Astronomy and Cosmology

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

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Needham and Ling have further opined as follows, 87 “Here Thai Yin is not, as might be supposed, the moon, but an invisible 'counter Jupiter' which moved round in the opposite direction to the planet itself. Jupiter (Sui hsing?), with the other planets, appears to move eastwards or anticlockwise through the stars, so a 'shadow-planet' (Thai sui3 or Sui Yin4 ) was invented to move with them, accompanying the sun. Wang Chhung, in The Lun Heng, devotes a whole chapter d to this peculiar theory. The twelve Jupiter-stations were named tzhub and the whole cycle of years a chi,6 The names for the years have survived in two forms, one set astronomical another astrological;9 and it was natural therefore that they should sometimes also have been used for the months of a single year and " for the double hours of a single day, as well as for the years of the Jupiter cycle, a The astronomical terms were used to designate the positions of Jupiter, the astrological or calendrical terms applied to the positions of counterJupiter. 6" 88 If it is possible to trace out the details of planetary motion in some text of Jaina School, it may throw some light as to the source of the above theory. However, from the available data about the planets and Yuga theory, the motion of the Jupiter, alongwith astrological theory in Jinendramālā or Jñānapradipikā, the secrets could be unravelled to a great extent.
MOTION OF ASTRAL BODIES
The whole of the celestial path has been divided into 109800 celestial parts (Gagana Khanda). But half of the path is covered by one sun, one moon, and its family, without any correlation, in twenty-four hours or thirty muhūrtas. The other half path is covered simultaneously, in the opposite sense, in so far as their journeys start from opposite ends. Thus only 54900 parts are needed for practical purposes of a calendar, and now from the above knowledge it appears that the other half might have some other use
The motion of the astral bodies every muhūrta is given as follows :89
The naksatras The sun
1835 celestial parts 1830 , ,
87. Cf, op. cit., vol. III., pp. 402, 404. 88, Compare this with the nakşatra samvatsara where the Jupiter's twelve
year motion is correlated with that of the nakşatras : Jam vā bahassa i mahaggahe duvālasahim samvaccharehim savvem nakkhatta mandalam
samāņei Il 10.20, C. P., sūtra 2. 89. Cf. T. S., 4.402 and 4.405. The T. P. has not mentioned about rāhu.
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