Astronomy and Cosmology

Author(s): L C Jain
Publisher: Rajasthan Prakrit Bharti Sansthan Jaipur

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and planetary motion came into existence only during the last three centuries B. C. In this connection it has been pointed out that the Jaina School had already developed a mathematical theory of the motion of heavenly bodies by the early centuries B, C., though as Yati Vrşabha mentions in his Tiloyapaņņatti that by his time, the description of the motion of the planets had become extinct but whatever remained in Candraprajñapti, Suryaprajñapti, or Tiloyapangatti, clearly proves that the Jaina School was in possession of a complete calendar based on a highly developed ingenious and original mathematical theory. This is clear even from the example that the total number of astral images was given by the Jaina School as the quotient set obtained by dividing the square of the Jagašreni (set of points) by the product of the set of the squared finger width and the square of 256. The Jaina School also believed that the distribution of the astral objects was symmetrical and based on five kinds of astral-groups, viz., the moon, the sun, the planets, the constellations and scattered stars (prakirņaka tārās) and that the moon was the head of the family of eighty-eight planets, twenty-eight nakşatrās and 66975 (10)14 stars.
As mentioned in this very Chapter, the Jaina School also believed that the phenamena of the heavenly events in all the islands was also symmetrical and could be represented by those, occurring in the Jambūdvipa island only except that in far off islands, the astral bodies were assumed at rest. From this it is clear that such a symmetry denotes the manipulation of the causality theory through an abstract mathematical model, principle theoretic in nature and consistent. It is also remarkable to find that like other world traditions, the Jaina tradition also believed in shadow invisible planets as found in the texts Jinendramālā and Jñānapradipikā. In the end of the Chapter, topics, like motion of astral bodies, relative motion of the nakşatras, the relative motion of the sun and the relative motion of the moon have been described.
In Chapter VII, the author gives a vivid description of the various meanings and measures of a 'Yojana' as stated by a number of different schools and scholars, for example, the Chinese School, the Jaina School, Needham and Ling, Lishk and Sharma, Muni Mahendra Kumar II, Megasthenes (3rd – 4th centuries B. C.) etc. In the Jaina School and in some other systems, the Yojana has been taken as primarily depending upon angula and equal to 768000 arigulas. But only in Jaina School, there are 3 types of yojana depending upon 3 types of aigūlas-mātmāigula, utsedhārgula, and pramāņā ngula which are used for measuring different types of objects as indicated in all concerned literature. The ātmāigula is used to measure the lengths of ornamental objects, gardens, cities, and residences
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