Many ancient Lord Siva temples from Kedarnath till Rameswaram with Kaleshwaram, Sri Kalahasti, Ekambareswar at Kancheepuram, Thillai Nataraja Temple at Chidambaram are aligned in a geographic straight line around 79° E 41’54” Longitude
Siva has five temples built, representing the manifestation of Linga in 5 elements of nature named as the Pancha Bhoota – Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space.
The temple for water is in Thiruvanaikaval, fire is in Thiruvannamalai , air is in Kalahasti , earth is in Kanchipuram and The temple for space/sky is in Chidambaram.
Geographic Speciality : The five temples were built according to the yogic sciences, and are placed in a certain geographic alignment with each other, so that the entire region reverberated with the possibility they offered.
All above temples exist for thousands of years when no satellite technology was available to measure latitude and longitude of those places.
Thiruvanaikkaval is located at around 3 degrees to the south and exactly 1 degree to the west of the northern tip of this divine axis, while Thiruvannamalai is around midway (1.5 degree to the south and 0.5 degree to the west).
Infact, Kedarnath temple in himalayas is also almost on same longitude as of these temples.
Kaleshwaram temple (where Lord Siva and Yama are placed on same platform), and Ramanathaswamy temple at Rameswaram are also almost on same line.
How people have constructed temples seperated by thousands of miles (2383 km between Kedarnath and Rameswaram) on almost same longitude, remains a msytery.
Flickering lamps in the SriKalahasti temple shows the play of wind (respiration of Vayu Linga), Water spring in the innermost sanctum of the Tiruvanaikka temple shows the temple’s relationship to the element water, Annual Kartikai Deepam (giant lamp is lighted atop the Annamalai hill) shows the Annamalaiyaar’s manifestation as fire, Swayambhu lingam of sand at Kanchipuram signifies the Siva’s association with the earth while the formless space (Akasa) at Chidambaram shows the association of lord with formlessness or nothingness.
Lord Siva Temples in India on almost same Longitude
- Kedarnath – Kedarnath Temple (30.7352° N, 79.0669)
- Kaleshwaram – Kaleshwara Mukteeshwara swamy Temple (18.8110, 79.9067)
- Srikalahati – Srikalahasti Temple (13.749802, 79.698410)
- Kanchipuram – Ekambareswarar Temple (12.847604, 79.699798)
- Thiruvanaikaval – Jambukeswara Temple (10.853383, 78.705455)
- Tiruvannamalai – Annamalaiyar Temple (12.231942, 79.067694)
- Chidambaram – Nataraja Temple (11.399596, 79.693559)
- Rameswaram – Ramanathaswamy Temple(9.2881, 79.3174)
There must be many more temples between Kedarnath and Kaleshwaram, which might fall on same straight line.