Reflections on the Nature of the Real - 3

Vedic Mathematics and

the Dharma that is Eternal

Thea (PNB)

Aeon Centre of Cosmology

Tamil Nadu, South India

4.9.2014

The article by Professor C.K. Raju that appeared in The Hindu on 3 September 2014, entitled ‘Nothing Vedic in Vedic Maths’, I feel requires a thoughtful response because it is entirely misleading. The learned professor is not to blame; he has taken up a subject that can only be rightfully analysed by a person who has realised the consciousness of the Vedic Rishis – and therefore what emanates from such a realisation in present times can in all honesty be termed Vedic. Naturally there has to be the necessary discrimination that allows one to pass judgement on the work of such enlightened souls.

This is what Swami Sri Bharati Krishna Tirtha-ji has done (originally published as Vedic Mathematics by the Banaras Hindu University in 1965). Incorporating Vedic Mathematics in school curricula is extremely important not because it brings out the attainments of the ancient Rishis, but rather it proves the eternal essence of the Dharma and that it is alive and well even in the midst of a contemporary society that appears to be far removed from that Source. It is important to do so for the fact that the Sanatana Dharma can thus be seen to be injecting life into the civilisation from time immemorial to the present.  This needs to be brought to light and demonstrated to the youth.

One who has reached that level of unity consciousness – that is, who has tread the same path as the Rishis, please take note – will produce a body of higher knowledge that expresses something of the same swar-solar essence. But also to be noted is that Swar, because it is translated as ‘heaven’ has been misleading spiritual aspirants by creating the illusion of a goal in the Beyond, disconnected from our planetary base. Contrarily, Swar is not a plane, a dimension beyond but is simply a realisation of the Truth-Consciousness exactly as propounded in the Veda – particularly in the Rig Veda – i.e. solar. When the lid (Vritra, the coverer of the Sun) is removed from the face of the supramental Sun of Consciousness, one has realised Swar and one has established one’s place in the pantheon along with the Immortal Ones.

This is what Swami Bharati Tirtha-ji brings to our attention by his offering of Vedic Mathematics to India and the world. This can never be understood by scholars trained in the halls of contemporary academia and according to the organisers of the curricula in India’s educational institutions. At this critical point in her evolution, as a civilisation that still maintains a connection to the ancient Source, the task at hand is to incorporate a discipline such as Vedic Mathematics for the purpose of allowing the young of contemporary India to appreciate the ancient tradition of renewal and thus to escape the trap of fossilisation that has engulfed humanity by the emergence of various brands of fundamentalism that contradict the Sanatana Dharma.

Vedic Mathematics, as the discipline has reached us through the genius of the Swami-ji, is an example of how to escape that plunge into fundamentalism. But mistakes are made when this pathway is not accurately understood and deviations are sought to be brought into the curricula, an example of which is Vedic Astrology; it was introduced into higher educational institutions by the earlier NDA regime.

Lamentably, there is nothing truly vedic in that brand of astrology; rather, it is actually un-Vedic and this can be easily proven by facts, such as science demands. Astrology became un-Vedic precisely when scholars/astronomers took it upon themselves to ‘set things right’ in astrological calculations. Their claim is that astrology is mere pseudo-science and is therefore superstition. But the truth of the matter is that astronomers are the direct cause of the ancient Vedic art tumbling into the abyss of superstition by unknowingly upholding the 13^th-century statement of Al Biruni in his book India, ‘The solstice has kept its place, but the constellations have migrated, just the very opposite of what Varaha has fancied.’ (India, II, p.7.)*    

Thus, post-Independence astronomers took up the advice of Al Biruni and also proclaimed that ‘the zodiac has moved on’ and is ‘no longer where it once was’, thereby setting firmly in place the misconceived Nirayana system of astrological computation for horoscopes and all temple rituals. The practical result is that the Equinoxes and Solstices, firm foundation of the art of the Sacred from the Vedic Age and still the foundation of temple constructions, have been eliminated as the fourfold basis of astrological computations and temple rituals by a displacement in time (and astrology is a study in the application of Time) of what should be the most important festival in the Hindu Calendar: the Makar Sankranti, or the entry into the sign of the zodiac known universally as Capricorn. This entry MUST coincide with the December Solstice, the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. As it now stands (and certainly this is revealing of the mire into which India has been submerged, causing a tamasic ‘tardiness’ in response to matters Vedic) that most important of all festivals, a date of such immense significance in the Veda and the Epics is today celebrated 23 days after entry into Makar – or Capricorn, known to astrologers throughout the world as the zodiacal ruler of India. If so-called Vedic Astrology had been called Post-Vedic, it would have been correct and its inclusion in the curricula would have been acceptable. But since it is not and continues to be presented to students as ‘Vedic’, it is not only incorrect but an outright falsehood. We have science and scholars to thank for this aberration that affects 80% of the population of the subcontinent, as well as the pundits who have not given deep thought to the sanctity of their trade that demands the utmost dedication to Truth.

There is another area of the Vedic legacy that can prove the eternal character of the Dharma, and therefore the precise way in which it escapes fossilisation. This concerns the vedi, or Vedic Altar, seat of the ancient Sacrifice. The new Indo-Centric Cosmology provides factual proof of how updating is accomplished in this pre-eminently Vedic area of the Dharma. In early January of 2015, an example of updating the Vedi will be presented as an offering of Aeon Centre of Cosmology to the Indian public at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts in New Delhi. It is an exhibition based on the vision of a contemporary Seer of the highest order, the Mother, Sri Aurobindo’s co-worker. Similar to the renewal accomplished by Vedic Mathematics, the Mother has provided the nation with the new Vedi for the new Age. This is by far the most significant example of just how the Dharma eternally renews itself.

Ganga Devi on her Vahana Makar, the Crocodile

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*  Quoted in the Introduction to M. Ramakrishna Bhat’s translation of Varamihira's Brihat Samhita, Part 1 (published by Motilal Banassidas) 1981.

Updating the Vedic Altar – 11

Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet

Director, Aeon Centre of Cosmology
November 3, 2011

[Link to Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI,
Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX, Part IX, cont., Part X, Part XII or Epilogue]

‘Here cried (or, moved) the stone impelled by the hand, whereby the Navagwas chanted for ten months the hymn…(RV, V. 45-7) ‘I hold for you in the waters the thought that wins possession of heaven, by which the Navagwas passed through the ten months…(RV. V, 45, 1).

‘The expression in the hymns, daso maso ataran, indicates that there was some difficulty in getting through the full period of ten months. It is during this period apparently that the sons of darkness had the power to assail the sacrifice; for it is indicated that it is only by the confirming of the thought which conquers Swar, the solar world, that the Rishis are able to get through the ten months…’ (Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, p.169).

Several elements of the new cosmology and its relation to the updated Vedi must be discussed after the foundation laid in Part 10. These are all interrelated but the Mother’s vision brings them into prominence in a special way. First there is the zodiacal sign Capricorn; second is Saturn because it is the planetary ruler of Capricorn; and third is India. Traditional astrology confirms the relationships by way of sign and rulership. In the Mother’s chamber they feature as key elements central to the equivalencies as determined in its Core. Indeed, in analysing Saturn, Capricorn and India in the Core, the most awe-inspiring features of this updated Vedi are revealed. This is when we truly enter the realm of a new way, a third way beyond science as well as spirituality.
In Part 7, I presented details of how the solar descending Ray (cow-energy) is defined as the year of 365 days. In so doing the necessity of using the universal calendar – and not the one used by Hindus – was revealed. We noted that Mahavishuva and Makar Sankranti are accommodated in the chamber’s translucent Globe. This was the only luminous object in the Mother’s vision, and rightfully so because the Globe is the element representing the Seeing Eye. It is the third in the trinity Transcendent, Cosmic, Individual – i.e., the individual Soul. In the human creation the Soul plays the same role as the Globe does in the chamber.
Saturn is the Time-Spirit, Chronos of Greek mythology, Mahakala of the Hindu. It needs to be stated before further discussion that the Mother’s vision in its entirety can be called a hymn to Saturn. In this context the Mother, being the embodiment of the 6 in the Formula, the Cosmic Divine, is the appropriate one of the Line to create a ‘hymn to Saturn’, the 6^th planet. The measurements she gave for the Ray and the Globe make this clear. I will demonstrate just how Saturn comes to play such a central role when we observe further ahead its position in the four horoscopes of the members of the Solar Line, as I have called Vishnu’s emanations in this 9^th Manifestation, consisting of the 9^th Avatar and his helpers, 6 and 3. The 4^th Power is the 10^th in the Line, as the Core reveals. But to appreciate these correspondences we must make use of the aphorism a day for a year. On this basis the Ray is also 365 years.¹
At the top of the Globe, which in the annual count is the Makar Sankranti, in terms of years it is 1935, with 1944 at the Globe’s centre equivalent to January 1^st. When the Ray reaches the top of the Pedestal, after which it is seen no more, it is 1950 – the year of Sri Aurobindo’s passing when he stepped out of this physical plane for the period indicated accurately in the Pedestal’s time measurement. 1950 is also important in that the numbers 9/5/1 of the Name are again present in the date which provided the key for the discovery of the Map of the 12 Manifestations and the appearances of the Vishnu Avatars across the millennia.²
Supermind is the faculty that allows us to appreciate something so novel and deeply significant for the Earth’s evolution as the Mother’s updated Vedi. It allows us not only to see in a way that makes all things new, but it was the faculty the Mother employed for the Act of Measuring, without which the details I am presenting in this series and in numerous other publications could not have been formulated. In his monumental collection on the subject, Sri Aurobindo described Supermind’s characteristics. The reader may consult his published works for an in-depth appreciation of this new faculty that opens the door to the next stage in evolution, displacing the supremacy of Mind in the human species. With that displacement, and as Supermind grows in our midst, the solutions will appear to the many woes we face as a transitional species at this crisis point of our common destiny.
However, the Mother’s chamber is the first factual example of Supermind’s function; added to this is the contribution of the third in the Line who provides movement, who, through the application of the Name, is able to set the time-wheel in motion so that the Becoming is established as an integral part of the transformation of consciousness of the human species. We may have visions inspired by a higher Light, but the issue is applicability; and that comes with Measure and Movement: the 6 and the 3 in action. And for the latter we need the human consciousness as an instrument of perception and fulfilment. The Formula 9/6/3 is the key, ever and always. However, the correct calendar is the tool with which we apply the Formula in the flow of Earth time. If not the exercise is purely speculative, or at best philosophic. It has no power to actually transform life on Earth as is required at this stage of evolution. Hence I stated in the beginning of this series that the Vedic Altar encompasses a process,
The objective of the 9^th Avatar’s descent was to reverse the direction spirituality had taken with its almost exclusive emphasis on an otherworldly realisation, leaving the Earth to her own devices, and to establish a life divine on this very planet, to bring Heaven upon Earth, as the Scriptures state. How can this best be achieved, is the question the sincere seeker must ask. Yogic realisations of the old schools, even if they could be extended beyond the single realiser to many others, would still not have the power to bring about any universal transformation, the signature of the Aquarian Age. Sri Aurobindo made this clear: it is not merely the goal of his mission that is different from the old Yogas; it is the process as well. That is, the Being and the Becoming would have to participate on equal terms. And indeed this has come to pass.
Supermind creates its own conditions for manifestation, is another aphorism of the new way cosmology. This means that the supramental Truth-Consciousness must arrange its manifestation in such a manner that in the becoming of its being, or its innermost essence, that divine life is manifested for all to see on Earth. Subjective realisations are desirable, but there has to be a revelation, with great precision in keeping with the character of Supermind, of exactly how the transformation can be accomplished. That revelation is the Mother’s chamber. It is the seed of all that is to follow.

In part 10, I dealt with the horizontal plane, for which the measure 1-12 was applied. In the solar system this same measure of 12 is observed in the horizontal expanse of the ecliptic plane which we divide into 12, as in the months of the year. That very same plane is further expanded to trace a full circle – in time by the laws of equivalency – to measure the larger movement the Earth experiences with the aid of the Precession of the Equinoxes, also a measure of 12. This is coherent and applicable. However, it would be only one of the two directions at the centre of which stands Earth – horizontal, related to Space. The other, the Vertical (time) is required to complete the process. Its measure is 9, or the Sun (0) and its 9 planets.

The Rig Veda records that the most difficult stage in the Journey is when the 9 (navagwas) become the 10 (dashagwas). We may express the passage in another way to mean the same thing: when the vertical 9 must become integrated with the horizontal 12. In Hindu temple architecture these directions feature prominently, as Stella Kramrisch explains in her monumental work, The Hindu Temple. In the section ‘The Form of the Vertical Axis’, she writes:

‘The vertical axis of the Prasada [temple] leads from the Highest Point…to the centre of the Garbhagriha…it traverses it like a hallow reed… The pillar inheres in the Prasada, which is the universe in a likeness. The Pillar of the Universe [skambha], the Axis Mundi, inheres in the World Mountain…The mountain shape of the Prasada is the sheath of the vertical axis… Its Highest Point, the end or beginning of the axis of the temple, is in the centre of the hollow shaft above the Linga or image in the Garbhagriha, above the Womb and Centre of the Cosmos and above the Navel of the Earth’ (p.175-76)

In her updated Vedi the Mother materialised the function by the descending (vertical) solar Ray which is equivalent to the ‘hollow reed/shaft’ of the temple, but which far from being hollow is filled with the Power of Time. When it meets the Core the integration begins between 9 and 12, vertical and horizontal, as can be appreciated in the photo. Indeed, the measure of 12, which the Mother’s own symbol provides in the chamber, is to be found only in the horizontal (see photo above) – equivalent to the ecliptic of our System where all the planets find their home base as they travel around the Sun, marking out the 12 stages of the Journey. The chamber reproduces this phenomenon by virtue of the laws of equivalency; in so doing, the architecture becomes applicable via the workings of Time through calendar and number. However as we analyse the Mother’s updated vedi, we SEE the measure of 12 to be the One Circle described in the Rig Veda, and also in the Atharva Veda:

One is the wheel; the bands are twelve; three are the hubs – who can understand it? Three hundred spokes and sixty in addition have been hammered therein and firmly riveted….
(Atharva Veda X, 8)

The Atharva Veda goes even deeper into this oneness in the next verse which captures the most profound esoteric function of the Altar, carried to subliminal heights in the Mother’s updating:

Though manifested, it is yet hidden, secret, its name is the Ancient, a mighty mode of being; in Skambha is established this whole world; therein is set fast all that moves and breathes.
(Atharva Veda X, 8)

In the chamber we see the Horse (horizontal – 12) as the upholder of the Cow (vertical – 9) just as the Vedic myth describes: Usha, the divine Dawn Goddess is the Globe is the Earth. She is carried across the horizon by Agni (the Horse) as she brings a new dawn each day to ‘make all things new’ (Aries/Agni is the first zodiacal sign, known as Cosmic Dawn). Through the Core we see Usha and Agni; we see Cow and Horse in a sublime geometric interplay of Consciousness-Force. The one gives the light, the other the movement which through our experience of Earth time makes the Divine Play intelligible to the human consciousness. We consciously live the experience of all that the updated Vedi encapsulates – for we live the Harmony, we are the Harmony. It is the supramental Truth-Consciousness that is responsible for this densification of the symbol; or, in the new-way aphorism, the symbol to become the thing symbolised. In the Rig Veda some of the most beautiful hymns are dedicated to the Dawn Goddess.
Success, or the victory of the 10^th month/stage of Capricorn/Makar, comes about when this intertwining of vertical and horizontal occurs in the individual realiser as it had in the Vedic Age; but now it is a realisation that must extend to the rest of humanity. It must be imprinted in the evolutionary matrix if the supramentalisation of the species is to occur, if Mind is to cede its position of supremacy to the next principle, the truth-conscious Supermind. The Core of the Mother’s chamber reveals the manner in which this imprinting was done in the years following Sri Aurobindo’s passing in 1950. It is indeed, as the Atharva Veda verses to Skambha indicate, the most secret of secrets. Nonetheless, this supreme Rahasya stands disclosed before our very eyes if we use them to see in a new way. We come to understand that the updated vedi has been an essential element in the imprinting, without which the task of the 9^th Avatar could not have been victoriously completed. All of this is ‘written’ in the chamber’s Core.


The sole measurement that allows us to see in this new way of Vedic equivalency and correspondence is the height of the Pedestal. Indeed, it provides the basis of realisation for the traveller on the Path so carefully described in the Rig Veda . The secret is the 9 becoming the 10, a process ‘contained’ in the Pedestal; but only a Pedestal of a certain measurement. Precision is provided by Sri Aurobindo’s four upright symbols, forming a square, which the Mother ‘saw’ when she entered the chamber in the supramental plane ‘touching at its angles’. We may refer again to the diagram below for verification. Sri Aurobindo’s old symbol, in use until May of 1964, when placed in the pedestal/square does not touch at its angles. On the other hand, the re-made symbol does. This shift from old symbol to new was the Mother’s unique way of transcribing for the world Sri Aurobindo’s accomplishment regarding the Vedic 9 becoming the 10, from 1950 onward, the period defined in the Pedestal’s time-measurement. In this Aquarian Age it must be imprinted in the fabric of evolution, it must step out of the parameters set for the individual realiser and become the basis for societal transformation. This is the secret the Pedestal of the Core holds.


With the Pedestal measurement one half of the puzzle is solved. The rest is provided by the precise measurement the Mother gave for the globe’s diameter: 70cm, the measurement of the chamber’s only luminous object. In fact, the Pedestal measurement itself derives from the Globe, as I will explain. On the basis of a diameter of 70cm, using one of the most sacred of all geometric figures, the Vesica Piscis, this extraordinary feat of capturing the Vedic process, once reserved only for an elite, can now be revealed as a firm part of the evolution on Earth.
Vesica Piscis means Vessel of the Fishes – or , the Mother’s own sign (A). But to be accurate, the line cutting through the circles should join their centres (B). Applying the Vesica of 70cm diameter (of the Globe), the lower portion then accommodates the Pedestal exactly with the angles of Sri Aurobindo’s symbol touching. His symbol fits neatly into the lower sphere of the Vesica. This could not occur if the pre-1964 symbol were used. In the discussions the Mother held explaining her vision in early 1970, she was insistent that the translucent Globe (not transparent as in the revised plan of the architects’ of Auroville) should measure 70cm diameter. On the basis of the sacred Vesica as shown in the diagram below, the Pedestal then measures 50cm height (60 width), exactly what is required for the application of the Geometry of Time.


If 50cm are added to the Pedestal, the total length of the vertical axis-shaft is 15m70. With the 15m20 of the visible Ray we have 365 days, according to the aphorism Cow is Ray is 365 days. But what happens when 50cm more are added, which equal 13 days. We then have 365+13 = 378. Remarkably these 378 days constitute exactly the synodic year of Saturn, making his presence felt by this Geometry of Time in an astonishing manner, certainly the only example of such an equivalency ever recorded in sacred geometry. And yet, this utter marvel of Seeing was dismantled by the Auroville architects; it seems the residents of the township preferred the ‘revised’ version – with its ego-sense embedded – over the Mother’s supramental updated Vedi, when they were offered the choice. With the higher things treated so cavalierly, is it any wonder that civilisation stands on the brink of self-destruction? The lesson learned from that saga is, in the words of the youth (Part 4), the ‘book of knowledge’ the Mother bequeathed could be ‘opened’ only when man ceases to be man – and becomes Superman. Thus are all things perfectly as they should be. The choice is made by each one of us in full awareness now, given the revelations Supermind has brought to the world.
Finally, we find that 15m70 must be added to two measurements the Mother recorded in her conversations; one was 15m20 and the other 15.50, both apparently for the chamber’s height. A certain confusion prevailed as to which was correct. But in fact both are correct. 15m20 is the length of the visible Ray; 15m50 is the height of the chamber, floor to apex. But to this, based on the Vesica Piscis of the Mother’s own natal sign, there are 20cm that are added, located below the floor level, as the photo of the Ray and Core indicate. This is one more means to establish the Mother’s Vedic credentials and that she is a Seer in the direct lineage of the Vedic Rishis. Stella Kramrisch discusses this feature of the Hindu temple by offering examples where in the Garbhagriha the idol is sunken beneath the floor, often as in a hidden crypt:

‘…In the Jambukesvara temple, near Trichinopoly, in South India, the Garbhagriha below the level of the ground enshrines a Svayambhu Linga standing in water. The great sanctity of the non-man-made Linga, the hidden darkness of the not only innermost, but also of the lowermost, Garbhagriha, are proper to Guha, the secret chamber around the omphalos, the navel and centre of the Earth and of Being. Above it is the Garbhagriha for daily rites, and above these graded levels of secrecy and sanctity is the superstructure. The finial above it shines golden, high up, straight above the omphalos, or centre of the Garbhagriha, the womb and cave in the mountain. Or else no floor separates the lower and the upper chamber, they are one; only the sunk level is preserved. The one and only Garbhagriha is often much lower in level than the hall, the Mandapam by which it is approached; stairs lead down to it, to a depth of seven or eight feet, or less; the actual extent into depth is immaterial as long as the descent is marked by the level of the floor being lower than that of the threshold, be it even one step only. In Orissa, the name of the Garbhagriha is Gambhira, the deep lying.’ (The Hindu Temple, page 172-3.)

Naturally very few or none would be able to see that the Mother’s vedi serves the same purpose as above, with its 20cm beneath floor level. However, if we understand the connection between Guha and the chamber’s Pedestal and the sunken Garbhagrihas as described above, we cannot fail to find a further confirmation of her Vedic credentials because the Pedestal does hold the essence of Guha and reveals the role the Divine Son plays in the evolution of humankind and the establishment of Supermind as the next and highest principle.
There is a footnote to the above paragraph in Kramrisch’s book which I include because it points to the fact that interpretations of the Sacred abound on the basis of time-bound historical happenings; whereas, the reason for the sunken Garbhagriha is a tradition that dates well before Muslim invasions and was not for protection but to encourage deeper communion with the Power in the Garbhagriha:

‘Fn #113, page 172: ‘The underground situation of the place of greatest sanctity has been explained as a protective measure from the Mohammedans, as all the temples where it is so placed, were built when the Muslims entered India. Apart from the fact that the vast majority of preserved Hindu temples dates from these centuries (10^th to 12^th), the presence of the Svayambhu Linga, the natural Omphalos, disproves this assumption.’

Here is the diagram indicating the sunken 20cm which does indeed hold the secret of Guha, the hidden One, the Son. This single item reveals certainly what must be considered the most remarkable of the Mother’s ability to update the Vedi. In the process, she established the credentials of Vishnu’s 9^th Avatar and his Line; but more importantly, she re-instates the axial role the Vishnu Dasavataras play in ancient as well as contemporary post-independent India. And that these 20cm should carry the solar Ray to the exact measurement of Saturn’s synodic year is indeed a testimony to the magnificence and relevance of astrology when the laws of its equivalency and correspondence are grasped. For this a New Way is needed, beyond the science and spirituality we know today.

Finally there is Saturn’s direct and finest addition to the credentials of the Time-Spirit’s emanations that I am establishing, through observing the placement of the 6^th planet in the four natal horoscopes of the members of the Solar Line, drawn up on the basis of the true Vedic astrology of the tropical zodiac. (These correspondences could not exist on the basis of the currently-used sidereal Nirayana system of computation for horoscopes, with its shifting ayanamsha that makes any such precision impossible). When Saturn’s zodiacal longitudes in the four charts are calculated and then converted to calendar days with the help of an ephemeris, and these dates in turn are located in the Core, given the accuracy of Supermind to which we have become accustomed, those days touch all four points of the Globe: top of the Globe – the Mother (6); centre – (3); top of the Pedestal (9), and finally the position of Saturn in the horoscope of the 4th (0/1) falls where we would expect – the bottom of the Globe, hidden deep in the pedestal (see The New Way, Vol.2, p. 267). For the feminine powers, Saturn is as we would expect – in the light-filled Globe, in full view; the Masculine supports but is not seen as the active principle. This is fully in keeping with Sri Aurobindo’s teaching. As in Tantra, the Shakti is active; Shiva exists but to support her play. In the Mother’s chamber core, these are the dancing particles of light in the Globe.

[Link to Part XII]

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¹ The Ray measurement as it enters the chamber in the day-month count is 5 January; but as years it is 1584, the first 9-power year after the last reformation in 1582 of the Julian Calendar currently in use throughout the world. This is the official calendar India adopted at Independence. The 15m20 of its length carries us to the top of the Pedestal and 5 January again.
² In The Hindu Temple, Kramrisch writes on page 11 (f.n. 22), ‘A knowledge of form (rupa), and number and proportion was an indispensible equipment; mathematics and architecture had their root in the Vedic altar. The indissoluble connection of number and form remained a consciously employed knowledge throughout. In the middle of the ninth century AD the mathematician Mahavira…speaks of the use of the science of number in architecture and in all that constitutes the peculiar value of the arts.’
Number has been an essential ingredient, in the manner used in Vedic Mathematics, reduction to a ‘seed digit’.

Updating the Vedic Altar – 8

Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet
Director, Aeon Centre of Cosmology
October 13, 2011

[Link to Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI,
Part VII, Part IX, Part IX, cont., Part X, Part XI, Part XII or Epilogue]

It is well at this point to establish the Mother’s Vedic credentials. That she was a direct link to the Rishis and the school of higher knowledge that was widespread in the Vedic Age becomes obvious when we examine her yogic legacy of the 95 years of her life span. But it is interesting to note that these credentials surfaced even before she took up definitive residence in India by Sri Aurobindo’s side. To prove the point, on 26 November – a date that would surface significantly many years later – in 1915 from Paris, the Mother sent the following description of an experience she had to Sri Aurobindo in Pondicherry. Perhaps more than any other realisation she was to have, this seems to have been her investiture as the Cosmic Divine, the 6 in the work that lay ahead for her with Sri Aurobindo as the Transcendent 9:

‘The entire consciousness immersed in divine contemplation, the whole being enjoyed a supreme and vast felicity.
‘Then was the physical body seized, first in its lower members and next the whole of it, by a sacred trembling which made little by little even in the most material sensation all personal limits fall away. The being progressively, methodically, grew in greatness, breaking down every barrier, shattering every obstacle, that it might contain and manifest a power which increased ceaselessly in immensity and intensity. It was as if a progressive dilation of the cells until there was a complete identification with the earth: the body of the awakened consciousness was the terrestrial globe moving harmoniously in ethereal space. And the consciousness knew that its global body was thus moving in the arms of the universal Personality, and gave itself, it abandoned itself to Her in an ecstasy of peaceful bliss. Then it felt that its body was absorbed in the body of the universe and one with it; the consciousness became the consciousness of the universe, in its totality immobile, in its internal complexity moving infinitely. The consciousness of the universe sprang towards the Divine in an ardent aspiration, a perfect surrender, and it saw in the splendour of the immaculate Light the radiant Being standing on a many-headed serpent whose body coiled infinitely around the universe. The Being in an eternal gesture of triumph mastered and created at one and the same time the serpent and the universe that issued from it, erect on the serpent he dominated it with all his victorious might, and the same gesture that crushed the hydra, enveloping the universe, gave it eternal birth. Then the consciousness became this Being and perceived that its form was changing more and more; it was absorbed into something which was no longer a form and yet contained all forms, something which, immutable, sees – the Eye, the Witness. And what It sees, is. Then this last vestige of form disappeared and the consciousness was absorbed into the Unutterable, the Ineffable.
‘The return towards the consciousness of the individual body took place very slowly in a constant and invariable splendour of Light and Power and Felicity and Adoration, by successive gradations, but directly, without passing again through the universal and terrestrial forms. And it was as if the modest corporeal form had become the direct and immediate vesture, without any intermediary, of the supreme and eternal Witness.’

Sri Aurobindo’s reply, by letter dated 31.12.1915, confirms that the experience was Vedic, and of an order that would not be recognised by today’s yogis, it is important to note.

‘The experience you have described is Vedic in the real sense, though not one which would easily be recognised by the modern systems of Yoga which call themselves Vedic. It is the union of the “Earth” of the Veda and Purana with the divine Principle, an earth which is said to be above our earth, that is to say, the physical being and consciousness of which the world and the body are only images. But modern Yogas hardly recognise the possibility of a material union with the Divine.’

Thus, the above attests to the fact that the Mother was following a line of knowledge that according to Sri Aurobindo was now unknown in India. Later he wrote in The Secret of the Veda that

‘…The Upanishads, mighty as they are, only aspire to bring out, arrange philosophically in the language of later thinking and crown with the supreme name of Brahman the eternal knowledge enshrined in the Vedas. Yet for some two thousand years at least no Indian has really understood the Vedas.' - Sri Aurobindo, India's Rebirth

It would take the descent of Vishnu’s 9^th Avatar and his helpers to re-establish the long-lost knowledge that was the hallmark of the ancient tradition. Portions of it remain in evidence in certain extant monuments across the globe; but, like the Rig Veda itself, they are largely incomprehensible. However, with the coming of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo, what was lost has been resurrected in an even greater glory given the advancements in the evolutionary process itself. Nothing is to be ignored if the full extent of the truth-conscious Supramental Manifestation is to be appreciated; but without their contribution darkness must prevail. The grace of the Guru is acknowledged in India even today to be the supreme blessing an individual can receive in any given lifetime; but the Mother explained in a letter to a disciple how much greater is that blessing when the Supreme Consciousness itself takes birth and becomes the Guru.
I stated earlier that four birthdates would join to provide the elementary numerical keys of knowledge for the retrieval of the Knowledge and the establishment of Supermind as the highest governing principle of the human evolving species. If we take just Sri Aurobindo’s birth date in conjunction with the Mother’s, it becomes clear that a carefully constructed plan had been set in motion perhaps from the beginning of Time itself – or at least from the beginning of our present evolutionary cycle – with the goal of bringing the Line of Ten Avatars to a culmination in our very times. Thus, Sri Aurobindo’s birthday was 15.8.1872; the Mother’s was 21.2.1878. Note the harmony of 6 between days, months and years:

Between 15 and 21 there are 6 days
Between 8 and 2 there are 6 months
Between 1872 and 1878 there are 6 years

This phenomenon of 6 is remarkable enough, but something even more remarkable occurred involving the days of their passings – the 18 days (3x6) between 17 November (the Mother’s) and 5 December (Sri Aurobindo’s). To compound matters, if this were not enough, there were 6 hours between their passings: the Mother’s occurred at 19:26 hours, and Sri Aurobindo’s at 1:26 AM. Furthermore, the date of the Mother’s important Vedic letter to Sri Aurobindo was 26 November – or the exact halfway date between the two passings. This date – named Immortality Day by the Mother and Sri Aurobindo in 1926 – would reveal itself through the measurements of the Chamber to be fundamental in the passage from the 9^th to the 10^th Avatar of Lord Vishnu, which will be discussed further on in conjunction with details regarding the chamber’s Core.
There is an interesting anecdote regarding the time of the Mother’s passing as officially circulated by the Ashram authorities. It is given as 19:25, not 19:26 as I have stated above. From the first moment I learned of the Ashram timing it seemed obvious to me that the time keeper had erred by one minute. That is, if there had been such a perfect harmony of 6 between their birth dates, it was logical to assume that coming so close to an even 6 hours in their passings, there had to have been a mistake. Perhaps the person entrusted with recording the time of the Mother’s passing had rounded it off to an even number, instead of respecting the passing to the minute. Or perhaps his watch was incorrect by one minute. Whatever had been the case, I was not convinced by the official timing. Three years later I was to receive confirmation of my assessment.
At Sri Aurobindo’s passing the clock in his room stopped at exactly 1:26 AM. It has been preserved with this reading ever since and left on display in his room for visitors to see. But it seemed that no such phenomenon occurred at the time of the Mother’s passing. Nonetheless, I still maintained that the correct time should be taken as 19:26, respecting Mahakala’s clear intention.
Three years later I happened to find myself in the reading room of the Ashram School where an imposing grandfather clock stands. It was not functioning because, I was told, it had stopped exactly when the Mother breathed her last, similar to the clock in Sri Aurobindo’s room. I was gratified to note that its hands pointed to 7:26 – and not 7:25. Of course it had to be so since this sort of precision has been a hallmark of the Supermind, unknown prior to its advent. Or rather, though the harmonies have been ever-present, they could not be ‘read’ or ‘seen’ without the enlightenment, coherency and precision Supermind provides. Sri Aurobindo makes this aspect of Supermind clear in a letter he wrote in February of 1923: ‘…The first condition of the Supermind is exactness, clearness and order both in the total and the details and their relations. Therefore it is a great advantage if there are these elements in the data upon which I have to work and a great disadvantage if they are absent.’ The incorrect recording of the Mother’s passing is a case in point.
There are a number of such harmonies between the births of the complete line of four which constitute the 9^th Avataric appearance along with his helpers. They are not random but are an intertwined phenomenon intended to present specific points that need to be rectified in order to re-establish the Sanatana Dharma on its correct foundations. To illustrate, the four Cardinal Points are firm pillars of the Vedic cosmology, but given the fact that astronomers persist in applying the wrong circle for astrological prescriptions and temple timings, their importance has been lost over the centuries. But true to my contention that by their very births the Vishnu emanations rectify or at least locate what is required to re-instate the Vedic tradition, the position of the Sun in each of the four natal horoscopes is situated in one of the four Cardinal corners of their charts; that is, emphasising the equinoxes and solstices. These births stretch across a century – 91 years, 1872-1963 to be precise. But this fourfold harmony was set in place for a very specific purpose: to highlight the need to respect the role the Cardinal Points and the equinoxes and solstices play in the Vedic Cosmology. It needs to be borne in mind that in order for this synchronisation between the four to take place, the exact birth times are the key – not the day or the month or the year, but four separate birth timings. We need to reflect on the question of control, which I have highlighted in the new cosmology, when presented with a configuration of this nature that stands well beyond the comprehension of today’s scientists from any discipline.
There is another such synchronisation, even more remarkable; in this case for the purpose of confirming the importance of the Cosmic Year, as it is sometimes called. This ‘year’ consists of 25,920 Earth years – or one round of the zodiac where passage through each sign requires 2160 years. This celestial movement is produced by the Precession of the Equinoxes. It takes place in a backward movement through the signs due to the Earth’s slow wobble like a gyroscope, whereby her equinoctial plane traces a circle in retrograde motion determining which astrological age of 2160 years the Earth is passing through. We emerged from the Age of Pisces in 1926 to enter our present Aquarian Age at that time.
The Precession of the Equinoxes is immensely important for astrological forecasting when dealing with cosmological periods covering centuries and millennia. This circle traced by the equatorial plane does not hold for individuals but only for vast evolutionary movements. It is through this method that the coming of Vishnu’s Avatars can be known and exactly when since each appearance is separated by approximately 6000 years; more importantly, we learn the task set out for each one to complete. The Precession was known to the ancients across the globe, and also in India, contrary to what scholars believe. This is proven with unparalleled accuracy by the Vishnu praises in the Rig Veda (RV 1, 154). But unfortunately, when the Vedic cosmology and zodiacal script were set aside at the insistence of astronomers, those verses could not be understood properly and the Precessional key they contain to indicate when the Avatar would appear was lost. Even more significantly, horoscopes for individuals are now done based on this vast movement of the Earth’s equatorial plane, in the belief that the circle thus traced on the backdrop of the constellations should be used for all astrological purposes, including ritual and temple timings. This practice should be halted and corrected at the earliest if astrology is to regain its former respected position as a true Vedic science. To each his own, is the motto: the individual’s place is within the tropical zodiac; the passage of the astrological ages is read according to a movement also produced by the Earth but involving not one year as in the Earth’s annual rotation around the Sun but thousands determined by the Precession of the Equinoxes. The error committed by Nirayana astrologers is to apply – incorrectly, in any case – the vast to the small. It is an aberration known only in India, birth place of the Veda!
The Precession of the Equinoxes, coupled with the Vishnu verses from the Rig Veda, are the keys required to read the cosmic credentials of the Avatars; and it is now precisely the Avataric descent in this Aquarian Age that can re-instate the cosmology by their own birthdates according to the Formula established for this purpose. Thus, to highlight the important role the Precession of the Equinoxes plays in the cosmology, the total count of the four dates in question correspond to one of the digits of the Precessional round in years – 25,920. Strung together, each birth date, by reduction to a ‘seed digit’ according to the Vedic method, forms the total year count of one Precessional round: 21.2.1878=2; 15.8.1872=5; 5.1.1938=9; 26.11.1963=2 – or 2/5/9/2 - 0. The Zero describes the supramental process involving Transcendence and Immanence, or the ‘birth of the One that fills the Void’. This will be explained further on. By this presentation, once again we are faced with Mahakala’s unparalleled control that makes a mockery of any ‘before’ or ‘after’, or of any limitation set by the assumed singularities of physics.

The Mother’s Vedic credentials are unmistakably discovered in perhaps the most important area of her competence: the symbol she designed for herself to reflect the most profound aspects of her mission. In fact, it is this symbol that formed the basis for the chamber design, which then brought it into direct connection with the vedi of the Rishis, as I will demonstrate conclusively.
Before all else, an explanation is required of just what her symbol and Sri Aurobindo’s are. They are not logos created by a graphic designer. Symbols of this superior order are based on gnosis; in the Mother’s case they reflect her supramental capacity. Therefore, we are blessed to have them to work with, as I have done. The supramental gnostic quality they possess surfaces when we realise that they hold a content that is applicable. I have discussed Sri Aurobindo’s (Part 3) with particular reference to its central square and the arrangement of petals that provided the sacred key to the descent of Vishnu’s 9^th Avatar; not only the Avatar himself, but also his helpers – the 6 and the 3.
Regarding the square, in 1958 the Mother explained its significance: ‘The junction of both (triangles) – the central square – is the perfect manifestation having at its centre the Avatar of the Supreme, the lotus.’

It is important to note her words carefully because some sustain – for example, Peter Heehs in his recent biography The Lives of Sri Aurobindo – that he was never referred to as the Avatar. Therefore, Heehs dismisses any such claims by his disciples or devotees as simple hagiography. This cavalier dismissal reveals the shallowness of his research. There are abundant references to his avatarhood in the files of the Ashram Archives Department where he worked – particularly available there are my extensive publications on this very subject. More pointedly, though having resided in India for several decades and having immersed himself in Sri Aurobindo’s writing on Indian culture, it appears Heehs failed to appreciate the role of the Vishnu Line of Ten and its singular place in Vedic civilisation.
The Mother answered many questions from disciples on symbols and their significance, as we find in her collected works. It was my direct experience that she withheld the gnostic significance based on the acolyte’s development, respecting the tradition of exoteric and esoteric levels. To provide an example, in reply to my query regarding the meaning of the number 9, since I was not satisfied with what had been explained to disciples, her explanation to me was one of the most important keys I received from her before she left this plane: she simply replied: The 9 is creation in matter. With this explanation, unrecorded elsewhere and which at the time seemed somewhat incomplete, when combined with the 0 provided the key to rest (0) and motion (9) of incomparable value in applying the Formula of Supermind. (See, The Tenth Day of Victory, Chapter 30.)
While identifying all the players involved in the appearance of the Avatar, this arrangement of 9/6/3 is applicable and made possible because of the number system and calendar, both of which are now universally adopted in this Aquarian Age. Its main attribute is precisely universalism, as in the Vedic call vasudhaiva kutumbakam = Earth is like a family. Similarly, the Mother’s symbol is applicable but with respect to the scale of 12 (the zodiac) and therefore to the months of the year. This application is carried over to sacred geometry and architecture via the chamber plan, consisting as it does of 12 walls among other elements, all of which are derived from her symbol. The Mother has confirmed this application in her discussion on the original plan by briefly stating that each wall is a month of the year; this is the Vedic methodology of correspondences.
The Mother’s symbol is placed centrally in the chamber. It lies horizontally in the centre, upholding the chamber’s Core, occupying 3 meters of the total 24m diameter. Given these profound applications I refer to the symbols as gnostic. They do come from a plane that until now has been tapped only sporadically but never in the impeccable manner of the Mother’s usage. However, there is far more contained in the Mother’s symbol to discover. This is achieved with the help of the following verses from the Rig Veda:

Twelve spokes, one wheel, navels three.
Who can comprehend this?
On it are placed together
Three hundred and sixty like pegs.
They shake not in the least.
(Rig Veda 1.154.48)

Here is the Mother’s own gnostic symbol. Every item enumerated by the Rishi finds its correspondence in her symbol, thereby establishing conclusively her Vedic credentials.


There are 12 ‘spokes’ and ‘navels three’ – by far the most significant element in the hymn because one does not easily understand how there can be ‘one wheel’ with three hubs or navels. In the Mother’s symbol above, this is made clear. Indeed, the three hubs/navels play an immensely important role in deciphering the coming of Vishnu’s Avatars, as I will explain in the following section of this series. The 360 ‘pegs’ are understood by the circle itself consisting of 360 degrees, as all circles do. Finally, the Rishi makes the most important declaration of all: They shake not in the least. This is completely contrary to the current Nirayana system of astrology, employed throughout India for temple timings and horoscopy, which does indeed SHAKE. Whereas, the Vedic system based on the tropical zodiac never ‘shakes’, resting as it does on the four unchanging pillars of equinoxes and solstices.
The Mother’s symbol presents the static, unmoving image of the Rishi’s verses. In the next section I will add the dynamism required to allow us to locate the appearances in time. This is the addition the third in the Line brings to the descent. I will use the several items presented in this section for the purpose of setting the Mother’s symbol in motion – that is, the Precessional Year of 25,920 Earth years, and the four Cardinal corners of the fourfold division of the circle of 12, based on the equinoxes and solstices. These combine on the backdrop of the Rig Veda verses quoted above to provide details of the Dasavataras, in a concise example of what Sri Aurobindo stated were the necessary conditions to recognise the Supramental Gnosis: ‘…The first condition of the Supermind is exactness, clearness and order both in the total and the details and their relations’. In the course of this study we have seen how nothing could have made sense of the revelations I am presenting without the explicit correspondences involving that total vision; or the seeing of the whole expressed diagrammatically as the circle; and then the ‘details’ which form the points on the circle’s periphery; and most important of all, the relations between all these elements, converging on a central point. We see this in the symbol of the Sun which Sri Aurobindo held to be the symbol of Supermind:. Mind alone cannot fathom a seeing of this nature. It is only possible with the advent of the truth-conscious Supermind.

[Link to Part IX]