The Sacred Measure of 432,000 – Part 2: The Measure of Unity & the Ancient Moorings of the Modern Mile

Andreas Cellarius Harmonia Macrocosmica (1660), Scenography of the Ptolemaic cosmography, showing signs of the zodiac and the solar system with world at centre. (Wikimedia Commons).

Links to Part 1, 3, 4, 5 & Addendum

To start off Part 2, I am repeating a few important excerpts from Part 1 in which Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet (Thea) referred to the 432,000 measure of the Sun’s radius as the “Measure of Unity”, so that they can be fresh in readers’ minds:

“[T]he 'Measure of Unity' … is the radius of the Sun, or the measurement which unites the central point to the outer circle or sphere. This is 432,000 miles (the figure of kaliyuga). The same figure is the number of ticks that a precision clock gives in 24 hours; there are 5 ticks or beats per second, which amounts to 432,000 in the 24 hours....”  ‒ Thea, The Gnostic Circle, p. 247 

“It can be understood how this figure [of the Kali Yuga] would be the key to the measure of Time since it is also the radius of the Sun. The Sun’s [432,000 mile] radius is the key of Truth in that it unites the outer circle of the disk (the Multiple) with the inner central core (the One). We could call this: ‘The Measure of Unity.’ It is precisely the Sun’s symbol, the point within the circle, that contains the Knowledge…showing the harmony between space and time and the evolutionary cycles of man on Earth which are determined by the unfolding and perfectioning of consciousness. The Rig-veda also appears to contain the same key to the measurement of Time based on the Sun of Truth because it is said to have 432,000 syllables."  ‒ Thea, The Gnostic Circle, pp. 61-62 [Text in brackets added for clarification] 

“The importance of the Sun's radius has been explained, the 432,000 miles that we have called 'The Measure of Unity', being as it is the Heart-beat of the whole System, the determinator of the System's time and therefore the key piece in the structure of matter of different degrees. … It has been pointed out that 432² = 186,624, or approximately the speed of light."  ‒ Thea, The Gnostic Circle, p. 272 [The last sentence here is Thea’s footnote to the preceding sentence.]

Over the past 18 years, in the course of presenting and discussing Thea’s teachings on the equivalence between the 432,000-mile radius of the Sun, the 432,000 Kali Yuga measure and the 432,000 measure of the Rig Veda, I have occasionally gotten criticisms from various quadrants which point out that the mile is a MODERN measure and that it is preposterous to imagine that the ANCIENTS attributed a 432,000-mile measure to the Sun’s radius. Recently one of Thea’s students reiterated this criticism with a different twist.

“Do you realise just how modern the measure of the mile is? Thea never claimed the Rishis knew about the modern measure of the Sun, because it is a modern measure - somewhat like the Gregorian calendar, it reveals a convergence in our own times, not necessarily some knowledge that existed in the distant past that needs to be recovered.”

 Here are a couple of recent comments from Indian men objecting along these same lines.

"A large part of Rigveda is lost. How can we tell the number of syllables? Mile is a modern unit unknown in vedic times."

"[M]iles was not the unit of measurement in vaidic times. So better not to connect anything with anything." [Bold emphasis added]

When I woke up from the February 2016 dream-vision demonstrating the equivalence between the 432,000ʺ (120° x 60′ x 60ʺ) measure of the vesica piscis and the 432,000-mile measure of the solar radius, I felt certain that this 1:1 equivalence between the divine measuring ray or rod (radius) and the sacred form (the vesica piscis) which it measures out in the circle was known in ancient times regardless of the modernity of the mile. It just felt like an ancient (if not eternal) correspondence based on the math and geometry of the 360° circle. I constructed the following image to demonstrate the equivalence between the solar radius, the measure of the vesica piscis, the Yugas and the Rig Veda.

It is entirely possible that my feeling of certainty regarding the ancientness of the 432,000-measure associated with the Sun’s radius, is totally off-base and it is just a supramental coincidence, divine conspiracy or multi-dimensional convergence that some clueless Europeans have given humanity a modern-measure that just-so-happens to render the Sun’s radius to be almost¹ precisely equivalent to the ancient measure of the Yugas, the Rig Veda and the radius and vesica piscis within the Circle. It is also entirely possible that the majority of modern-day humans simply do not have an accurate picture of how the modern mile came to be, just as the majority of modern-day humans do not have an accurate understanding of how the measure of the 12-month, 360° solar year (a.k.a. the Zodiac) came to be. Considering how rarely humans actually do have an accurate picture of our ancient history, and considering the tradition of secret societies and mystery schools which protected secrets of ancient wisdom and sacred measure from the masses, it is a very real possibility or likelihood that modern humanity is ignorant of the full story with regards to the origin of the modern mile. I will discuss the very convincing geometric-mathematical-cosmological support for this possibility in the next section.

What I want to emphasis first is this: the most important essence of what the dream-vision conveyed to me is that together, the radius and vesica piscis measure out precisely one-third (120° or 432,000ʺ) of the 360° circle, and that together this sacred pair lays out the eternal law (sanatana dharma) and basis of the triple knowledge (triple Veda/trayi vidya) of the Vedic Rishis. The vision gave me the sense that the Rishis were absolutely aware that the radius of the circle, is the source of and is equivalent to its own sacred measure (Divine Maya) or sacred form of the vesica pisces within the 360° circle/Sun symbol. In other words, the vision demonstrated that the measurer (the radius) and its sacred measure (the vesica piscis) are wedded as One, and that this inseparable pair would clarify much about the sanatana dharma and assist in its restoration in our world; and it quickly proceeded to do just that, as I have recorded in my book. 

It would be a shame for readers to get stuck on the denial that there could have been any ancient affiliation between the Sun’s radius and the sacred 432,000-measure of the Yugas and Vedas and thereby not actually make any attempt to see or understand exactly what this dream-vision of the vesica piscis proceeded to reveal about Vishnu’s Avatars (and the eternal law they preserve) and about the Rig Veda and post-Vedic mythology. Regardless of whether or not the Vedic Rishis applied a 432,000-measure to the radius of the Sun (or to the circle), the fact remains that the 432,000 figure of the solar radius (which Thea dubbed “Measure of Unity”) shown in conjunction with the 432,000ʺ (120° x 60′ x 60ʺ) measure of the vesica piscis in the circle has served a crucial role and purpose in the restoration and recovery of the Eternal Law of the Vedic Rishis.  

The Ancient Moorings of the Modern Mile

After I had the dream about the 432,000-mile measure of the Sun’s radius in conjunction with the 432,000” measure of the arc of the vesica piscis, I began to wonder if the mile was originally based upon the 360° measure of the Earth’s equatorial circumference, because that would make perfect Vedic sense. I saw that the equatorial circumference of the Earth is measured as 24,902 miles, and immediately wondered if this had anything to do with the measure of the Earth’s 360° Precession of the Equinoxes or “Great Year”, which has been measured as 24,000 years (12 Ages of 2,000 years each), as 26,000 years, and more precisely as 25,920 years (12 Ages of 2,160 years each).² 

While beginning to inquire into this issue, I first found that the nautical mile is indeed based upon the sexagesimal (60-base) division of the 360° circle as applied to the Earth’s circumference. This system of measuring the body of the Earth is credited to British mathematician Edmund Gunter, circa 1600. It defines the polar (or meridian) circumference of the Earth at the equator as 21,600 (360 x 60) miles, wherein each mile is approximately 1/60th or 1 minute of latitude.³ 

I later found that the ancient Greek measure of the mile actually did reflect an exact equivalence between the 25,920-year measure of the Precession of the Equinoxes and the Earth’s circumference. This equivalence is easy to see because the ancient Greek measure of the circumference of the Earth is 25,920 (Greek) miles. Each of these 25,920 (Greek) miles consisted of 5000 (Greek) feet, yielding the Earth’s circumference as 129,600,000 (Greek) feet (25,920 x 5000). 129,600,000 is an expansion by two decimal places of the full 1,296,000ʺ sexagesimal measure of the 360° Vedic Year/Circle (360° x 60′ x 60ʺ = 1,296,000ʺ).⁴ The ancient Greek 129,600,000-foot measure of the Earth circumference can also be calculated as: 360 x 360000 feet (360 x 60 x 60 x 100 feet). By this sexagesimal measure, one-third of the Earth’s circumference is 43,200,000 (Greek) feet (equivalent to 8640 miles), containing in itself the sacred measure of 432,000. The Greek foot is 1.01376 times the “modern” [English] foot. This ratio of Greek foot to modern foot closely mirrors the ratio of the (whole) number of days in the Earth’s year and the number of degrees in a circle: 365/360 = 1.013888… .

More recently, I came upon the research of John Michell and Robin Heath who co-published The Lost Science of Measuring the Earth: Discovering the Sacred Geometry of the Ancients in 2006, discussing the “geodetic basis of ancient measures”, including the Greek measures mentioned above. Heath concludes from his extensive research that “measurements of time were transduced [or transposed] into the spacial dimension … way back in prehistoric times” and that the modern inch, foot and mile are not modern measures after-all.⁵ Heath and Michell convincingly demonstrate that the modern mile has its moorings in ancient cosmological, geometric and geodetic gnosis.

In his “Lots of Circles, Very Little Knowledge” lecture, Heath demonstrates the astonishing fact that multiplying 365.24 (the precise measure of the days in Earth’s year) by 360,000 yields the circumference of the Earth in modern feet.   

365.25 days x 360,000 feet = 131,486,400 feet

131,486,400 feet is 24,902 miles, the equatorial circumference of the Earth in modern miles.

131,486,400 ft/5280 ft = 24,902.7272… miles

Heath calls this measure of the Earth, “almost prehistoric”. This is a profound display of ancient geodetic gnosis, hiding in plain sight in our “modern” measures. This kind of precision indicates that regardless of the disinformation regarding the mile that modern humanity has inherited and accepted, the mile is based on the ancient practice of transposing the measure of Time onto the Spacial dimensions of the Earth, and presumably onto the Moon and Sun as well. It also raises the real possibility that someone or some group of people involved in establishing the English measure of the mile in England in 1592 were conscious of carrying on and preserving the ancient tradition of geodetic gnosis.

In the same lecture, Heath shows an equation demonstrating the close mathematical relationship between the 24,883.2 measure of the Earth’s polar circumference (in modern miles) and the Greek 129,600,000 (360 x 360,000) measure of Earth’s circumference.  

24,883.2 miles  =  131,383,296 feet =  360 x 360,000 Greek feet x 1.01376  

It must be re-emphasized that the measure of the Earth’s circumference in Greek feet is based not only upon the 360° measure of the year, but also on the 25,920-year measure of the Great Year (Precessional Cycle). The Time measure of 25,920 years was transposed onto the 25,920-mile measure of the Earth’s circumference. 

25,920 miles = 25,920 miles x 5000 feet = 129,600,000 feet = 360 x 360,000 feet

In the case of the so-called modern foot and mile, it is the Time measure of 365.24 days (the Solar Year) that is transposed onto the measure of the Earth’s circumference. 

24,902 miles = 24,920 miles x 5280 feet ≈ 131,486,400 feet = 365.24 x 360,000 feet⁶   

The English mile in use today is recognized as being based on Roman mile which, in turn, is said to be the distance spanned by 1,000 human paces (5,000 Roman feet), regardless of the fact that human paces naturally vary and are in no way a reliable or precise measure of distance or space. There is at least some acknowledgement that the 5,000 feet of the Roman mile was based upon the Greek system of measure, but there is no widespread acknowledgement or understanding of the geodetic gnosis upon which the Greek system is based. The difference between the 5,000 feet of the Roman mile and the 5,280-foot modern mile is solely attributed to the wish of the English Parliament in 1592 to establish the mile as 8 furlongs (8 x 660 feet = 5280 feet). The furlong is said to be calculated via the distance oxen could plow in a day (which again cannot be considered a reliable or precise standard of measure). The fact that the number of inches in a furlong is equivalent to the measure of the Earth’s diameter in miles is somehow left out of this story  (660 ft x 12 inches = 7,920 inches). Thanks to this inherited disinformation, the many coincidences concerning modern measures and ancient measures have simply been chalked up to randomness or spiritual synchronicity, not begging any further investigation. I am grateful there are people such as John Mitchell and Robin Heath who are educating modern humanity on this important subject.

Thea wrote that just as the 12-month 360° measure of the Solar Year was known in Vedic times, so was the Precession of the Equinoxes (the Great Year) with its 12 Astrological Ages. She also wrote that this is the cycle upon which the Hindu Yugas are based. If Thea’s understanding of this is accurate (which I believe it is), it is not at all far-fetched to think that the Vedic Rishis applied their gnosis of the 360° circle of Time, and their gnosis of the Great Year to the spacial dimension of the Earth. This gnostic linkage of the measure (and the dimensions) of Time and Space is indeed the basis of the Greek mile. Given the research of Mitchell and Heath, it is entirely reasonable to wonder if the Greek geodetic-measure of the mile and foot was really a Greek invention or is it just as old as the Vedic (or pre-Vedic ancient) tradition of measuring out the Earth’s Solar Year and Great Year in terms of 12-months (ages) and 360 degrees.

In my mind at least, Mitchell and Hearth’s research gives a good sense of how the modern mile has ended up being a sacred unit of measure, harmonized with the ancient math and geometry of the 12-month, 360° Vedic Year and Great Year with the approximate measurements of the Earth’s radius/diameter (3960/7920 miles), the Moon’s radius/diameter (1080/2160 miles) and the Sun's radius/diameter (432,000/864,000 miles). For readers who are unaware of how these mile-based measures harmonize with the ancient 360° measure of the Vedic Year, take out a calculator and divide these measures by 360. You will find that 360 happens to be a factor of each.

It may not be provable that the Vedic Rishis applied their Time (temporal) gnosis to the spatial dimensions of the Earth’s geometry, but considering what I have learned of the Vedic gnosis and Vedic “laws of equivalence” from Thea, it seems likely to me that ancient tradition of transposing the 360° measure of Time to the 360° measure of the Earth’s circumference did extend back to the gnosis of the Vedic Rishis. In her work, Thea presented the unified vision of Time and Space of the Vedic Rishis in terms of what she called the “Gnostic Circle” in which the measure of Time and the Space are seen to be One inseparable whole. When initiated into this vision, it becomes entirely apparent that ALL is connected in Space and Time (Past, Present and Future) regardless of incapacities of the egoic-mental human consciousness to recognize how or why. It also becomes entirely apparent that the progressive goal of Yoga (the Vedic Yajna) is to increasingly embody this unity consciousness (or supramental truth-consciousness as Sri Aurobindo called it) in manifestation, within the unified dimensions of Time and Space, not to transcend or to be “liberated” from material-temporal existence as many believe.

Thea discussed this spiritual goal of transcendence in Eastern religions, mirrored by the goal of ascending into heaven in Judeo-Christian religions, as a natural biproduct of the darkened egoic-mental consciousness (the ruling consciousness of the Age of Pisces, 234 BCE – 1926 CE) which projects a stark division between Matter and Spirit. Sri Aurobindo called this the “revolt of Spirit against Matter that for two thousand years, since Buddhism disturbed the balance of the old Aryan world, has dominated increasingly the Indian mind.”⁷ It is thanks to this spiritual trend (or darkened evolutionary stage of consciousness) that the Feminine principle of Creation and Manifestation has been largely dismissed as an illusion that needs to be discarded or transcended (i.e. escaped), entirely distorting the Vedic goal of Divine manifestation, and entirely distorting the Vedic understanding of the Divine Feminine principle of Maya. The Rishis understood Maya as the creative power of the Divine, shaping and measuring out forms of the “vast and illimitable Truth of infinite existence”.⁸ It is also thanks to this mentally perceived and reinforced false split between Spirit and Matter that the ancient tradition of uniting the sacred measures (the Divine Maya) of Time and Space has been almost completely erased from our collective consciousness. It is fitting and important that this largely forgotten ancient sacred tradition is now being exposed and recovered in our Age of Aquarius (1926 – 4086 CE according to Thea).

***

Part Three: The Sexagesimal Measure of the 360° Circle, addresses the history and sacred geometry of the sexagesimal measure of the Circle and Sphere of Time and Space and address the question: “How can we tell the number of syllables [due to lost portions of the Rig Veda]?” In Parts 4, 5 & 6, I will discuss the sacred number of 432 in relation to the Sacred Word/Syllable, Vishnu’s three steps (trivikrama) across the entire universe, and the Speed of Light.

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[On 1 December 2020 SGD YouTube channel posted a fascinating video entitled "Time Keepers: Pendulums, Seconds, Cubits, Metres & Ancient Architecture" which discusses the relationship between ancient (and now modern) measures and TIME, touching upon the equivalence between the Mohenjodaro (Indus Valley) Foot and the Saxon/Northern Foot, three of which comprise the Saxon yard, closely equivalent to the modern Meter (according to the video).] 

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Endnotes:
¹ The Sun’s full measure in miles is 432,170. It is commonly rounded down to 432,000.
² The 12 Ages of the Precessional cycle or Great Year are equivalent to the 12 Months of the Zodiac. It is notable that the word “month” is etymologically and cosmologically connected to the Moon, and that the diameter of the Moon in miles is 2160, equivalent to the number of years in one “Month” or Age of the Great Year. Just how long humans have been tracking ages within this 25,920-year cycle is unknown.
³ “Since the earth is not a perfect sphere but is an oblate spheroid with slightly flattened poles, a minute of latitude is not constant, but about 1861 metres at the poles and 1843 metres at the Equator”, “Nautical mile”, Wikipedia.
⁴ Robin Heath, John Michell, The Lost Science of Measuring the Earth: Discovering the Sacred Geometry of the Ancients, Adventures Unlimited Press, 2006, p. 80.
⁵ Robin Heath: Lots of Circles, Very Little Knowledge (lecture), You Tube.
⁶ I used the ≈ (approximate) sign in this equation because I wanted to show the geodetic sense of the Greek and modern measures without the remainder throwing off the columns. The full equation is: 24,902.7372 miles = 24,902.7372 miles x 5280 feet = 131486,000 feet = 365.24 x 360,000 feet.
⁷ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, CWSA, Vols. 21-22, p. 26. More of this quote is found in my post, “The Revolt of Spirit Against Matter: A Two-Thousand-Year-Old Negation Rooted in Buddhism”.
⁸ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, CWSA Vols. 21-21, p.123.