Why the description of Bhū-mandala in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam does not mean the earth is flat
Some take the description of Bhū-Mandala in the 5th canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as meaning that the earth is flat, but it is a little more complicated than this.
You can receive new articles directly in your inbox. Subscription is free; donations are welcome.
Some take the description of Bhū-Mandala in the 5th canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as meaning that the earth is flat, but it is a little more complicated than this.
The first point is that nowhere in the sastras is it directly stated that the earth, as the planet where we walk, is flat. This idea is interpretative, and it actually contradicts a number of direct passages. In the Surya-siddhanta (1.59), for example, which was commented on by Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Thākura, it is mentioned:
yojanāni śatānyastau bhukarmo dviguṇānitu
tadvargato daśaguṇāt padam bhūparidhirbhavet“The earth’s diameter (bhukarna) is 1600 (2 x 800) yojanas. The square root of 10 times the square of earth’s diameter is earth’s circumference.”
There is no single fixed length for a yojana; different sources define it differently. In the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Prabhupāda takes the measure of the yojana as eight miles, which is consistent with the descriptions of the Puranas. It appears, however, that the Surya-siddhanta uses a different measure for the yojana, of about five miles. We can see that in this particular verse, the diameter of the earth is given as 1600 yojanas. If we take the yojana as five miles, we have 8000 miles, which is extremely close to the 7,918 miles for the average diameter of the earth in modern calculations. Similarly, the distances and circumference of the planets in the Surya-siddhanta closely match modern estimates when the yojana is taken as five miles. If we take it as slightly less, then the agreement becomes even closer. Similarly, the formula given for calculating the earth’s circumference (the square root of 10 times the square of the earth’s diameter) is very close to modern estimates.
The measure of the earth’s diameter and circumference clearly indicates the earth we live on as a globe, which is consistently confirmed in other passages of the Surya-siddhanta and of the Puranas.
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 5.21.9, for example, mentions:
yatrodeti tasya ha samāna-sūtra-nipāte nimlocati yatra kvacana syandenābhitapati tasya haiṣa samāna-sūtra-nipāte prasvāpayati tatra gataṁ na paśyanti ye taṁ samanupaśyeran
“People living in countries at points diametrically opposite to where the sun is first seen rising will see the sun setting, and if a straight line were drawn from a point where the sun is at midday, the people in countries at the opposite end of the line would be experiencing midnight. Similarly, if people residing where the sun is setting were to go to countries diametrically opposite, they would not see the sun in the same condition.”
This describes our practical experience on earth. When it is midday in Japan, it is midnight in Brazil, which is located on the diametrically opposite side of the globe. If the earth were flat, the sun would circle overhead, just as it does at the north pole.
We can also see that Prabhupāda consistently identifies the earth as a globe in his translations and commentaries of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. He even instructed his disciples to depict Varāhadeva lifting a spherical earth from the ocean to illustrate the third canto, where the pastime is described.
At the same time, however, there is the description of an extended earth, formed by the collective of all the planets that form the intermediate planetary system, called Bhū-Mandala. This is a gigantic flat structure of which the planet earth is part.
How can these two descriptions be reconciled? It is just like in modern cosmology, where the earth, as a planet, is spherical, but it is part of a flat structure: the solar system, which in turn is part of an also relatively flat structure: the milky way. Similarly, although the earth is spherical, continents and islands are not. Therefore, one’s concept of living in a flat or spherical structure, as well as any description created by him, can vary according to which level he is speaking about. One can say that he lives on a flat island, that is part of a spherical planet, that is part of a flat solar system, and the three statements will be simultaneously true. Such apparent contradictions are also found in the Vedic literature, where our cosmic abode is described as spherical or flat according to the context. The earth itself is described as Bhū-gola, which can be translated as “the earthly globe”, but it’s also stated that our planet is part of a greater structure called Jambūdvīpa, which in turn is part of an even greater structure called Bhū-Mandala.
Such structures cannot be observed from our gross dimension; therefore, when we look into the sky, we see only the vastness and darkness of space, but according to the scriptures, higher beings can see such subtle structures, and thus their view of reality is very different from ours. Their view of the universe is conveyed in books like the Śrīmad-Bhagavatam, and thus, such books of knowledge describe a reality that does not directly correspond to what we can observe using our human senses.
Another interesting point to be observed is how the view of the universe of different people from antiquity was similar. The Vedas explain that before the beginning of Kali-yuga, different peoples of antiquity were part of a global Vedic culture, and thus had access to the same knowledge. This explains how different groups had similar views of the universe, from the Chinese to the American Indians, including practically everyone in between. The Vedas explain that all these ancient civilizations were once connected with the Vedic culture. They thus had access to the same knowledge about the structure of Bhu-Mandala.
With the passage of time, however, the advanced concepts were forgotten, and these different civilizations became stuck with a flat earth concept, imagining our universe as some kind of flat island with the abode of the gods above, demons living below in subterranean abodes, and some kind of great mountain in the middle. We can see that over time this happened even in India, with the higher meanings of the model being forgotten over the centuries, until revived by the work of Śrīla Prabhupāda in his books.
The universe, as conceived by the ancient Chinese, Nordic people, Native American Indians, and Mayas
Back to Bhū-mandala, there is a part of the structure that is indeed flat: the top of Mount Sumeru. However, the inhabitants of this place perceive the orbit of the sun very differently from the other inhabitants of Bhū-mandala, who, just like us, see the sun rising and setting every day. This is described in SB 5.21.8:
tatratyānāṁ divasa-madhyaṅgata eva sadādityas tapati savyenācalaṁ dakṣiṇena karoti
“The living entities residing on Sumeru Mountain are always very warm, as at midday, because for them the sun is always overhead. Although the sun moves counterclockwise, facing the constellations, with Sumeru Mountain on its left, it also moves clockwise and appears to have the mountain on its right because it is influenced by the dakṣiṇāvarta wind.”
Different from us, the demigods living on top of the Sumeru Mountain always see the sun circling overhead and feel its warmth. For them, there is no night, just as expected from a flat structure. If the earth were flat, it would be the same for us. Similarly, the sun rises and sets in all the other inhabited parts of Bhū-mandala, showing that the whole structure is composed of many spherical planets that are somehow connected, just as concluded by Prabhupāda in his famous letter to Svarupa Damodhara from 1976.
There are thus two cosmological models described in the Vedas: the cosmos of our practical experience, centered around our small planet, and the higher-dimensional universe experienced by demigods and other higher beings, which is centered around Bhū-Mandala, the extended earth, of which our planet is part.
Bhū-Mandala is composed of seven concentric islands, separated by concentric oceans. We just studied the central island, Jambūdvīpa, and there are six other islands around it. Each of the seven islands is somehow formed by several different planets. Earth, or Bharata-varṣa, comprises the southern part of Jambūdvīpa, separated from the rest by the higher-dimensional Himalayas. Some interpret our planet as not even the whole Bharata-varṣa, but just part of it, since the dimensions given for Bharata-varṣa are much greater than our planet.
This is a publication for thoughtful readers who want to go deeper into Kṛṣṇa consciousness. I publish daily, and all posts are available to free subscribers. If you wish, you can also choose a paid subscription to support this work. By subscribing, you also gain access to the PDFs of all my books and drafts of books I’m working on.
If you would like to contribute further, you can find the donation links here.