Q1: What is Vedic Astrology?

Vedic Astrology [hereafter, VA for short] is an ancient Indian Divine-centric, analytical system of profound understanding of the
totality of events and circumstances in human life-beginning with birth & karma and ending with death.

It is a limb of the ‘Vedas’ [the ancient scriptures of the Hindus] and therefore implies a ‘Vedic’ world-view which is Divine-centric and consequently vastly different from the modern world-view that has come to us from the Western sciences and philosophies, and which forms our outlook in our day to day life.

Thus it is a mathematical-philosophical-spiritual system of understanding the mystery of human life and destiny. Though of ancient
origin, it has never ceased to be a living system of guidance for Indians in every bygone century and millennium-for dealing with all of life’s baffling enigmas. Like the proverbial self-rejuvenating liver, there have been significant self-rejuvenating spurts of growth and research in Vedic astrology even in this century and such spurts invariably serve to offset the inevitable ‘corruption’ of the shastras (‘shastra slatha’, shastras being authoritative texts), which always happens because of the ravages of time.

We may remember at this juncture that like this ancient Indian system of VA, most ancient civilizations have also had their
characteristic systems of astrology- the Chinese, the Babylonian, the Egyptian, the European, etc.

Q2: What can you say about the Chronology of Vedic Astrology?

VA is considered to have taken birth in another Yuga (‘Age’), very far back in time, going back at least to anything from ten to twelve thousand years. We moderns hesitate to conceive of history, beyond a few thousand years, but the ancient Hindus felt very comfortable with astronomical time spans, where the cycle of the Yugas (Ages) itself was of the order of 24,000 years, the Precessional period of the earth’s axis. In those ancient times all learning was preserved by oral traditions and palm leaf scrolls.

Though borrowing from ancient astronomy, in its scope and quest, VA is entirely different from Vedic Astronomy.

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