2 Sahagun, A History of Ancient Mexico (transl. F. R. Bandelier, 1932), p. 25.
3 H. H. Bancroft, The Native Races of the Pacific States (1874-1876), III, 302.
4 Ibid., p. 301.
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The conflict between Venus and Mars was also symbolized in religious ceremonies of the ancient Mexicans. In one of these ceremonies the priest of Quetzal-cohuatl shot an arrow into an effigy of Huitzilo-pochtli, which penetrated the god, who was then considered dead.5 This appears to have been a symbolic repetition of the electrical discharge that Venus ejected toward Mars.
But the Aztecs would not concede the death of Mars, the bellicose destroyer of towns, the god of sword and pestilence, and carried on their wars against the Toltecs, the people who looked to the planet Venus. These wars between the Toltecs and the Aztecs must have taken place earlier than is generally supposed; they might have occurred before the present era, when there was rivalry between the peoples devoted to Venus and those devoted to Mars, and when the memory of the cosmic conflict was still vivid.
Tao
What is it that we call the Tao? There is the Tao, or Way of Heaven; and there is the Tao, or Way of Man.
—KWANG-TZE
Planets of the solar system were disturbed by the contacts of Venus, Mars, and the earth. We have already referred to the annals of the Bamboo Books, where it is written that in the tenth year of the Emperor Kwei, the eighteenth monarch since Yahou, "the five planets went out of their courses. In the night, stars fell like rain. The earth shook."J The disturbances in the family of planets were caused by collisions between Venus and Mars. The battles of two stars appearing as bright as suns are mentioned in another Chinese chronicle as having occurred in the days of the same Emperor Kwei (Koei-Kie):
"At this time the two suns were seen to battle in the sky. The five
6 Sahagun, Historia general de las cosas de la Nueva Espana, III, Chap. I, Sec. 2. 1 James Legge (ed), The Chinese Classics, III, Pt. 1, 125.
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planets were agitated by unusual movements. A part of Mount Tai-chan fell down." 2
The two battling stars are recognized by us as Venus and Mars. In the language of Eratosthenes, the Alexandrian librarian of the third century before this era: "In the third place is the star [stella]
robin-bobin
of Mars. ... It was pursued by the star [sidus] Venus; then Venus took hold of him and inflamed him with an ardent passion." 3
In an astronomical chart dating from the Middle Ages (1193), used in the education of emperors and known as the Soochow Astronomical Chart,4 it is asserted on the authority of the ancients that it happened that planets went off their courses. It is said that once Venus ran far off the zodiac and attacked the "Wolf-Star." A change in the course of the planets was regarded as a sign of heavenly wrath, since it occurred when the emperor or his ministers sinned.
In the old Chinese cosmology "Earth is represented as a body suspended in air, moving eastward,"5 and thus was understood as one of the planets.
The following passage from the Taoist text of Wen-Tze 6 contains a description of calamities which, as we have found, belong together:
"When the sky, hostile to living beings, wishes to destroy them, it burns them; the sun and the moon lose their form and are eclipsed; the five planets leave their paths; the four seasons encroach one upon another; daylight is obscured; glowing mountains collapse; rivers are dried up; it thunders then in winter, hoarfrost falls in summer; the atmosphere is thick and human beings are choked; the state perishes; the aspect and the order of the sky are altered; the customs of the age are disturbed [thrown into disorder] ... all living beings harass one another."
Hoei-nan-tze, a Taoist author of the third century of this era, speaks of the sun and the earth leaving their paths; he transmits the tradi-2L. Wieger, Textes historiques (2nd ed., 1922-1923), I, 50.
3 Eratosthenes, ed. Robert, p. 195.
4 The Soochow Astronomical Chart (transl. and ed. by Rufus and Hsing-chih tien).
5 J. C. Ferguson, Chinese Mythology (1928), p. 29.
6 Wen-Tze in Textes Tadistes, transl. C. de Harlez (1891).
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tion that "if the five planets err on their routes," the State and the provinces are overcome by a flood.7
Taoism is the dominant religion of China. "The term Tao originally meant the revolution of the way of the heavens about the earth. This movement of the heavens was regarded as the cause of the phenomena on earth. The Tao was located about the celestial pole which was considered to be the seat of power because all revolves about it. In the course of time Tao was viewed as the universal cosmic energy behind the visible order of nature." 8
Yuddha
In an old textbook on Hindu astronomy, the Surya-Siddhanta, there is a chapter, "Of planetary conjunctions." Modern astronomy knows only one kind of conjunction between planets, when one planet (or sun) stands between the earth and another planet (differentiated only as superior and inferior conjunction and opposition). But ancient Hindu astronomy distinguished between many different conjunctions, translated as follows: samyoga (conjunction), sama-gama (coming together), yoga (junction), melaka (uniting), yuti (union), yuddha (encounter, in the meaning of conflict, fight).1
The first paragraph of this chapter, "Of planetary conjunctions," of the Surya-Siddhanta tells us that between planets there occur encounters in battle (yuddha) and simple conjunction (samyoga samagama). The force of the planets, which manifests itself in conjunctions, is called hala. A planet can be vanquished (jita) in an "apasvya encounter," struck down (vidhvasta), utterly vanquished (vijita). A powerful planet is called balin, and the victor-planet in an encounter, jayin. "Venus is generally victor."
To the last sentence the translator of Surya-Siddhanta wrote: "In this passage we quit the proper domain of astronomy, and trench upon that of astrology." Aside from the introductory lines in which the work is presented as a revelation of the sun (a common introduc-7 Hoei-nan-tze in Textes Taoistes.
8 L. Hodous, "Taoism," Encyclopaedia Britannica, 14th ed. 1 Surya-Siddhanta, Chap. VII (transl. Burgess).
robin-bobin
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tion in many astronomical works of the Hindus), it is written in very sober terms. It makes use of square roots and geometrical figures, and speaks in algebraic terms; every sentence of the work is in scientific language, very precious, indeed.2
This manual of the Surya contains also the correct notion of the earth as a "sphere" or "globe in the ether," showing that the Hindus of early times knew that the earth is one of the planets, though they thought it to be situated in the center of the universe.3 Aryabhatta held the opinion that the earth revolves on its axis.4 Like the author of the Book of Job, who wrote that the earth hangs "upon nothing" (26 : 7), the Surya knew that "above" and "beneath" are only relative:
"And everywhere upon the globe of the earth, men think their own place to be uppermost—but since it is a globe in the ether, where should there be an upper, or where an under side of it?" 5
The strange chapter of Surya-Siddhanta dealing with the conjunctions of planets and with their conflicts when in close proximity made modern scholars think that this portion did not have the scientific value of the rest of the work, and was a product of astrological invention, or even an interpolation. We know now that this chapter has equal scientific value with other chapters of the work and that encounters between planets actually took place a number of times in the solar system.
In Hindu astronomy a junction of the planets is called yoga [yuga]. Very revealing is the fact that the world ages are also called yogas, planetary conjunctions 6 (or more precisely, junctions).