesh or Sahasra is one thousand
Yuga-sahasra means one million

Yuga-sahasra yojana means one million yojanas

This verse says  that Shri  Hanuman thought Bhanu (the Sun) to be a sweet fruit, at a distance of one million yojanas..At the conversion of  12.5 Km per Yojana, the mean distance of the Sun comes out to be 150 million KM, which nearly matches the modern figure.

Regards,

Sunil KB