[Advaita-l] loka-aloka mountain

[Shrinivas Gadkari]

Namaste, 

Some more interesting angles related to the center of our Galaxy and 
possible references to it in Gita/ purANa-s. 

- As seen the Earth, the galactic center is located near the dhanu 
  rASi (the Sagittarius constellation). 
- Galactic center corresponds to the heart of shishumAra chakra which the 
  residence of Narayana who upholds the shisumAra chakra (Vishnu Purana 2.9.4). 
  (sishumAra chakra is our galaxy. Note that the center of the Galaxy 
  actually holds the Galaxy together. Also note the word chakra which
  indicates clear knowledge of the actual structure of our Galaxy though
  it does not look like a chakra from the Earth.)
- The month of Margashirha corresponds to the period when Sun enters into 
  dhanu rASi - that is when sun as seen from the Earth is in the region 
  of the Galactic center. This month is singled out in Gita (10.35). 
  This is very interesting - I have always wondered what is so special 
  about the month of Margashirha. 
- The most interesting: Gita 15.3-6 notes that the parama dhAma of 
  Adya puruSa is not illumined by the sun (stars), moon (reflected 
  light of stars) or even fire (not sure how to interpret this here). 
  If this parama dhAma is actually within the event horizon of the 
  galactic black hole that seems reasonable. 

Regards, 
Shrinivas Gadkari 


--------------------------------------------
Namaste, 

Putting together information collected from different sources, and 
my own contemplation on 7 dvIpa-s mentioned in puraNa-s. 

Primary reference source is bhAgavatam Book 5. 

- Description of jAmbu dvIpa alone can be (somewhat) correlated 
with the Geography of earth. So let us go ahead and conjecture 
that jAmbu dvIpa is a term used to denote "all land" on earth. 
Then it makes sense to say that jAmbu dvIpa is surrounded by 
salt water ocean. 
- Regarding other dvIpa-s, we have two options, (a) discard this as 
fantasy, or (b) be open to the possibility that these are earth-like 
planets somewhere in the universe. 
- Let us consider option (b), with further assumption that these are 
earth-like planets within out own galaxy. 
- Then the term dvIpa will mean land on that particular planet, and 
samudra is the ocean on that planet. 
- In general "meru" mountain represents the axis of a system 
- in our body "meru" is the central axis corresponding to spinal column. 
- For earth "meru" is the axis of rotation 
- For Solar system, "meru" is the axis of revolution of planets around the sun. 
- For our Galaxy, "meru" is the axis passing through the center of our 
  Galaxy, around with all stars (along with their planets) revolve. 
- Now can we assume that the ordering of the dvIpa-s from jAmbu to puSkara 
  is representative of their location within our galaxy? In my opinion - yes. 
  The clue for this is the loka-aloka mountain. 
  The ordering of dvIpa-s is: jAmbu-plakSa-shAmali-kusha-shaka-puSkara-lokAloka 
- Now what may be loka-aloka mountain? 
- Bhagavatam 5.20.35 says that : this mountain has mirror like appearance, and 
  "any object dropped into this cannot be retrieved". 
- To me this seems like an apt description of the "event horizon" of the      
  massive block hole at the center of our Galaxy. 
- So the ordering is: jAmbu dvIpa is farthest from Galactic center and puSkara 
  dvIpa is the closest. 
- Brahma loka may either be puSkara dvIpa itself or near it. Bhagavatam 
  mentions that on puSkara dvIpa, the inhabitants worship god brahmA. We 
  know that time flows very slowly in brahma loka. This makes perfect sense 
  if brahma loka is located very close to the event horizon of the galactic 
  black hole - the lokAloka mountain. 

Hari Om. 

Regards, 
Shrinivas Gadkari