2.25 stars make one month - a mail conversation

From: Sundaresh H.K.
Posted At: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 4:04 PM
Posted To: My mails
Conversation: Why does the date of Durga puja vary from year to year
Subject: 2.25 stars make one month.

2.25 stars make one month.
'cos 2.25 * 12 = 27. (reason enuf !! :-))

Jokes apart, let me make an attempt at resolving it.

There are 12 months in a year. There are 12 corresponding zodiac signs in a year too.
What are zodiac signs?
They are the constellations that fall in the zodiac belt. The sun and the moon traverse this belt.

It means that in the month of Jan (Dec 20 - Jan 20 around) if you draw an arrow from the earth connecting the sun and go further ahead, you will touch the Capricorn constellation. Similarly, do the same in Feb and you will get Aquarius and Pisces in March.
If you draw a similar line from earth connecting moon then you would more often than not, find a different constellation than the one obtained in the sun's direction at that time.
This explains the difference in a person's solar and lunar signs. Mine for ex: is Capricorn solar-wise and Taurus lunar-wise. When I was born, Sun was in Capricorn and Moon in Taurus.

Relation between the stars(nakshatras) and the signs.
2-3 prominent stars of each constellation have been named for reference. They total 27.
Further each star is divided into 4 padas.

One zodiac sign is made of 9 padas.
for ex:
Ashwini, Bharani, Krittika are present in the Aries and Taurus constellations astronomically. Each of them have 4 padas.
To form the first zodiac sign Aries astrologically, you need - 4 padas of Ashwini + 4 padas of Bharani + 1 pada of Krittika
Similarly, to form the second sign Taurus, you need - the remaining 3 padas of Krittika + 6 padas of the succeeding two stars.

On a clear night, you can see identify these constellations and stars moving from the east to west direction as the night progresses. Identify a zodiac sign A. Move 30 degrees towards west and you'll find its successive zodiac sign. This way you can make out the zodiac belt. 2-3 stars from each of these constellations are named for reference as I mentioned earlier.

Finding which constellation is behind the Moon is easier than finding the one behind the Sun. I think this is the reason why our ancestors chose following the pattern of the Moon in identifying time.

Back to our older problem:

One lunar revolution is approximately 1 earth day.
Hence, 365 lunar revolutions do not equal 1 solar year exactly. But both the Hindu year and the Solar year are made up of exact 365.* days. In order to rectify the difference, the Hindu calendar adds up the deficit number of days to the lunar year at a certain periodicity. This is the reason why Durga Puja is not on the same date as it was last year.

For the astronomically hungry ;-)

(If you're already confused, don't go further..)

1 star - 4 padas
1 sign - 9 padas
12 signs - 12 * 9 = 108 padas

Zodiac belt is circular and hence 360 degrees.

360/ (12 zodiac signs) = 30 deg / sign
Hence the zodiac signs are 30 degrees apart. Sun and Moon move shift 30 degrees every month!!

360/ (108 padas) = 3.33 deg/pada
3.33 deg/pada * 4 padas = 13.33 deg
Hence the nakshatras are 13.33 degrees apart.

Hope this information helps. Do pitch in, to add on to this.

-Sundaresh.

-----Original Message-----
From: SUBRATOJM
Posted At: Wednesday, March 31, 2004 2:56 PM
Posted To: Konark Genera
Conversation: Why does the date of Durga puja vary from year to year
Subject: Hindu Months and Some Remarkable Resemblance

Well,there is a krittika amongst the Nakshatras in your list - that corresponds to the month of Kartika.

Also Margashirsha is the other name of Agrahayana in some of the Indian languages (e.g., Marathi) - so the entry of Mrigashirsha corrsponds to that.

By the way, what are these Nakshatras - Nakshatra literally means star - could anyone correlate these names with the more common names of the celestial bodies ?

Also what is the correlation between the stars and months - I'm assuming there would some reasoning behind naming the months after 12 of the stars.

Could it be that each of the months starts with the moon "in" that particular nakshatra (after which it is named). This could be true if, for example, baishakh, jaishtha, ashadha has 29 days, Shravana, bhadra has 30 days, and so on - using the sequence of nakshatras in the list. But this adds up to only 351 days per year ! How many days are there in a Shaka year ? (I guess it is pretty close to 365, if not exactly that !)

Does anyone have a more palatable explanation ?