Did the Hanuman Chalisa really predict the distance between the Earth and sun? (Critical analysis)

 

I'm sure we've all heard Hindus claiming how 'scientifically' superior their religion is, plus we've heard several examples from them as well, which they put out as proof for their claims. One of the more famous ones is the claim that the Hanuman Chalisa (written by Tulsidas in the 16th century) accurately predicts the distance between Earth and sun.

This claim comes from the following verse -

"Yuga-sahastra-yojana para bhanu leelyo tahi madhura phala janu"

It implies that Hanuman jumped a distance of 'yuga sahastra yojana' at the Sun, thinking it to be a sweet fruit.

The calculations made are -

1 Yug = 12000 years Sahastra = 1000 Yojana = 8 miles = 12.8 kilometres.

So yug X sahastra X yojana = 12000 X 1000 X 12.8 = 153600000

Or 153.6 million km.

This is close to the actual figure of 149.6 million calculated by NASA.

This appears to be some kind of miracle, but don't get fooled so easily.

First of all we must decide the units. Every quantity has a unit. So this figure must have one too.

Unit for yug is years, for yojana it's km and sahastra has no unit whatsoever (it's simply '1000', like 1000 books, 1000 apples, etc).

So what's the unit? Years kilometres? There is no such unit as 'years kilometres'. It can be kilometres per year, but that has a completely different meaning. So technically this calculation is wrong because it's end product has a weird invalid unit.

Let's ignore the above.

What's 1 Yug? According to a Hindu website -

Yuga (युग).—The intervening time between one yuga-sandhyapūrva and sandhyāṃśa; four in number; Kṛta, Treta, Dvāpara and Kali. The extent is of 12,000 years of celestial measure; the duration of the yugas includes sandhya, 12,000 divine years, 1,000 caturyugas make a day of Brahmā.

Did you see that? 1 yug is 12000 celestial years, not human years. According to other Hindu sources, 1 chatur yug is 4.32 million human years (Satya, Treta, Dwapar and Kali yug combined makes 1 chatur yug).

Hindus take the 12000 divine years and ignore the 4.32 million human years. That's really weird.

Let's ignore that as well.

What is 1 yojana?

The famous astronomer Aryabhatta calculated the circumference of the Earth as 4967 yojanas and the diameter as 1581 1/24 yojanas. His calculations take 1 yojana as 5 miles, not the 8 that the Hindus take in reference to this verse.

Ignoring this, we can refer to the Ramayana for the measurement of 1 yojana. The Ramayana says that the measurements of the 'Ram Setu' is 100 yojanas in length. The length of Adam's Bridge (or 'Ram Setu') is around 35 km. So 1 yojana is 0.35 km.

Then again we can refer to the Vishnu Purana for help. It states 1 gavyuti is the distance to which a cow's calling can be heard and it's approximately 3.7 km. 4 gavyutis is 1 yojana. 4 x 3.7 = 14.8 km. It is NOT 12.8 but 14.8 km. Using 14.8 km gives a value of 177.6 million km which is not even CLOSE to the actual figure.

Finally it's not as if other astronomers hadn't tried to calculate the distance. Greek astronomer Eratosthenes (276-194 BC) calculated the distance between 126 million to 168 million km. Remember this was in BC, long before the Hanuman Chalisa was written in the 16th century AD. His calculation is still far more accurate than the Chalisa one.

It's obvious that Hindus have been cherrypicking numbers to show off their 'ancient scientific prowess'. A quick analysis is enough to refute all their claims. Unfortunately many people have been deluded by them.

This myth is officially #Debunked.

Thanks for reading.