YUGA Calculation
Srinivas Prasad
prasad at NSRC.NUS.SG
Wed Oct 1 20:19:26 CDT 1997
From: jai at mantra.com (Dr. Jai Maharaj)
As far as the length and compostition of the ages is concerned, I
have created the following compilation based on the verses in the
ancient Soory(a) Siddhant(a), or "Sun Principles":
% % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % %
% COMPOSITION OF A CHATURYUG (Quadruple) AGE %
% From the same source as the principle of Karm: %
% %
% Divine Years Solar Years %
% %
% Dawn 400 144,000 %
% Krt Yug 4,000 1,440,000 %
% Twilight 400 _____ 144,000 _________ %
% Total Krt Yug Duration 4,800 1,728,000 %
% %
% Dawn 300 108,000 %
% Tret Yug 3,000 1,080,000 %
% Twilight 300 _____ 108,000 _________ %
% Total Tret Yug Duration 3,600 1,296,000 %
% %
% Dawn 200 72,000 %
% Dwapar Yug 2,000 720,000 %
% Twilight 200 _____ 72,000 _______ %
% Total Dwapar Yug Duration 2,400 864,000 %
% %
% Dawn 100 36,000 %
% Kali Yug 1,000 360,000 %
% Twilight 100 _____ 36,000 _______ %
% Total Kali Yug Duration 1,200 432,000 %
% ====== ========= %
% Total Duration of a Chaturyug 12,000 4,320,000 %
% %
% Further, 1 Manvantar = 71 Chatryug + 1 Krt Yug %
% = (71 x 4320000) + 1728000 %
% = 308,448,000 Solar Years %
% And, %
% 1 Kalp = 14 Manvantar + 1 Krt Yug %
% = (14 x 308448000) + 1728000 %
% = 4,320,000,000 Solar Years %
% % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % % %
>From Wed Oct 1 19:53:49 1997
Message-Id: <WED.1.OCT.1997.195349.0400.>
Date: Wed, 1 Oct 1997 19:53:49 -0400
Reply-To: chandran at tidalwave.net
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Ram Chandran <chandran at TIDALWAVE.NET>
Organization: Home Personal Account
Subject: Re: Vedas
Comments: To: Advaita List <Advaita-L at tamu.edu>
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At 05:47 PM 30/09/97 -0800, Allan Curry wrote:
>Namaste,
>
>How do we know when the vedas are to be read literally and when they are to
>be interpreted metaphorically? Do we have a choice at all, or must the
>vedas be accepted or rejected (in their totality) as being the *literal*
>truth? If the vedas are not *always* literally true then what criterion
>enables us to know when the vedas are literally true and when they suggest
>a merely "poetical" truth? How could there be any other such criterion
>when the vedas themselves are the touchstone we must use to assess all
>other truth claims? Are we not forced to accept the vedas as being
>*literally* true or abandon the claim the vedas are the touchstone which
>can correctly assess all other truth claims?
>
>I hope the orthodox list members can clear this up for me...
>thanks,
>-Allan Curry
Namaste:
First, I want to thank Vidyasankar for a thoughtful reply to the
questions. Second, I agree with Martin that you have brilliantly
constructed your questions on the Truth of Vedas. Third, the sequences
of your questions give the impression to reader like me that you have
serious doubts on the validity of Vedas. Finally, I do not qualify
myself to belong to any orthodox group. If you imply orthodox by true
believers of Vedas, they respect and live by the Vedas and they do not
like to conduct and participate in intellectual debates. Some orthodox
Hindus may not feel comfortable to look and answer few of your blunt
questions.
Hindu scriptures in general and Vedas in particular do not make
false claims. The purpose of Vedas is to guide the seekers of Truth to
understand the limitations of human intellect. The literal meaning of
"Vedas" is knowledge. Sometimes there is confusion on the point of
reference - whether the reference is attributed to the scriptures or
knowledge. For example, Vedas have no beginning or end literally means
that knowledge has no beginning or end! We the human beings have our
limitation, "knowledge" to understand the revelations of God. Vedas
describe "Infinite Truth." To understand infinite Truth, we need
infinite knowledge. Until we attain infinite knowledge, we can't fully
grasp Vedas! The sages of Upanishads have paraphrased this truth in the
quotation: "More we know, we realize, more we don't know!" The question
of acceptance or rejection of Vedas is irrelevant and logically
inappropriate. If I say that I accept the Vedas, I undermine (from
infinite to finite) the TRUTH. I can't reject Vedas until I know the
TRUTH. There is no logical conclusion to this RIDDLE.
Alternatively we can BELIEVE that Vedas represent the TRUTH and
respect and live by the Vedas. Vidyasankar has beautifully answered how
the acceptance varies according to different beliefs. Vedas do not force
anyone to accept without ENQUIRY and CONTEMPLATION. If at all, Vedas
only help us to avoid jumping into conclusions without facts!
Ram Chandran
>From Wed Oct 1 19:57:16 1997
Message-Id: <WED.1.OCT.1997.195716.0400.>
Date: Wed, 1 Oct 1997 19:57:16 -0400
Reply-To: chandran at tidalwave.net
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Ram Chandran <chandran at TIDALWAVE.NET>
Organization: Home Personal Account
Subject: The Key to Happiness
Comments: To: Advaita List <Advaita-L at tamu.edu>
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THE KEY TO HAPPINESS
Happiness is the universal aim of life. Happiness depends on
the modes that dominate our nature. When we were kids, we thought that
we could buy happiness in the toy stores. Now we are grown up kids and
we seek wealth, power and pride to get our happiness. We focus our
attention on illusionary happiness through material objects. The more
illusionary happiness we get, we are eager to venture for more!
Nevertheless, at the end, we get to a decisive point and reach the dead
end street of pain and misery. We fall into this vicious endless loop
of happiness and disappointment and forget our true nature!
Our real problem is that we don't know what is true happiness? True
happiness is not a result from human action. Results are transitory
where as happiness is omnipresent and no one can create or destroy
happiness. True happiness is an experience of the realization of SELF.
True happiness is free from sorrows and disappointments! The key to real
happiness is within and it is futile to look for the key outside. True
happiness requires that we see our-self in all beings and all beings in
our-self. The key to true happiness is to keep positive thoughts within
and throw the negatives for ever. Pain will become an illusion and
disappear and eternal joy and freedom will emerge and sustain.
Ego is the major hindrance to true happiness and ego brings misery
and depression. We can liberate ourselves from unpleasantness and
misery by discarding EGO! Everyone will love to kick the soccer ball
full of AIR. No one will like to kick the ball when the soccer ball has
no AIR. When we abandon our ego, no one will kick and insult! Colton
(1780-1832) points out, "There is this difference between happiness and
wisdom that he that thinks himself the happiest man really is so; but he
that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool."
True happiness implies peace. Peace requires freedom from
conflicts
and conflict arises with plurality. Subjective beliefs and notions of
the world cause plurality around us. Such notions will unplug our mouth
and plug our ears! We start our conversation by opening our mouth and
closing our ears. Such conversations inevitably lead into intense
arguments. The moment prejudice gets in, patience evaporates, peace
gets disturbed and conflict takes over! We can remove plurality by
freeing our mind from prejudiced notions. The key to true happiness is
to eliminate subjective beliefs and perceptions on others. Happiness
will enter when we open our eyes, ears and heart.
True happiness can sustain when we accept the world as it is. We
can
enjoy the world and realize true happiness if we prepare to change our
attitude. Mahatma Gandhi once said that we are the only change that we
wish to see in the world. The key to true happiness always comes when we
change our attitude to life. We can save our-self from many hard falls
by refraining from jumping to conclusions. Anyone who thinks he knows
all the answers, isn't quite up-to-date on questions. A minute of
keeping our mouth closed is worth an hour of explanation. The problem
that most of us face is not the presence of mind, but only the absence
of thought. Ann Landers points out that no one is ever completely
worthless; they can always serve as a bad example. Goethe (1749-1832)
once said: "We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves."
The Upanishad (Vedic philosophical text) outlines the following
beautiful path for our daily life: "Life is a bridge, enjoy while
crossing but don't try to build a castle on it." Nathaniel Hawthorne
(1804-1864) explains happiness in this quotation: "Happiness is as a
butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but when we
sit quietly, may alight upon us." The quotation from Fontanelle
(1657-1757) is an appropriate conclusion - "The greatest obstacle to
happiness is to expect too much happiness."
>From Wed Oct 1 19:59:43 1997
Message-Id: <WED.1.OCT.1997.195943.0400.>
Date: Wed, 1 Oct 1997 19:59:43 -0400
Reply-To: chandran at tidalwave.net
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Ram Chandran <chandran at TIDALWAVE.NET>
Organization: Home Personal Account
Subject: Positive Attitude
Comments: To: Advaita List <Advaita-L at tamu.edu>
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What is the right path of our life? The seers who wrote the Upanishads
have this excellent answer: " Life is a bridge; enjoy while crossing it;
but don't build a castle on it." The creator of human life gave the
positive mental attitude as a gift to the new born child. This gift has
helped the child to accept everything from everybody. We better
remember and learn from the child to accept life, the gift of God. Let
us also remember not to teach our bad habits to the children! With
positive mental attitude, we can accept the realities of life without
resistance and fear. We become the witness of our own life and can
probably accept joy, sorrow, good, bad, tall, short, beauty, ugly,
light, dark, past, present and future. We can stop asking instantaneous
explanations for everything. The root cause of all our questions is our
ego and it seeds doubts in our mind. Consequently, we do not want to
accept the world as it is and we crave for the world to change! Positive
mental attitude will help us to change our life without forcing others
to change. Realities can be sometimes painful, but we can always avoid
unnecessary sufferings! Every religion wants to help people to remove
negative tendencies. Religions do play an important role to cope up with
uncertainties and unforeseen events in everyone's life. Modern
management techniques do stress the importance of positive mental
attitude and managers get training accordingly. Positive mental
attitude was responsible for the success of leaders in science,
politics, religion, industry, and sport.
The Upanishads classify the human mind into pure and impure.
Persons
who sustain pure mind can maintain positive mental attitude. Ego,
hatred and jealousy germinate when the mind gets corrupted. The person
who hates suffers more than the hated entity! Positive mental attitude
is obviously a win-win choice for everyone. The following article will
illustrate the benefits of keeping a positive mental attitude. I hope
that this article will help us to take control of events and prevent the
events to take control of our life!
POSITIVE ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING ( One of my friends has sent this
article and I don't know the author's name)
Jerry was the kind of guy you love to hate. He was always in a
good
mood and always had something positive to say. When someone would ask
him how he was doing, he would reply, "If I were any better, I would be
twins!" He was a unique manager because he had several waiters who
had followed him around from restaurant to restaurant. The reason the
waiters followed Jerry was because of his attitude. He was a natural
motivator. If an employee was having a bad day, Jerry was there telling
the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.
Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up
to
Jerry and asked him, "I don't get it! You can't be a positive person
all of the time. How do you do it?" Jerry replied, "Each morning I
wake up and say to myself, Jerry, you have two choices today. You can
choose to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in a bad mood.' I
choose to be in a good mood. Each time something bad happens, I can
choose to be a victim or I can choose to learn from it. I choose to
learn from it. Every time someone comes to me complaining, I can choose
to accept their complaining or I can point out the positive side of
life. I choose the positive side of life." "Yeah, right, it's not
that easy," I protested. "Yes it is," Jerry said. "Life is all about
choices. When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice.
You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people will
affect your mood. You choose to be in a good or bad mood.
The bottom line: It's your choice how you live life." I
reflected on
what Jerry said. Soon thereafter, I left the restaurant industry to
start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought about him
when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it. Several
years later, I heard that Jerry did something you are never supposed to
do in a restaurant business: he left the back door open one morning
and was held up at gunpoint by three armed robbers. While trying to
open the safe, his hand, shaking from nervousness, slipped off the
combination. The robbers panicked and shot him. Luckily, Jerry was
found relatively quickly and rushed to the local trauma center. After
18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, Jerry was released
from the hospital with fragments of the bullets still in his body.
I saw Jerry about six months after the accident. When I asked
him how
he was, he replied, "If I were any better, I'd be twins. Wanna see my
scars?" I declined to see his wounds, but did ask him what had gone
through his mind as the robbery took place. "The first thing that
went through my mind was that I should have locked the back door,"
Jerry replied. "Then, as I lay on the floor, I remembered that I had
two choices: I could choose to live, or I could choose to die. I chose
to live." "Weren't you scared? Did you lose consciousness?" I asked.
Jerry continued, "The paramedics were great. They kept telling me I
was going to be fine. But when they wheeled me into the emergency room
and I saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I
got really scared. In their eyes, I read, 'He's a dead man.' I knew
then I needed to take action." "What did you do?" I asked. "Well,
there was a big, burly nurse shouting questions at me," said Jerry.
"She asked if I was allergic to anything. 'Yes,' I replied. The doctors
and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply. I took a deep
breath and yelled, 'Bullets!' Over their laughter, I told them, 'I am
choosing to live. Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead." Jerry
lived thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his
amazing attitude. I learned from him that every day we have the choice
to live fully.
Positive Mental Attitude, after all, is everything. You have
2
choices now: 1. save and delete this mail from your mail box. 2.
forward it to a friend Hope, you will choose choice 2.
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