Artifacts of ancient India. What is written in the Vedas. Scientific Achievements of Ancient India Cosmology and Geography

Wisdom of the Vedas

The word "veda" is translated from Sanskrit as "knowledge", "wisdom" (compare with Russian "to know" - to know). The Vedas are considered one of the most ancient texts in the world, the earliest cultural monument on our planet.

Indian researchers believe that they were created around 6000 BC, European science refers them to later times.

In Hinduism, it is believed that the Vedas are eternal and appeared immediately after the creation of the Universe and were dictated directly by the gods.

The Vedas describe many industries scientific knowledge, for example, medicine - "Ayurveda", weapons - "Astra Shastra", architecture - "Sthapatya Veda", etc.

There are also so-called Vedangas - auxiliary disciplines, which include phonetics, metrics, grammar, etymology and astronomy.

The Vedas tell in detail about very many things, and researchers all over the world still find in them various information about the structure of the world and man, unexpected for ancient times.

Great mathematicians

The well-known Indologist, academician Grigory Maksimovich Bongard-Levin, in collaboration with Grigory Fedorovich Ilyin, published the book “India in Antiquity” in 1985, in which he studied many remarkable facts about science in the Vedas, for example, about algebra and astronomy.

In particular, the Vedanga Jyotisha highly appreciates the role of mathematics in a number of other sciences: “Like a comb on a peacock’s head, like a gem crowning a snake, so ganita is at the top of the sciences known in Vedanga.”

In the Vedas, algebra is also known - “avyakta-ganita” (“the art of calculating with unknown quantities”) and the geometric method of converting a square into a rectangle with a given side.

Arithmetic and geometric progressions are also described in the Vedas, for example, they are mentioned in Panchavimsha Brahmana and Shatapatha Brahmana.

Curiously, the famous Pythagorean theorem was also known in the earliest Vedas.

And modern researchers claim that the Vedas contain information both about infinity and about the binary system of calculation and data caching technology, which is used in search algorithms.

Astronomers from the banks of the Ganges

The level of astronomical knowledge of the ancient Indians can also be judged by numerous references in the Vedas. For example, religious rites were tied to the phases of the moon and its position on the ecliptic.

Vedic Indians, in addition to the Sun and the Moon, knew all five planets visible to the naked eye, they knew how to navigate in the starry sky, connected the stars into constellations (nakshatras).

Full lists of them are given in the Black Yajur Veda and Atharva Veda, and the names have remained virtually unchanged for many centuries. The ancient Indian system of nakshatras corresponds to those given in all modern star catalogs.

In addition, the Rig Veda calculated the speed of light with maximum accuracy. Here is the text from the Rig Veda: "With deep reverence, I bow to the sun, which covers a distance of 2002 yojins in half a nimeshi."

Yojana is a measure of length, nimesha is a unit of time. If we translate yojins and nimeshis into modern system calculus, you get the speed of light at 300,000 km / s.

Cosmic Vedas

Moreover, the Vedas talk about space travel and various aircraft (vimanas) that successfully overcome the earth's gravity.

For example, the Rig Veda tells of a miraculous chariot:

"Born without horses, without reins, worthy of praise

A three-wheeled chariot circles space.

“Faster than thought the chariot moved, like a bird in the sky,

rising to the Sun and Moon and descending to the Earth with a loud roar ... "

According to ancient texts, the chariot was driven by three pilots, and it could land on land and on water.

The Vedas even indicate the technical characteristics of the chariot - it was made of several types of metal and worked on liquids called madhu, rasa and anna.

The Indian Sanskrit scholar Kumar Kanjilal, author of the book Vimanas of Ancient India, states that rasa is mercury, madhu is alcohol made from honey or fruit juice, anna is alcohol from rice or vegetable oil.

Here it is appropriate to recall the ancient Indian manuscript of the Samarangana Sutradahra, which also speaks of a mysterious chariot flying on mercury:

“Strong and durable should be his body, made of light material, like a large flying bird. Inside you should place a device with mercury and an iron heating device under it. By means of the power that is hidden in mercury, which sets in motion the carrying whirlwind, a person inside this chariot can fly long distances across the sky in the most amazing way ... The chariot develops the power of thunder thanks to mercury. And she immediately turns into a pearl in the sky.

According to the Vedas, the chariots of the gods were of different sizes, including huge ones. Here is how the flight of a huge chariot is described:

“Houses and trees trembled, and small plants were uprooted by a terrifying wind, caves in the mountains were filled with a roar, and the sky seemed to split into pieces or fall from the great speed and mighty roar of the air crew ...”.

Medicine at the highest level

But not only space is discussed in the Vedas, they also say a lot about man, his health and biology in general. For example, the Grabha Upanishad talks about the intrauterine life of a child like this:

“The embryo, which has lain in the womb day and night, is a kind of mixture (like porridge) of elements; after seven days it becomes like a bubble; after two weeks it becomes a clot, and after a month it hardens. After two months, the head region begins to develop; after three months legs; after four - the stomach and buttocks; after five - the spine; after six - the nose, eyes and ears; after seven, the embryo begins to rapidly develop its vital functions, and after eight, it is almost a ready-made little person.

It is worth noting here that European science reached such knowledge in embryology only centuries later - for example, the Dutch doctor Renier de Graaff discovered human ovarian follicles only in 1672.

In the same place, in the Grabha Upanishad, it is said about the structure of the heart:

“There are one hundred and one blood vessels in the heart, each of them has a hundred more vessels, each having seventy-two thousand branches.”

And this is not the only amazing knowledge in ancient books. The connection of male and female chromosomes in the zygote was discovered in the 20th century, but they are mentioned in the Vedas, in particular in the Bhagavata Purana.

The Srimad Bhagavatam tells about the structure and structure of the cell, as well as about microorganisms, the existence of which was discovered by modern science only in the 18th century.

In the Rig Veda there is such a text addressed to the Ashvins - it deals with prosthetics and, in general, the successes of medicine in antiquity:

“And you have done, O multi-useful ones, so,

That the grieving singer began to see well again.

Since the leg was cut off like a bird's wing,

You immediately attached Vishpala

An iron leg, so that it rushes to the appointed reward.

And here we are talking about a process that is still inaccessible to our medicine - a complete rejuvenation of the body:

“... aged body cover

You have taken off Cyavana like a garment.

You have extended the life of the abandoned by all, oh amazing.

And they even made him the husband of young wives.”

Another point is interesting. The Vedas were translated in past centuries, at the level of ideas about science and technology of that time. It is possible that new translations of ancient texts will reveal to us completely new knowledge, which modern science has not yet reached.

1. Start. The most ancient surviving documentary sources of information about astronomical ideas and knowledge of the inhabitants of ancient India are seals with images of mythological cosmological and cosmogonic subjects. Brief inscriptions on them have not yet been deciphered. These documents refer to the Indus civilization that existed in 3000 BC. e. in the Indus River Valley, in the territory of present-day India (Western Punjab) and Pakistan (Multan region). Its main cultural centers were the cities of Harappa, Mohenjo-Daro, Kalibangan, discovered in the early 1920s. of our century (archaeologists have given them modern names). In total, more than 500 monuments were discovered, including villages, fortresses, seaports, testifying to the highly developed economic and cultural life of their inhabitants, who had land and sea connections with the cities of Mesopotamia and ancient egypt. By the XVII-XVI centuries. the centers of Indian culture were weakened both by natural disasters (earthquakes and floods) and by internal contradictions, environmental troubles and wars, and were finally destroyed by the invasion of the Aryans, the Indo-Iranian-speaking tribes who came from the northwest and gave rise to the main modern Indo-European population of India.

There is very little information about the astronomical knowledge of the period of the Indus culture. The written history of ancient Indian astronomy begins for us only from the time of the establishment of the Aryan civilization. In the ancient collection of religious hymns "Rigveda", the creation of which dates back to the period from the end of the 2nd to the first half of the 1st millennium BC. e., reflected some of the astronomical knowledge of the ancient Indians. From these fragments, their general ideas about the Universe, that is, the astronomical picture of the world, emerge. The question of whether even earlier, pre-Aryan knowledge and ideas were reflected in these ideas remains debatable.

2. Fragments of observational and mathematical astronomy. The first objects of study in the sky for the ancient Indians were the Sun and the Moon. As in other regions of the Ancient World, they were regularly observed by priests, and the first practical application astronomy was the compilation of the calendar. Particular interest was shown in the constellations along which the Moon made its visible movement. This region of the sky, which was also first identified closer to the celestial equator, was divided into 28 (sometimes 27 are mentioned) "lunar stations" - nakshatras. Each nakshatra, according to the Rigveda, corresponded either to a bright star (for example, Arcturus) or to a group of stars (Pleiades, Orion, Pegasus).

Information about any systematic observations by the ancient Indians of the planets has not been preserved. But if you take a closer look at an old drawing that reflects the picture of the Universe in accordance with the Rig Veda (Fig. 8, a), it can be seen that at least three planets have been marked as a permanent element of the sky. And since they are depicted far from the Sun, it can be concluded that Mars, Jupiter and Saturn were observed (at least shown in the figure).

Among other astronomical phenomena, the Rigveda mentions a certain paired phenomenon of Rahu and Ketu. Some researchers interpreted this as the observation of comets, or shooting stars, or eclipses, that is, short-term, unexpected phenomena. But it is possible that the pairing of Rahu and Ketu reflected the observation of the morning and evening visibility of Venus, which, perhaps, was still perceived as two different objects, but still paired, somehow connected with the Sun.

No indications have been preserved of the systematic observation of stars during this period in ancient India. However, the religious and philosophical nature of the only written monument of the Vedic era that has come down to our time - the Vedas - excludes the reflection of such results in them.

Of the mathematical achievements of the ancient Indians, the invention of a decimal counting system with positional notation of numbers is most widely known. By the VI century. BC e. they already knew arithmetic operations with integers and fractions, the solution of indefinite and quadratic equations, and the approximate determination of the values ​​of irrational quantities. A few centuries before the Greeks, a theorem was also known here, later named after Pythagoras (there is a version that Pythagoras visited India).

Information about any astronomical instruments among the ancient Indians, as well as the remains of observation platforms, has not yet been found.

3. Calendar. The fact that astronomical observations of at least the Moon and the Sun were nevertheless carried out by the Indians already in ancient times is evidenced by the existence among them in the era of the Nigveda already in the 6th century. BC e. several calendar systems. They were based on a lunar year of 354 days, and a year close to the tropical solar year in the civil calendar (360 days + 5 days "for sacrifices"), and a sidereal month of 27 days (the year consisted of either 12 or 13 such months) .

There are no direct references to the planets in the Vedic hymns. The Rigveda, however, mentions among the deities "seven Adityas" (seven suns), and some historians, not without reason, interpret this as "seven luminaries" - five planets, the Moon and the Sun.

In Indian calendars from the VI century. BC e. in the names of the days of the seven-day week, the names of seven moving luminaries began to be used, in the same order as, for example, in Egypt: the first day of the Moon, the second - Mars, the third - Mercury, the fourth - Jupiter, the fifth - Venus, the sixth - Saturn, the seventh - Sun.

Some similarity with the Egyptian calendar was also manifested in the division of the month into two halves. In ancient Indian astronomy, these were the bright half, before the full moon (shukla) and the dark half (krishna).

4. Naturphilosophy of Ancient India and cosmological-cosmogonic picture of the world. In the philosophical understanding of the Universe, the cosmophysical picture of the world, the ancient Indian natural philosophers were ahead of the ancient Greek thinkers. Through the mythological and religious form of presentation, traditional for that era, ideas of such depth sometimes break through, to which mankind in its development has again approached only in our days.

The ancient Indians of the times of the Rig Veda divided the Universe into three spheres: the Earth, the sky, and the airspace separating them (or connecting them!) For ancient cosmology (and only for ancient?) Exaggeration of the role and scope of the tangible surrounding world was characteristic, in this case « airspace". It was presented as an essential part of the entire Universe and extended from the Earth to the sky with its luminaries. In this intermediate region, the gods of the wind (Vayu), thunderstorms and storms (Rudra), the god of lightning, thunder and generally destructive elements (Indra) acted. The latter was considered a king among the gods, who struck the dark forces with the help of "cosmic lightning" - the vajra (like Zeus the Thunderer). But the Indians also had a special, original idea of ​​Indra as a symbol of the "Sun at its zenith" - a scorching unchanging force, the embodiment of the abstract essence of the central phenomenon of nature. At night, he was replaced by a twin brother - the god Agni, otherwise sacrificial fire. In turn, Surya meant "The sun in motion" - from east to west. Moreover, it was believed that it is not the behavior of the Sun that causes the phenomenon of day and night, but, on the contrary, it itself depends on the change of day and night and should disappear by night! This manifested one of the earliest "mirror" reflections of reality.

The ancient Indian philosophers developed an idea of ​​the existence in the Universe of a universal organizing principle, or the principle of ordering the world. They called this principle "rita", as opposed to "anrita" - chaos, darkness. The world order meant the cyclical movement of the Sun, the change of the seasons of the year, the return of the Moon to the same nakshatra. All this indicates the existence of an observational basis for the emergence of the idea of ​​"rita".

The existence of the universe consisted in the struggle between rita and anrita. Initially, the carriers of ordering and destructive forces had a mythological zoo- or anthropomorphic character. The patroness of Mother Earth was the goddess Prithivi. The earth was represented as an endless flat "vast space" (this is what "prithivi" meant, see Fig. 8). The intermediate air zone was ruled by the sky god Varuna, "the creator and guardian of nature", the protector of world order. In one of the hymns of the Rigveda it was said: “He pushed the firmament high, [created] the luminary in two ways and spread out the Earth.”

Ancient Indian cosmology, which also began its formation with a mythological description of the universe, was characterized, however, by an early transition to abstract natural-philosophical ideas of certain forces of nature. The "gods of nature", as a rule, did not have specific features, unlike, for example, the gods of the ancient Greeks (the latter switched to abstract ideas later).

An essential element of ancient Indian natural philosophy (as well as the natural philosophy of all ancient civilizations in general) was the idea of ​​the close connection of every living being with the entire world order, with the “rhythm of being”. This is what the compilers of the Rig Veda taught three thousand years ago. The same permeated the teachings of their followers - the authors of the concept of "Upanishads" (literally - "sitting around the teacher"), and then Buddhism.

Another feature of ancient natural philosophy was the idea that the connection between the Universe and man is mutual, active on the part of man. It was believed that a person can and is obliged by his behavior, the norms of life to maintain not only his well-being, but also the entire world (!) Order.

Indian natural philosophy was also characterized by the idea of ​​a “single universal impersonal force”, to which not only people, but also (!) celestial gods obey. In this regard, ancient Indian philosophy is permeated with very deep conjectures.

Already in some ancient Vedic hymns it was proclaimed that the gods themselves were created by the “formless, not having a visible appearance, the origin of all things”, which was called “Brahmanaspati” (“Lord of prayer”). Sometimes this abstract deity was identified with the Sun, sometimes with the idea of ​​knowledge, wisdom. In the Rigveda, this "creation of everything" was preceded by the appearance of the "first germ" (prathama garbha) or "golden egg" (brahmanda), which appears in the primordial ocean. The idea of ​​the germ of the world is not without interest: after all, even all future gods, like all things and beings, were contained in it. This cosmic germ, as one of the hymns of the Rig Veda said, was "that which is beyond the sky, beyond this earth, beyond the gods and asuras [demons]." The germ of the world was considered either "unborn", "eternal", or originated in the waters. According to the myth of 1 thousand BC. e. The earth floated in the world ocean in the form of a lotus flower, and India was one of the petals. The entire universe rested on the backs of elephants. The sun walked across the sky around Meru - the mountain at the center of the flat Earth.

Essential in the ancient Indian natural-philosophical cosmogony was the idea of ​​the initial cosmic heat (“tapas”). Sometimes it was identified with the concept of "tension", "desire". The Rig Veda says:

Law [rita] and truth were born
From ignited heat.
From here the night was born,
Hence the surging Ocean.

A year emerges from the Ocean, "distributing the days and nights, the Sun, the Moon and all beings."

The universe, according to the ideas of the ancient Indians, endlessly repeated a certain multi-stage cycle of "development" - from birth to death and again to rebirth.

As the main feature of ancient Indian cosmogony, researchers of the culture of ancient India note a special “spirit of searching”, the absence of axioms in judgments. From this arose the spirit of doubt, self-criticism. The ancient cosmogonists asked questions, not claiming to receive a definite answer, but by thinking and giving others "information for reflection." In the Rig Veda there is a "Creation Hymn" which begins like this:

There was no non-existent, and there was no existent then,
There was no air space, no sky above it.
What moved to and fro? Where? Under whose protection?
What kind of water is a deep abyss?

In addition to the already mentioned idea in the teaching of the Upanishads that being was born from non-being, the existence of something third, irreducible to either one or the other, was also allowed. The hymn about the creation of the world ends with reflections full of doubts, testifying first of all to the understanding of the degree of depth and vastness of the problem raised - the origin of the Universe:

Who truly knows? Who will proclaim here?
Where did this creation come from?
Further, the gods appeared through the creation of this
[peace, - not before his creation!]
So who knows where he came from?
Where did this creation come from?
Maybe it created itself, maybe not -
He who oversees this [world] in the highest heaven,
Only he knows or does not know [!]

5. The origin of materialistic natural philosophy in ancient India. In the philosophy of nature set forth in the Vedas, something non-material was thought to be the origin of everything: “non-existence”, the moral principle of order “rita”, “ruler of prayer”, knowledge, wisdom ...

In contrast to this worldview of priestly circles, already in the 2nd century. BC e. the first materialistic philosophical teachings were formed in ancient India - "sankhya" and "lokayata". The closest to the dialectical and materialistic worldview was the philosophical school of Sankhya (which means "rational", "analyzing", "quantitative", "numerical"). Formed before the II century. BC e., this doctrine has come down to us only by retelling in later writings of the 4th-5th centuries. According to the Samkhya doctrine, the Universe is material, and all things in it, all beings arise from self-developing matter. Moreover, in the beginning, matter was in an undifferentiated state, in an “unmanifested” form (avyakta). Due to the existence of three qualities - “gunas”, it turns into a “manifested” form (vyakta) - the observable Universe, into the world of objects and beings. These qualities are "tamas" (darkness, inertia), "rajas" (passion, fire, energy, activity, red) and "sattva" (essence, truth, balance, tranquility, white).

The lokayat doctrine (literally, widespread among the people, following the path of the earthly world, materialistic, since “loka” means the material world) argued that the only essence of all living things is the body, while the soul is a pure illusion. In this teaching, perhaps, more ancient ideas, rooted in pre-Aryan civilization, were revived. The works of the Lokayatiks were ruthlessly destroyed. Their ideas have reached our days only through the criticism of these ideas by their opponents.

An attempt was also made to describe materialistically the "first element" of the Universe in the form of "breath" (prana) as a sign of existence itself. This idea was expressed by the later followers of the Vedas.

Notes

This is sometimes explained as creating a daytime and "nighttime" path for the Sun, under the Earth. But another interpretation is also possible: he did not “create”, but “moved” the Sun with annual and daily movements.

In one version of the myth about the origin of the world, being (Sat) was born from non-being (Asat), and being consisted of the solid Heaven and Earth (i.e., it was material).

One hymn describes the creation of the universe from the parts of a giant's body. But here a clear social order already sounds - to justify the existence of unequal castes: the higher ones - the Brahmins - came out of his mouth, and the lower ones - the Pirias - were created from ... feet.

On the territory of Ancient India, or rather in the north-west of the Hindustan peninsula, in the third millennium BC there were two centers of civilization: Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro. Science knows very little about the culture of these civilizations, since the writing of the peoples who inhabited this territory is still a mystery. It is impossible to give names and trace the specific routes of travelers. But archaeological excavations indirectly prove that the civilization of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro conducted intensive trade with Mesopotamia and Indochina. Not far from Bombay, the remains of an ancient shipyard dating back to the time of the Indus civilization were found. The dimensions of the shipyard are striking: 218x36 m. It is almost twice as long as the Phoenician ones. At the beginning of our era, the Indians began to trade with Sumatra, Java and other islands of the Malay Archipelago. Indian colonization also began to spread in this direction. The Indians penetrated into the central regions of Indochina before the Chinese.

11. Travel and geographical knowledge in ancient China.

The civilization of Ancient China originates in the middle of the II millennium BC. e. in the Juane river basin. By the end of the II millennium BC. The Chinese settled in East Asia, reaching the banks of the Amur in the north and the southern tip of the Indochinese Peninsula. In ancient China, spatial ideas about the surrounding world were also not limited to the borders of their country. Chinese travelers were well aware of the geography of China. The ancient Chinese sailed not only on their rivers, but also went out on their ships to the Pacific Ocean. Already in the period of the Shan-Yin dynasty (XVII - XII centuries BC), the Chinese state had overseas colonies. You can learn about this from the Shan Odes, in one of the parts of the Book of Songs. In the XI century BC. during the ascension to the throne of one of the emperors of the Zhou dynasty, a ship was presented to him as a gift. The fact that sea travel was an integral part of the life of Ancient China is evidenced by the fact that the ruler of the kingdom of Qi in the VI century BC. for six months sailed on a ship on the sea for research purposes. The Chinese philosopher Confucius spent over 13 years as an itinerant teacher. In addition to merchant and pleasure ships, powerful warships also existed in ancient China. The chronicler reports a major naval battle between the kingdoms of Wu and Qi in 485 BC. It is known that in these kingdoms there were special shipyards where military, civil ships, as well as ships for government officials and ambassadors were built. To intensify trade in ancient China from the 7th century. BC. detailed geographical overviews were created, which can be considered as a prototype of a guidebook. They described not only natural conditions, but also the economy, transport, etc. During the Zhangguo era, pilgrimage and scientific tourism were born in China. The priests went to the Bohaiwan Bay (Yellow Sea) to the islands of Penglai and Yingzhou, where the elders lived, who owned the secret of immortality. Another example of the deep knowledge of the Chinese in geography is the construction of the Great Wall of China. Its construction, which began in the 4th c. BC, proves the excellent knowledge of the Chinese in the field of physical geography. The wall ran clearly along the border separating the steppe regions, where the nomads lived, from the agricultural ones. The intensity of travel in ancient China increased in the III century. BC. during the Han Dynasty. Two factors contributed to this: a) the presence of well-developed means of communication in the country, b) the liberalization of political life. The most famous traveler of ancient China was Sima Qian. Three great journeys of Sima Qian are known, which were made in the period 125 - 120 BC. The first is to the southwest and northwest of China. Along the lower reaches of the Yellow River, Sima Qian passed through the valleys of the Huaihe and Yangtze rivers to Taihu Lake. Further, south of the Yangtze and through Zhejiang, he arrived in the last possession of China in the south, the province of Hunan. Return trip passed along the Xiangjiang River, Dong-ting Lake, the lower reaches of the Yangtze and further north. The second is the newly conquered areas in the southwest by China. Through Sichu-an and Yunnan province, Sima Qian reached the border of China with Burma. The third is to the northwest along the Great Wall of China to the province of Gansu. Sima Qian not only traveled, but also described his travels in detail. He is called "the father of Chinese historiography", in European literature "Chinese Herodotus". His "Historical Notes" were a kind of standard for subsequent historians. Sy-ma Qian describes in most detail the northern neighbors of China - the Huns, who in the III century. BC. formed a tribal alliance. His writings also provide geographical information about China's southwestern neighbors, such as Korea.

Fa Xian was a Buddhist monk and traveler - from 399 to 414 he traveled around most of inner Asia and India. It is believed that with his travels began an ongoing cultural cooperation between China and India. He left notes about his trip. Biographical information about Fa Xiang is scarce. It is known that he was born in Shaanxi province, and spent his childhood in a Buddhist monastery. After becoming a monk and discovering gaps in the laws of Buddhist teachings then known in China, Fa Xian decided to make a pilgrimage to India for complete copies of the laws. From the 4th century A.D. e. Buddhism flourished in China, which penetrated from India and spread in the country from the 1st century. Buddhism has had a huge impact on the development of Chinese culture. From China to India, pilgrims were sent - Buddhist monks, who paved the way through the deserts and high mountain passes of Central Asia. One of them was Fa Xian, who left a deep mark in historical and geographical literature. In 399, with a group of pilgrims, he set out from his hometown of Xi'an (Chang'an) northwest across the Loess Plateau and further along the southern edge of the sandy deserts of northwestern China. About the complexity of this segment of the path, Fa Xian writes in his diary: "In the sandy stream there are evil geniuses , and the winds are so burning that when you meet them, you die, and no one can escape it. You don’t see a bird in the sky or four-legged creatures on the ground. The pilgrims had to find their way along the bones of those who had gone on a journey before them. Having passed along the “silk” road to Mount Boxiangzi, the pilgrims turned west and after a seventeen-day journey reached a wandering lake Lobnor.Near this lake, in the area now sparsely inhabited, in the time of Fa Xian there was an independent state of Shenshen, and the traveler met here a population familiar with Indian culture.At the end of the 19th century, N.M. the existence here in the past of a major cultural center.After staying at Lop Nor for a month, the travelers headed northwest and, having crossed the Tien Shan, reached the valley of the Ili River, then they turned to the southwest, again crossed the Tien Shan, crossed from the north to the south the Taklamakan desert and near the city of Khotan reached the foot of the Kunlun Range.After thirty-five days, a small caravan arrived in Ho the Tang kingdom, in which there were "several tens of thousands of monks." Fa Xian and his companions were admitted to the monasteries. They were lucky enough to be present at the solemn festival of Buddhists and Brahmins, during which luxuriously decorated chariots with images of the gods were transported through the cities of the Khotan kingdom. After the festival, Fa Xian and his companions headed south and arrived in the cold mountainous country of Balistan, in which, apart from cereals, there were almost no cultivated plants. From Balistan, Fa Xian took the road to eastern Afghanistan and wandered for a month in the mountains covered with eternal snow. Here, according to him, "poisonous dragons" met. Having overcome the mountains, the travelers took the path to Northern India. Having explored the sources of the Indus River, they arrived at Folusha (probably the present city of Peshawar), located between Kabul and the Indus. After many difficulties, the caravan managed to reach the city of Banu, which still exists today; then, again crossing the Indus in the middle part of its course, Fa Xian came to the Punjab. Thence, descending to the south-east, he crossed the northern part of the Indian peninsula, and, crossing a large saline desert lying to the east of the Indus, reached the country which he calls the "Central Kingdom." According to Fa Xian, "the local people are honest and pious, they have no officials, they do not know the laws, they do not recognize the death penalty, they do not eat any living creatures, and there are no slaughterhouses or liquor stores in their kingdom." In India, Fa Xian visited many cities and places, where he collected legends and tales about the Buddha. "In these places," notes the traveler, describing the Karakoram, "the mountains are steep like a wall." On the steep slopes of these mountains, the ancient inhabitants carved images of the Buddhas and numerous steps. Fa Xian found a Buddhist monastery in the Ganges valley, where he studied and copied the sacred books of Buddhism. After staying in India for a long time, the traveler in 411 set off on his way back to his homeland by sea. From the mouth of the Ganges, he sailed to Ceylon, where he lived for two years, and then in 413 went on a merchant ship to Java. After a five-month stay in Java, Fa Xian returned to his hometown of Xian-fu (Canton).

Until now, despite advanced engineering knowledge and modern equipment, scientists have not been able to solve the mystery of the hanging column that violates the laws of gravity.

The ancient Indian treatises contain a lot of scientific knowledge, to which modern science has reached quite recently or has not even been approached to them yet. We offer you some facts about the amazing knowledge of scientists who lived thousands of years ago. The Indian Vedas are an ancient source of amazing knowledge.

Vedas (Sanskrit - "knowledge", "teaching") - a collection of the most ancient sacred scriptures of Hinduism in Sanskrit (XVI-V centuries BC). For many centuries, the Vedas were transmitted orally in poetic form and only much later were they written down. The Hindu religious tradition considers the Vedas to be uncreated by man, eternal divinely revealed scriptures that were given to mankind through the holy sages.

Scholars on the Vedas

To begin with, we note that the wisdom of the ancient Vedas was recognized by many famous scientists and the greatest minds. humanity XIX-XX centuries. The American philosopher and writer Henry David Thoreau wrote:

“There is not a shadow of sectarianism in the great teaching of the Vedas. It is intended for all ages, climatic regions and nations, and is the royal road to the attainment of Great Knowledge."

Leo Tolstoy wrote to the Indian guru Premananda Bharati in 1907:

"The metaphysical religious idea of ​​Krishna is the eternal and universal basis of all true philosophical systems and all religions." He wrote: “Only such great minds as the ancient Hindu sages could think of this great concept ... Our Christian concepts of spiritual life come from the ancients, from the Jewish ones, and the Jewish ones from the Assyrian ones, and the Assyrian ones from the Indian ones, and everything goes on. vice versa: the newer, the lower, the older, the higher.

It is curious that Albert Einstein specifically studied Sanskrit in order to read the Vedas in the original, which described the general laws of physical nature. Many other famous people, such as Kant, Hegel, Gandhi, recognized the Vedas as a source of various knowledge.

From zero to kalpa

Ancient mathematicians in India introduced many concepts that we still use today. Note that only in the 7th century did the number 0 first begin to be mentioned in Arabic sources, and only in the 8th century did it reach Europe.

However, in Indian mathematics, the concept of zero (in Sanskrit "shunya") has been known since the 4th century BC. It was in ancient India that this figure first appeared. Note that without the concept of zero, a binary system and computers could not exist.

The decimal system was also invented in India. In ancient India, the number pi was known, as well as the Pythagorean theorem, more precisely, the theorem of Ba-udhayana, who first stated it in the 6th century BC.

The smallest number given in the Vedas is Krati. It is equal to one thirty-four thousandth of a second. Most big number kalpa is equal to 4.32 billion years.

Kalpa is the "day of Brahma" (in Hinduism - the god of creation). After this period, the “night of Brahma” begins, equal in duration to the day. Thus, the divine day lasts 8.64 billion years. The month of Brahma consists of 30 such days, which is 259.2 billion years, and the year consists of 12 months. Brahma lives for 100 years (311 trillion 40 billion years), after which he dies.

Bhaskara is the first!

As we know, the Polish scientist Nicolaus Copernicus proposed that the Earth revolves around the Sun in 1543. However, 1000 years earlier, the Vedic astronomer and mathematician Aryabhata stated the same thing: “Just as a person sailing on a boat, it seems that the trees on the banks are moving, so it seems to people living on Earth that the Sun is moving.”

In a work called "Aryabhatiya", the scientist argued that the Earth is round, rotates around its axis and around the Sun and "hangs" in space. In addition, he gave accurate data on the size of the Earth and the Moon.

The theory of attraction was also well known to ancient astronomers. The sage Bhaskara in the famous astronomical treatise "Surya-siddhanta" wrote: "Objects fall to the Earth due to the force of its attraction. The Earth, Moon, Sun and other planets are also held in their orbits by the force of gravity.
Note that Isaac Newton discovered the law of attraction only in 1687.

In the Surya Siddhanta, Bhaskara gives the time it takes the Earth to go around the Sun: 365.258756484 days. Modern scientists accept the figure of 365.2596 days.

The Rig Veda stated that the Moon is a satellite of the Earth.

“Being a satellite of the Earth, the Moon revolves around its mother planet and accompanies it in rotation around its father planet, the Sun. Total in solar system 32 satellite planets. The moon is the only satellite that has its own individual nature. The size of the remaining satellites does not exceed 1/8 of the size of their parent planets. The moon is the only satellite of a very large size.

The origin of matter was explained by the Upanishads: "From it (the Absolute) came space, from which the wind came, from the wind came fire, from fire - water, and from water - earth." This is very similar to the sequence of the origin of matter, as modern physicists understand it: plasma, gas, energy. liquid, solid.

Amazing monuments of the past

Not only theoretical knowledge, but quite specific traces of material culture remained from the ancient Vedic civilization. The temple complex of Angkor Wat in the jungle of Cambodia is dedicated to the god Vishnu and is one of the most amazing monuments of the Vedic civilization.

This is the largest religious building in the world. Its area is 200 square kilometers, and 500 thousand people lived on its territory!
How this amazing structure was created is still a mystery. Yoshinori Iwasaki, director of the Geoscience Institute in Osaka, Japan, writes:

“Starting from 1906, a group of French restorers worked in Angkor. In the 1950s, French specialists tried to lift the stones up the steep embankment. But since the angle of the steep embankment is 40°, after the first stage five meters high was built, the embankment collapsed. A second attempt was made, but with the same result.

In the end, the French abandoned the idea of ​​​​following historical technologies and installed a concrete wall inside the pyramid to preserve the earthen structures. Today we do not know how the ancients could build such high and steep mounds.

Near Angkor there is a huge reservoir of Western Barai. The dimensions of the reservoir are 8 * 2.1 kilometers, and the depth is five meters. It was made in time immemorial. The accuracy of the boundaries of the reservoir and the grandeur of the work performed are striking. This huge reservoir has clear straight boundaries, which is uncharacteristic even for modern similar structures.

Another temple, located in the village of Lepakshi in India (Andhra Pradesh), has a mystery that haunts many researchers. The temple has 69 ordinary columns and one special one - it does not touch the ground. For the entertainment of tourists, local guides stick a newspaper under it to show that the column really floats in the air.

For many years, experts have tried to unravel the mystery of the hanging column. For example, British engineers during the period of colonization of India even tried to knock it out of place, but, fortunately, they did not succeed. Until now, despite advanced engineering knowledge and modern equipment, scientists have not been able to solve the mystery of the hanging column that violates the laws of gravity.

I recommend reading it to anyone interested. ancient history, age and origin of mankind, the work of P. Oleksenko “Artifacts of Ancient India”, which tells about the amazing knowledge contained in the Vedas and other ancient Indian books written in Sanskrit. The conclusion is made about the primacy of Sanskrit, as well as its similarity with many languages ​​of the world, and it is assumed that Sanskrit is the language of the Nostratic community.
The work of P. Oleksenko provides interesting information that Sanskrit sounds are in natural harmony with cosmic vibrations, so even just listening to Sanskrit texts and reading them have a beneficial effect on the human body and psyche, and also contribute to spiritual searches. The author cites an Indian legend about the origin of Sanskrit, according to which the ancient enlightened yogis caught fifty different vibrations emanating from the chakras, and each of these subtle vibrations became one of the letters of the Sanskrit alphabet, that is, Sanskrit is internal energies expressed in sounds.
P. Oleksenko's hypothesis that Sanskrit was the language of snake people - the Nagas or the language of communication between them and the devas seems to be quite curious and justified.
At the same time, it seems to me very controversial (despite their seeming persuasiveness) the author’s reasoning that the Indus and Saraswati civilization was the ancestral home of Sanskrit, and that Sanskrit was created on the basis of the Indian script, as well as the conclusion that follows from this that the origins of the Nostratic community were on the Hindustan Peninsula. There is too much information in the Vedas and other ancient Indian texts that goes far beyond Hindustan and is more related to another ancient continent - Hyperborea, where, according to the reconstructions carried out by me in the book “The Land of the Immortals, Magicians and Sorcerers. When there was a “golden age” on Earth, white gods or maidens lived.
It also seems to me that the given by the author - February 18, 3102, is underestimated by several orders of magnitude. AD, especially since it is younger than a number of existing dates for writing the Vedas and other ancient Indian texts (the author himself speaks of this in relation to the Bhavishya Purana) - and the texts contained in the Vedas were transmitted orally before they were written over many generations.

The author's assertion that a few thousand years ago the life span of intelligent beings was 1000 years, and several hundred thousand years ago - 10,000 years, also looks unconvincing. As I showed in my books and works "Formation of a new earth, new sky and new people", "5.2 million–12.5 thousand years ago - from the Creation of the world to the Flood", "Once again about the time of the Creation of the world and the biblical (Noah's) flood. Adjustments made by geology and folklore"and others, intelligent beings had such a life expectancy much earlier (millions of years ago).

Despite the disagreements expressed by me, the work of P. Oleksenko "Artifacts of Ancient India" will undoubtedly become a pearl in the collection of works posted on the site.

modern science tries to fit the entire history of modern mankind into a certain time frame. That our civilization begins after the global flood, which occurred approximately 5 - 6 thousand years ago. With this approach, Ancient India is an artifact that does not fit into traditional science and modern ideas.
Here are some examples:
Example one. The number 108, sacred in the East, is an attribute of the god Vishnu, the guardian of the world. According to the Vedas, it indicates the structure of the world. Indeed, it shows the ratio of the diameters of the Sun and the Earth, as well as the ratio of the distance from the Earth to the Sun to the diameter of the Sun. The equality of the ratios of the diameter of the Sun to the diameter of the Earth and the distance from the Sun to the Earth to the diameter of the Sun with an accuracy of 1% may also be of some interest. When expressed in kilometers, it looks like this:
1 390 000: 12 751 = 109
149 600 000: 1 390 000 = 108
Question: where did the priests of ancient India, the keepers of knowledge, learn these proportions?
Question two: can such proportions and ratios of 1% be a random result?
Second example. Already in the Rigveda, the multidimensional worlds inhabited by the gods are described. Our society is only getting closer to understanding this.
Example three. The Mahabharata and Ramayana describe aircraft - vimanas, which, in terms of their flight characteristics, coincide with the descriptions of UFOs.
Example four. The ancient Indian epic describes grandiose wars with the use of weapons of the gods (not only nuclear, vacuum bombs, plasma guns, but also other types of weapons that modern humanity is still going to "invent").
Example five. More than 4,000 seals were found in the ancient cities of India, many of which are duplicates, and all the signs of ancient writing are present on the seals, both stone and metal! This indicates that we have before us - the oldest printed metal set in the world, used as part of some organized activity. It is known that woodcut printing existed in India and Tibet two thousand years ago. The Buddhist canon was printed in Kashmir and Tibet and delivered to Central Asia and China in the middle of the first millennium. This indicates that the idea of ​​printing was well known throughout Asia two thousand years ago and has probably never died out since Vedic times.
Example six. According to experts, the ancient language Sanskrit, in which ancient Indian texts are written, is the most perfect language of all that exists. And it is also almost ideal for programming, eclipsing Fortran, Algol and other languages.
Similar examples can be continued, but let's try to comprehend these facts from today's positions and within the framework of our worldview.