Sunday, January 22, 2012

2012 and the Kali Yuga (video)

Bruce Fenton* (2012rising.com); edited by Wisdom Quarterly
(LINK) Mayan calendars point at Dec. 21st, 2012, suggesting the end of the world as we know it -- another Dark Age or a new Golden Age? Who was the blue eyed, white haired Kukulcan (asura)? What is the great pyramid at Chichen Itza? When will feathered serpents (nagas) plunge into our hollow Earth?

One of the most interesting calendar coincidences in relation to the Mayan 2012 information is the similarity between the start dates of the last long count cycle of the Mayan system and Hinduism’s Kali Yuga (the cyclical Dark or Decadent Age).

Yugas are vast periods of time, epochs that relate to the Earth's journey around a cosmos' central sun. The four yugas (Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, Dvapara Yuga, and Kali Yuga) together make up an entire world age (aeon, kalpa) between formation and disintegration events, calculated to be about 4,320,000 years in total duration.

The Hari Krishna movement derived this view of the Kali Yuga from the Vedanta. Why are disparate cultures telling essentially the same tale? It is because extraterrestrial visitors seeded imperial cultures across the globe. But the ancient astronauts are now mythologies of "gods," angels, and demons.

While most Dec. 21, 2012 researchers are aware of the 3114 BCE start date of the current long count cycle, few are aware that the Kali Yuga -- a predicted era of moral decline and spiritual bleakness -- began in the year 3102 BCE.

It is startling that there are only 12 years difference between systems on different sides of the planet. The Brahma Vaivarta Purana Sutra from ancient (Vedic) India depicts a period which has many of the failings visible in our modern society. Such is the backdrop of the spiritual decline in the Kali Yuga.

It is, however, a mistake for people to seek a link between the Mayan 2012 end-date and the closing of the Kali Yuga. Although their starts may be similar, their ends do not. (Although some suggest this is an error).

Buddhism

The Kali Yuga is set to continue for a vast period, at least 432,000 years, well eclipsing the 5126 years of the Mayan long count calendar. Scholars from Eastern philosophies such as Buddhism and from religions such as Brahmanism (Vedic Hinduism), often suggest that ages are many millions of years long, vast kalpas (aeons, of which there are a variety of differing spans).

There is an excellent Buddhist parable that attempts to explain the staggering length of a kalpa. The Buddha said it was hard to say in terms of years, centuries, of millenia but that nevertheless an idea could be conveyed: The vivid description of an aeon is far more effective than a string of numbers.

It can be likened to a mass of flawless marble the size of mythical Mount Meru (Sumeru). And once every a bird whets its beak on top of the mountain with a fine Varanasi cloth. Carrying on in this way, that mountain of stone would sooner be completely worn away and yet a single kalpa would not have elapsed.

It is worth noting that Buddhist philosophy does not tend to hold to the idea that a time of any great universal significance will happen in our near future. Every moment carries the same inherent flaws and their solution is present, even if it is only revealed very rarely by universal teachers (buddhas) who rediscover and make known the Dharma.

The only significant events predicted or prophesied are the ending of vast epochs and the extremely rare and intermittent arising of new buddhas. There have been suggestions in relation to 2012 that the next Buddha (Maitreya) will arise at this time in a Judeo-Christian (Messiah) end of days scenario.

Unfortunately, anyone familiar with Buddhist lore will recognize that it is made clear that fully enlightened teaching buddhas only arise millions of years apart -- not on a regular interval or when needed but after vast stretches of geological time.

() "Shift of the Ages" film is an authentic story of the Maya, the Mayan Calendar, 2012, and the turbulent times in which we are living told through living Grand Elder Wandering Wolf, who is also known as Don Alejandro Cirilo Perez Oxlaj. It will be Maya's first official discourse to the world (shiftoftheAges.com),

Buddhism (the Dharma) is prophesied to completely disappear during the Kali Yuga. And during that time it will be virtually impossible for seekers to find any opportunity for spiritual realization (breakthrough to the stages of enlightenment) at all by any system now available.

Only when such utter darkness has shrouded the world will another being become fully realized wholly by unprompted effort and without any guidance to become the next supremely enlightened teacher, the Buddha Maitreya.

The most notable discussion on the Kali Yuga by Buddhist teachers actually refers to how lucky a living being is to be reborn as a human at any time when the Dharma still exists and how much rarer to ever see a buddha or even an enlightened individual (arhat).

To quote the Tibetan teacher Pabongka Rimpoche, “Most important of all through this physical rebirth you are able to achieve the state of Vajradhara [unification of the illusory body and great bliss] within one short lifetime in this degenerate age; otherwise it would take thee countless great aeons to achieve. Thus this rebirth is worth more than one thousand billion precious jewels.” Dec. 21, 2012 may close a cycle... More

*() Bruce Fenton introduces 2012Rising.com.

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