In the Vahara avatar of Lord Vishnu, one wonders how the rescue of earth was affected?
Where was Vishnu? Was he reclining on Sesha, and creation was in abeyance? If so, earth would not have been created at all and would not be in need of rescuing.
If creation was already in progress, one needs to know where dwelt Lord Vishnu. And why take the form of a boar to facilitate the rescue?
And what was the Samudra Manthan? What Samudra (Ocean) was churned? Why was it giving up such goodies as the amrita, the celestial elephant Airavat, the unequalled equine Uchachaihsravah, and even the goddess Lakshmi. More than that, why, and how, is the moon one of the goodies that came out the churning?
Why would the devas and the asura work together to something like this, especially the asuras who already had the upper hand in their ongoing battle with the devas?
Who are Madhu and Kaitabh? And why did they rampage across the universe, undefeated by even the mighty Vishnu, only to succumb to the boon he asked of them to die when they could not defeat him either? Why Vishnu with a horse head – Hyagriva?
Why a half-man, half-lion incarnation? Only to give a messy death to some evil king? The questions can be endless, and some answers are hard to make sense of. Nevertheless, there must be some basis for these myths, maybe one lost in antiquity, or suffocated in interpretations over the generations that have rendered them so unlike what they should be.
Let’s start with an overview of the Das Avatars, the 10 incarnations of Lord Vishnu that practically forms the basis of Hinduism in our age. Why does the Lord need to take a fish form, one may ask? And ask this with some validity. There are many answers given to this, and most are based on interpretations of a holy man, which itself is based on what that holy man has understood of that particular scripture he is interpreting.
Yes, the raison d’être of our mythologies change from scripture to scripture, interpretation to interpretation, depending on what one wants to make of it. While the avatars of Vishnu is largely accepted to be 10, there are groups who believe in 22 avatars, or more. We will stick to Das Avatars for practical purposes.
Some say the first few avatars of Vishnu is the Hindu way of depicting human evolution.
Science says life was first formed in the waters of the earth, and then that life learned to live on the land (water creature to amphibian to land animal). The first avatar of Vishnu - Matsya, the fish - is said to depict the first step of evolution through from water to land.
The background to the Matsya Avatar is the great flood that makes up the starting point of present times in virtually every religion/mythology in the world. Lord Vishnu takes the form of a fast-growing horned fish to save Manu, who builds a ship and hooks it onto the horn of the fish to be towed to safety when the flood comes.
Over time, the facts associated with these events kept changing to suit the mentality of that generation. The evolutionary fish turned into the fish that saved Manu and his family for repopulating Earth after the devastating flood.
The second avatar of Kurma, the tortoise/turtle is the amphibian intermediary before life of the purely land-based creatures. That has turned into Lord Vishnu taking the shape of a turtle to base Mount Mandara while the devas and asura churned Kshirsagar (the Ocean of Milk, or Buttermilk Ocean) using the serpent Vasuki has the churn rope.
And the first land animal as per Hindu evolution is represented by the boar, which in the Dash Avatar tales is Lord Vishnu taking that anthropomorphic form to save the Earth from the evil grasp of the demon Hiranyaksha. Hiranyaksha is, of course, the brother of Hiranyakashyap, the father of Prahlad who was torn apart by the Narsimha (Nar Singh) avatar.
In between (or before all these) is the fascinating myth of Madhu and Kaitabha, the demons inadvertently spawned by Vishnu, and as strong as him, for which Vishnu had to take on an incarnation of horse-headed man to make these demons succumb. More on this later in the article.
Then comes the half man, half lion Narasimha (Nar Singh) showing our pre-evolution into the human cycle, followed by the dwarf avatar Vamana depicting the first man, small and cunning, relying on its intellect to survive in an environment where claws, fangs and brute strength ruled.
The next few avatars are all humans (Parasurama, Rama, Krishna and Buddha) until the last one, the yet-to-come Kalki avatar who/which is either going to be a white horse or be seen as riding a white horse. Again we have the fascinating horse amalgamation in an avatar. What is it with the horse and our celestial stories?
The Hindu cosmology does provide some different/better answers to understanding our mythology but we have to shift the arena somewhere else to make sense of the ‘myths’.
The Das Avatar of Vishnu is the history of the cosmos wrapped, or rather lost, in the dumbing down of its true origins – the story of the formation of the Milky Way galaxy.
The obvious link to the Milky Way is the creation mythology – Vishnu reclines/sleeps/is in yoganidra on Sesha/Anantha Naag in Kshirsagar (Ocean of Milk) until creation is to start. The kshirsagar is the Milky Way (thus named for its milk-like appearance in the sky above us), Sesha represents the spiral formation of this particular galaxy and Vishnu is the universal that governs/sustain this galaxy.
When creation is ready to start, a lotus comes out of Vishnu’s navel (the centre of the Galaxy) and Brahma is enthroned upon it. Brahma then sets forth the basis of all creation.
Before we can go into the Das Avatars and how they relate to our galaxy, let’s deal with the Madhu and Kaitabha phenomenon that has baffled Hindus for generations.
There is a lot of talk - among astronomers, astrologers and people of science - that the sun has a double - a planet or star that shadows it – and which affects the progress of our sun as well as its very temperament. Some say the double is an opposite of the sun, either in opposite orbit or in the opposite side of the sun in relation to their orbits.
The story of Madhu and Kaitabha is the story of the sun and its double (doppelganger?) in their initial days of rampaging around the galaxy. It is the story of how the force of the galactic centre finally curbed their wild orbits into a semblance of order around itself.
When they finally settled in their orbits around the galactic centre or Vishnu Naabhi, Madhu and Kaitabha are said to have succumbed to the Lord. That is why Vishnu is called Madhusudhana (the forceful pacifier of Madhu), rather than Madhu Mardhan (the destroyer of Madhu).
Pretty much the same cosmological concept applies to the Varaha avatar. The mythology says the Earth is lost among the disorder and chaos of the galaxy, and was rescued by Vishnu in his boar form.
This could very well be from the time when the moon was formed from a collision between two planets – one of which lost a chunk of itself and then was formed into what we call the earth. The collision takes place in time immemorial – the planet orbiting the sun is then called Tiamen.
Another planet, in another elliptical orbit (but not around our sun) crosses Tiamen’s orbit with disastrous effect. A chunk is blown off to become the moon later on, the debris from the collision form the asteroid belt and Tiamen is thrown off course by the impact.
Lost among the debris of the solar system (the asteroid belt) and buffeted and banged about, the former Tiamen has to be rescued and restored to its orbit around the sun.
Was Hiranyaksha the rogue planet that slammed into Tiamen, later to be called the Earth? It is said that Vishnu battled a 1000 years to restore the earth. Was the gravitational pull of the rogue planet so great that a major effort had to be made by the galactic centre to pull the earth back on course?
Thus we come to the story of the Samudra Manthan. One of the goodies that came out of the manthan was the moon itself. It is one of the several things that came out of the churning (some versions also say the Sun came out of the churning too).
The Samudra manthan is the story of the formation of the galaxy, of the diverse and disparate elements coming together to form various other elements, some good (the nectar of life, the celestial toys, medicine, apsaras,etc). And some bad - the halahal poison that endangered everyone and which Shiva is said to have sucked in and kept in his throat.
Substitute the halahal poison for the initial calamitous antimatter-like substances that could have destroyed the galaxy, substitute Shiva for the blackhole at the centre of the galaxy (Vishnu Naabhi) that had to come in help quell and isolate the production of this antimatter-like substance, and the story starts making sense, somewhat.
Once the destructive elements are subdued, the goodies can come into being. Each of the elements represents some thing of the beauty (see notes below for a list of what was produced in the churning).
The Moon (and in some versions, the Sun) was, in another age, churned like butter out of the primordial ocean by the “gods” and “demons.” And that could be the basis of the Samudra manthan myth.
As before, ‘clarifying’ additions were made to this observation by the ancients (or their descendents) and we ended up with the ‘understandable and acceptable’ version of today. Which is that the devas went to Lord Vishnu and asked for his intercession in the drubbing they were taking from the asuras. Lord Vishnu came up with the plan to whip up some amrita (nectar of immortality) by churning the ‘ocean’, invited the asuras to partake on the basis they would share in the bounty but cunningly only allowed the devas to become immortal. (It’s your choice what you want to believe as a Hindu, but it is good to open your mind to other explanations.)
Many believe that the ancients intimately knew the workings of the universe, but focussed more on the workings of the Milky Way as it was the galaxy in which they resided.
When the ancients wrote of the early days of the galaxy when things were falling into place around the centre, they would have had either akashik records to fall back on or would have had direct knowledge (supra-knowledge) of the phenomenon that was the beginnings of our galaxy.
How could they pass on the knowledge of this phenomenon to the people? Maybe they related it as they saw it and it was later changed to more palatable rendering so that more people could ‘understand’ the story of creation? Who knows? But one thing is clear – there were records of what happened in our skies and these records were either wilfully or inadvertently changed to suit some people.
Today they are available to us as metaphors, allegories, parables – of the celestial battles in the sky between devas and asuras, or Shiva’s contention with Prajapati, or any of the many stories out of our Puranas.
Sadly the observation of the ancient into the workings of the universe appears to have changed into the power struggle between the devas and the asuras, of greed and violation of trust and cunning and betrayal – all the things that make humans human. In ‘humanifying’ the information, we lost the true knowledge of the heavens.
Notes:
Creation in Hinduism is cyclic – it will happen again and again. Many says each cycle will have its own set of avatars, repeating the avatars as required again and again. Sounds like premises of the Matrix movie.
Yet the universe is an expanding entity, and each cycle must have some difference to the preceding one.
Each cycle or age is denoted by an astrological sign. The Age of Pisces is variously said to have either begun in 330 BCE or AD1 (Year One) and it is the age that we are in presently.
Does the Matsya avatar mythology denote the beginning of this age? Is Jesus Christ’s symbol of the fish (as the fisher of man) another allegory of the start of the Age of Pisces?
And does this mean that when the next cycle starts, will it start with a different incarnation? Say if the age starts of with the astronomical positioning in the Leo quadrant, will the first incarnation be that of the lion or lion-man?
These are the questions few can answer, and I look forward to the day when I do come across someone who can provide valid answers. It will be an honour to know someone like that.
Ages exactly 2000 years each
Many astrologers find ages too erratic based on either the vernal point moving through the randomly sized zodiacal constellations or sidereal zodiac and, instead, round all astrological ages to exactly 2000 years each. In this approach the ages are usually neatly aligned so that the Aries age is found from 2000 BC to 1 AD, Pisces age 1 AD to 2000 AD, the Aquarian age 2000 AD - 4000 AD, and so on. This approach is not consistent with the precession of the equinoxes. Based on precession of the equinoxes, there is a one degree shift approximately every 72 years, so a 30 degree movement requires 2160 years to complete.
The list of products from the Samudra Manthan (Other lists have additional products):
Lakshmi, the Goddess of Fortune and Wealth -Vishnu's consort
Kaustubha, the most valuable jewel in the world
Parijat, the divine flowering tree with blossoms that never fade or wilt
Varuni, goddess and creator of alcohol
Dhanvantari, the doctor
Chandra, the moon
Kamadhenu, the wish-granting divine cow
Kalpavriksha, the wish-granting tree
Airavata, the elephant of Indra
Apsaras, various divine nymphs like Rambha, Menaka, Punjikasthala, etc.
Uchhaishravas, the divine 7-headed horse
Sharanga, the bow of Vishnu
Shankha Vishnu's conch
Amrita the nectar of immortality.
The symbolism of samudra manathan
The story represents the spiritual endeavor of a person to achieve self-realisation through concentration of mind, withdrawal of senses, control of desires and practice of austerities and asceticism.
The Devas and Asuras represent the positives and negatives respectively of one's personality. The participation of both the Devas and the Asuras signifies that when one is seeking bliss through spiritual practice, one has to integrate and harmonise both the positive and negative aspects and put both the energies to work for the common goal.
The ocean of milk is the mind or the human consciousness. The mind is like an ocean while the thoughts and emotions are the waves in the ocean.
The Avatars and Yugas
The Avatar concept is the very cornerstone of Hindu theology. According to it, the Supreme Power manifests itself in animal or human forms on earth, with the divine mission of cleansing it of the periodically increasing evil. The Avatar concept is closely related to the measurement of time in Hindu theology which has its basis on one working day of brahma. According to the Bhagwat Purana, Brahma, the creator, is the causal effect of the predetermined periodic creation and dissolutin of the universe.
Each creation of Kalpa is equal to one day and each dissolution or Pralaya is equal to one night in the life of Brahma. A Kalpa and a Pralaya last for 4,320 million human years each. Every Kalpa has 1000 cycles of 4 Yugas (ages). Each cycle of 4 yugas is completed in 4,320,000 human years.
The Yugas are called Satya, Treta, Dwapara and Kali. The Avataras which are considered most significant are ten in number and they form the "Dasha Avatar" these ten start with the form of a lowly fish and work up to the noble man, cast in the image of God.
The fanciful find a parallel to Darwin's theory of evolution in the progression of these Avatars. The Avatars enable the common folk to speak of or listen to stories of divine doings which is a simple way of proceeding towards Godhead; particularly in our Kali Yuga with its 'sick hurry and divided aims'.
- Nalinesh Arun is a former Fiji journalist who lived in India for many years. He is now based in Christchurch
Showing posts with label Vishnu Naabhi. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Vishnu Naabhi. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Thursday, December 23, 2010
The Earth owns us
The Earthquake in Christchurch on September 4 brought the message of the fragile nature of our lives too close for comfort. Fortunately, we did not lose any lives, although the cost of damage is expected to run in the billions. The majority of people only want one thing in the aftermath of the Earthquake – get back to their normal lives as quickly as possible.
One message that the Earthquake again failed to impress on our minds is the reality of how we as a species are inter-related, that we live in the interconnected world of nature and are as open to the vagaries of nature as anyone in any part of the world.
However, much and which ever way we protect our borders and our way of life, natural disasters don’t recognise these demarcations. Nor does something like global warming or climate change or any other global event like El Nino or La Nina.
While the Earth has been divided up in countries and regions, oceans and stratosphere and other spheres, it remains for all intents and purpose a ‘single operating system’ – connected in so many ways that we only starting to understand. It is rightly said that the fluttering of a butterfly’s wings in Wales will eventually lead to a storm in the Amazon, that is how interconnected we are.
Why the Earth is continually changing
The Earth has been around for some time now and in that time it has experienced change that is not only mind-boggling but beyond our scope (science or otherwise) to truly understand.
Several ice ages, dinosaurs, mass extinctions, different species of humans and hominids, secrets deep in the ground, under the seas, pole reversals, and other climatic ‘disasters’ – the planet is in a state of continuous change, all the time.
It is the nature of things, or, if you will, the nature of the Earth to do these things to maintain its balance. After all, it is but a satellite of the sun, and has to keep up pace and decorum with the others in the grand design of things.
Forget the universe, the Earth is a very tiny entity in the galaxy itself. In the solar system, it has to play a role in the general balance of things, spinning at great speed around the sun while itself spinning at head-snapping speeds on its axis. On top of it, it is wobbly and slanted in its circuit around the sun.
Every planet circulating the sun exerts its own force on every other planet in some way, influencing their movement one way or another. Imagine the solar system as a three dimensional freeway, with lanes marked out for each planet and traffic management and traffic lights in place. Then imagine an acrobat whirling a number of dinner plates on sticks, getting the balance just right and ensuring the rotating plates do not collide as he moves the sticks around on his hands and forehead. Put the acrobatics and freeway image together and you can get an idea of how the solar system operates.
When Sir Isaac Newton was talking of gravity, it was this balance, poise and movement of the planets that he was talking about. (And we have taken this great man’s computations of the planets and shoved it in the inane illustration of an apple falling on his head to illustrate what gravity is.)
As the Earth continues its relentless, yet varying, march around the sun with the other planets, and the sun spins around in the galaxy around some other pivotal point (many agree it is the galactic centre), and the galaxy itself travels in its relation to the other billions of galaxies in the universe, this gravitational pull, working in so many different ways, keeps a tight rein in the movement of planets, solar system and galaxies.
All this while, what happens on its surface has to be noted and attended to by the Earth. In the past millions of years, the Earth survived the dinosaurs, and it survived the extinction of the dinosaurs. It is still here, 65 million years after the dinosaurs, sustaining us. It has seen several races of people live and become extinct, seen civilizations start, dominate and fade away from memory, has spawned several species of flora and fauna, lost them, had more species come up to replace those lost.
At different stages of its journey in the cosmos, the Earth is a different thing at different times. What it is now is near-perfect for the life forms on it. What it will be next (whenever this happens) may not be as good for us (or it could be better, who knows?). We, the human race, may just be a passing phase for the Earth however much we want to believe that we are the rulers of Earth.
So, who is in charge?
The Earth, apparently, is in charge here. If we believe that we, as a species, have dominated the Earth and wrought our changes on its face, we are sorely mistaken. The day we control the weather or stop dead a natural disaster is the day we can claim to have a semblance of control over the Earth.
Until that day comes, we can only say we have been given leave to live on this planet, that we are here at the tolerance of Mother Earth. What we really do is exist within the bounds of the conditions that have been established by the Earth.
And she is a marvellous host, giving us the bounty of her land and seas, allowing us to go forth and multiply, and multiply, and multiply. As a species, we have ‘conquered’ almost all kinds of obstacles and made a good life for ourselves amid conditions detrimental to our existence including the heat or the cold, the dry or the wet.
But at all times we remain but a subset of the entity we call the Earth. There is little or no chance of this species surviving outside of the Earth, however much we may want to live on the moon.
Just another disaster?
Disasters on Earth is always a given – from our point of view. For the huge entity that is Earth, it is only a matter of maintaining its poise and balance. It has a habit of reversing its poles to balance its magnetic fields – the Earth has reversed its poles 200 times in the past 178 million year, the last one being 730-750,000 years ago. After all, the Earth is also a dynamo, with its solid inner core using solar magnetic energy to throw up a deflecting field against the solar winds that could burn the Earth to a crisp.
But there are disasters that even the Earth may not be able to take in its stride.
Now science is telling us that the solar system is careening towards the centre of the galaxy, where, it is believed, awaits it a supermassive blackhole. So say scientists who have been keeping a extremely close eye on the workings of the galaxy. They also say that this supermassive blackhole could be benign – meaning it is well-meaning and perhaps may not swallow up the Earth, or the solar system.
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory revealed in 2000 what was long-suspected - a black hole does exist at the centre of the galaxy. Instead of the highly active monster that most other galaxies have, our blackhole is less active. Apparently a supernova exploded close to it sometime back and masked its pulling capabilities with enough dust to make it a starving blackhole.
Nevertheless it can still eat up a comet or two if they come close enough, as was shown in 2001 when the blackhole swallowed a comet and released enough x-rays to brighten a nearby star by 45 times its normal brightness. So its devouring capabilities are largely intact. By the way, blackholes cannot be seen and so are only discerned by the x-rays they emit.
On the face of it, careening headlong towards a blackhole is a mother of a disaster. Maybe not. The galactic centre is a massive area – a radio signal associated with the centre and called Sagittarius A emanates from an area with a diameter of 44 million kilometres.
There are a thousand stars and systems already very near the galactic centre, including a ‘sun’ that is seven times as big and 15 times as heavy as our sun, called the S2. It is so close to the centre that it only takes 15.2 years to orbit it (our sun does it in 50,000 plus years). In fact there are some 100 new stars, ‘born’ and evolved near the centre and scientists are baffled as to why this happened if a blackhole exists near to them.
No-one is absolutely sure how far away the centre of the galaxy is away from us presently. In the great scheme of things it could be trillions of kilometres away or ‘just around the corner’. For all we know, it could take the solar system a twinkling of time to cover the enormous distance, or it will not never happen in our lifetime. So far, so good as far as science is concerned
The creation of our galaxy
Now, our ancients had a good idea of what’s happening in the galaxy. Let’s look at our so-called mythology and see what these ancients have been trying to tell us.
Our galaxy is called the Milky Way, because of the dusting of the white that accompanies its spiral formation. And Lord Vishnu, the all-pervading, lies in the ocean of milk (Ksheer Sagar) on the endless coils of the serpent Anantha/Shesha Naag. The allegory is so right: the Ocean of Milk for the Milky Way, the coils of the serpent to indicate the spiralling nature of the galaxy. And Vishnu (the name means that which pervades all) right in the middle of it all, or forming the basis of it.
Vishnu in his preserver role, is either non-active or active, depending on whether creation (shristi) is in progress, or is in abeyance. When creation is in abeyance, Vishnu rests and the serpent lies coiled. Come creation, the serpent uncoils and everything starts happening, including the spinning off of solar/star systems and galaxies.
To start creation, a lotus pops out of Vishnu’s navel on which is borne Brahma, the creator. This is called Vishnu Naabhi and correlates to the centre of the galaxy (the seat of Brahma). And planets, suns, star and systems are spawned out of this centre. It is all a matter of expansion, for creation is expansion. As the systems evolve, they start their elliptical journey from the centre in an outward direction, growing, spawning and ‘living’.
For our solar system, this journey takes some 26,000 years before it comes back to the periapsis or pericentre( the point of closest approach to the centre) and it will take a similar timeframe to do the circuit in the opposite direction. Many of our astrologers are saying the elliptical journey for the sun is halfway done now and it is approaching the centre, where the solar system will be the closest to the Naabhi in the past 26,000 years.
Now all this galaxy creation is a microcosm of the greater role of creation, where Vishnu pervades the universe and Brahma starts creation of the galaxies and systems (or lokas). The process of creation is passed down intact to the lowest level so that any small creation is similar to the ultimate creation and vice versa. What is above is below and what is inside is outside. Or is our galaxy really the centre of the universe if it actually has the Vishni Naabhi at its centre?
The end of creation
And with creation comes dissolution, as it should be. The Naabhi started the creation and its here where dissolution must take place. As stars and systems spawned out of the centre, so must they come to the centre to be ‘consumed’.
The blackhole can be said to be the destroyer of the trinity, Shiva. The tandav dance of Shiva is the crackling, electrifying, super heavy, all-swallowing, x-ray emitting processes of a blackhole. It is the ultimate dissolution and destruction. Nothing escapes Shiva when he sets out to destroy something, not even light.
But dissolution is an ongoing business, not a one-time event only. Of course, for a planet about to be destroyed, it is a one-off thing but there are myriad of planets and each will eventually be destroyed. And each destruction will be termed a pralaya (dissolution).
Alternatively, followers of Shiva believe it differently. Shiva is the creator, preserver and destroyer all rolled in one, as represented by Natraja. The Tandav is itself the ongoing story of creation, preservation and destruction; a creation ringed by fire, keeping rhythm to the Anahat Sound, represented by Shiva’s damaru (drum).
Each of Natraja’s four arms symbolises the four aspect of divinity: beating the rhythm of the universe with the damaru; blessing us and telling us not to fear anything (abhayahasta); holding fire to show the destruction of both the universe and the ego; and, most importantly, pointing to the demon pinned under his foot that is not upraised in dance. The demon Apasmera represents ignorance, especially ignorance that is an offshoot of dualism. Others call the dwarf demon, Mara (illusion) or Maya (illusion).
Whichever way one will have it, the ancient knew a thing or two and tried their best to pass it on to us. Wrapped in allegory, metaphor and downright-in-your-face imagery, the workings of the universe was told to us. Yet, we failed to understand them.
Now, as science counts down the headlong rush of planet Earth to the centre of the galaxy, it is an apt time to look to our mythology and see what happened in such situations, and find counters to it, if we can. And to ask questions that we have dared not ask before.
Are we heading right into the jaws of this suppermassive blackhole? Is it Earth’s time to experience pralaya?
According to our scriptures, NO. The benign blackhole will certainly exert a force, a tremendous force but not enough to break the sun’s orbit of the centre. There is a great chance of survival for the Earth. But for the people and the other species that reside on Earth, it may be another thing.
Like I said, from the point of view of Earth, the adjustments to the planet may be minor indeed. But the trickle down effect on things living on it may be enormous. What awaits mankind as we speed ahead to this tryst?
The things that have been predicted could happen to us:
Cataclysms – major upheavals, including monster volcano eruptions (there is talk of the nine mountain gods erupting in several mythologies), Earthquakes, tsunamis of giant proportions. A vast majority of humanity will suffer and the planet will reface itself (resurfacing).
Cleansing - a virtual wiping out of many species without much damage to the planet itself. This includes solar winds that pass through the Earth’s protective magnetic shield and change the very molecular structure of things on the planet. It may also just burn every thing up, leaving no chance of cultivation on the surface, and thus little chance of civilisation surviving for very long. Electrical storms would disrupt communications and cut off everyone from everyone.
Consciousness – several cultures and several noteworthy scholars believe the closer we come to the centre of the galaxy the more in tune we become to the pervading consciousness of the universe (God, Brahman, Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti, etc). This rise in consciousness will, of course, come at a price. We will need to give up our body awareness (maybe even our bodies?) – either voluntarily or be forced to do so.
Our ancients have been calling for a new way of living for millennia, in which we are to go beyond body consciousness into the unified field consciousness. Our body is only a vehicle and we have to realise our real self to understand the part we must play in understanding the workings of the universe.
Has the time arrived for major upheavals to take place in our lives, in our very existence? If yes, are we ready for it? Most probably, no. The unrelenting sequels of natural disasters taking place on Earth should teach us something but we are too enamoured by life to see the deadly destruction. It is Yuddhistar who said (when asked by Yama) what was the most astounding thing on Earth: “Thousands are dying everyday but people believe that they will go on living forever. This is the most astounding thing”.
It is the killing of ignorance, especially of the duality of this world, that Shiva’s tandav is teaching us. Maybe it is time to actually look at what we really need to do and see how we can actually live while we still have a body and a mind to understand things.
Asato maa, Sad gamaya
Tamaso maa, Jyotir gamaya
Mrityo maa, Amritam gamaya
NOTES
Black holes
The intense gravity of the black hole prevents any light from escaping it, and it is therefore invisible. Its vicinity, however, contains a fairly high density of stars, including one big star--about 15 times the mass of the Sun and 7 times its radius--which was recently found to go around the centre with an orbital period of only 15.2 years. That star, designated S2 by astronomers, follows an ellipse which at its closest comes within about 124 astronomical units (1 AU=mean Sun-Earth distance) of the centre of the galaxy. At that time it speeds up to about 5000 km/sec--close to 2% of the velocity of light! Its side facing the black hole is somewhat closer to the black hole than the side facing away, and is therefore pulled more strongly; on a very close approach, such a difference could tear a star apart, but S2 would have to get some 70 times closer before that would happen, at a distance comparable to the orbital radius of Mars.
Galactic Centre of Milky Way
The central parsec around Sagittarius A* contains thousands of stars. Although most of them are old red main sequence stars, the Galactic Center is also rich in massive stars. More than 100 OB and Wolf-Rayet stars have been identified there so far. They seem to have all been formed in a single star formation event a few million years ago. The existence of these relatively young (though evolved) stars was a surprise to experts, who expected the tidal forces from the central black-hole to prevent their formation. This paradox of youth is even more remarkable for stars that are on very tight orbits around Sagittarius A*, such as S2.
A world-ending prophesy
Pope Leo IX (Pope from 1513-1522) wrote in 1514 of what is coming: "I will not see the end of the world, nor will you my brethren, for its time is long in the future, 500 years hence." 500 years hence would be 2014, just two years after the Mayan Prophecy End Date, and as Leo was obviously rounding the date to a full sum, it is very possible he is even referring to the year 2012.
Mayan Calendar and yuga separation of the Hindus
The now famous date December 21, 2012 is the date that the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, used by the preColumbian Maya civilization, and known by them and by the Aztecs as the Fifth Sun, completes a "great cycle" of thirteen b'ak'tuns. This means that since the last creation date on August 11 3114. or 13.0.0.0.0 in the Long Count calculation, the "clock hand" will have reached 13.0.0.0.0 again for the first time, marking the completion of this cycle.
Yet this period, lasting c. 5125 years, is just one last (fifth) part of an even longer cycle that turns out to be the same as the Great Year. Knowledge of the Great Year is found in other ancient astrological-astronomical records (i.e. in India) and so with further study the Mayan 2012 calendar end finds roots in other cultures too. With the ending of the last part of this age, the Mesoamerican cycle of five ages also completes. Herewith a large time period of five x 5,125 (c. 25,625 years) is also drawing to a close.
The second coming?
Mention of nine godlike figures is found in many ancient cultures - Maya, Egyptian, Chinese and Tibetan and if you do enough reading of the ancient texts it is quite clear that these nine were volcanic mountains.
They were connected to a very ancient plan that has been copied and kept alive in different areas of the world (you can begin to recognize the connection by reading on Nine Tibetan Mountain Gods). The Return is, then, of fallen or lost mountains, which might cause a certain amount of Earthquakes, tsunamis and eruptions. Moreover they were connected in the plan to one central volcanic mountain that marked the centre of the whole Earth, a mountain that has completely disappeared, sunk below the seas and into our own subconscious
One message that the Earthquake again failed to impress on our minds is the reality of how we as a species are inter-related, that we live in the interconnected world of nature and are as open to the vagaries of nature as anyone in any part of the world.
However, much and which ever way we protect our borders and our way of life, natural disasters don’t recognise these demarcations. Nor does something like global warming or climate change or any other global event like El Nino or La Nina.
While the Earth has been divided up in countries and regions, oceans and stratosphere and other spheres, it remains for all intents and purpose a ‘single operating system’ – connected in so many ways that we only starting to understand. It is rightly said that the fluttering of a butterfly’s wings in Wales will eventually lead to a storm in the Amazon, that is how interconnected we are.
Why the Earth is continually changing
The Earth has been around for some time now and in that time it has experienced change that is not only mind-boggling but beyond our scope (science or otherwise) to truly understand.
Several ice ages, dinosaurs, mass extinctions, different species of humans and hominids, secrets deep in the ground, under the seas, pole reversals, and other climatic ‘disasters’ – the planet is in a state of continuous change, all the time.
It is the nature of things, or, if you will, the nature of the Earth to do these things to maintain its balance. After all, it is but a satellite of the sun, and has to keep up pace and decorum with the others in the grand design of things.
Forget the universe, the Earth is a very tiny entity in the galaxy itself. In the solar system, it has to play a role in the general balance of things, spinning at great speed around the sun while itself spinning at head-snapping speeds on its axis. On top of it, it is wobbly and slanted in its circuit around the sun.
Every planet circulating the sun exerts its own force on every other planet in some way, influencing their movement one way or another. Imagine the solar system as a three dimensional freeway, with lanes marked out for each planet and traffic management and traffic lights in place. Then imagine an acrobat whirling a number of dinner plates on sticks, getting the balance just right and ensuring the rotating plates do not collide as he moves the sticks around on his hands and forehead. Put the acrobatics and freeway image together and you can get an idea of how the solar system operates.
When Sir Isaac Newton was talking of gravity, it was this balance, poise and movement of the planets that he was talking about. (And we have taken this great man’s computations of the planets and shoved it in the inane illustration of an apple falling on his head to illustrate what gravity is.)
As the Earth continues its relentless, yet varying, march around the sun with the other planets, and the sun spins around in the galaxy around some other pivotal point (many agree it is the galactic centre), and the galaxy itself travels in its relation to the other billions of galaxies in the universe, this gravitational pull, working in so many different ways, keeps a tight rein in the movement of planets, solar system and galaxies.
All this while, what happens on its surface has to be noted and attended to by the Earth. In the past millions of years, the Earth survived the dinosaurs, and it survived the extinction of the dinosaurs. It is still here, 65 million years after the dinosaurs, sustaining us. It has seen several races of people live and become extinct, seen civilizations start, dominate and fade away from memory, has spawned several species of flora and fauna, lost them, had more species come up to replace those lost.
At different stages of its journey in the cosmos, the Earth is a different thing at different times. What it is now is near-perfect for the life forms on it. What it will be next (whenever this happens) may not be as good for us (or it could be better, who knows?). We, the human race, may just be a passing phase for the Earth however much we want to believe that we are the rulers of Earth.
So, who is in charge?
The Earth, apparently, is in charge here. If we believe that we, as a species, have dominated the Earth and wrought our changes on its face, we are sorely mistaken. The day we control the weather or stop dead a natural disaster is the day we can claim to have a semblance of control over the Earth.
Until that day comes, we can only say we have been given leave to live on this planet, that we are here at the tolerance of Mother Earth. What we really do is exist within the bounds of the conditions that have been established by the Earth.
And she is a marvellous host, giving us the bounty of her land and seas, allowing us to go forth and multiply, and multiply, and multiply. As a species, we have ‘conquered’ almost all kinds of obstacles and made a good life for ourselves amid conditions detrimental to our existence including the heat or the cold, the dry or the wet.
But at all times we remain but a subset of the entity we call the Earth. There is little or no chance of this species surviving outside of the Earth, however much we may want to live on the moon.
Just another disaster?
Disasters on Earth is always a given – from our point of view. For the huge entity that is Earth, it is only a matter of maintaining its poise and balance. It has a habit of reversing its poles to balance its magnetic fields – the Earth has reversed its poles 200 times in the past 178 million year, the last one being 730-750,000 years ago. After all, the Earth is also a dynamo, with its solid inner core using solar magnetic energy to throw up a deflecting field against the solar winds that could burn the Earth to a crisp.
But there are disasters that even the Earth may not be able to take in its stride.
Now science is telling us that the solar system is careening towards the centre of the galaxy, where, it is believed, awaits it a supermassive blackhole. So say scientists who have been keeping a extremely close eye on the workings of the galaxy. They also say that this supermassive blackhole could be benign – meaning it is well-meaning and perhaps may not swallow up the Earth, or the solar system.
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory revealed in 2000 what was long-suspected - a black hole does exist at the centre of the galaxy. Instead of the highly active monster that most other galaxies have, our blackhole is less active. Apparently a supernova exploded close to it sometime back and masked its pulling capabilities with enough dust to make it a starving blackhole.
Nevertheless it can still eat up a comet or two if they come close enough, as was shown in 2001 when the blackhole swallowed a comet and released enough x-rays to brighten a nearby star by 45 times its normal brightness. So its devouring capabilities are largely intact. By the way, blackholes cannot be seen and so are only discerned by the x-rays they emit.
On the face of it, careening headlong towards a blackhole is a mother of a disaster. Maybe not. The galactic centre is a massive area – a radio signal associated with the centre and called Sagittarius A emanates from an area with a diameter of 44 million kilometres.
There are a thousand stars and systems already very near the galactic centre, including a ‘sun’ that is seven times as big and 15 times as heavy as our sun, called the S2. It is so close to the centre that it only takes 15.2 years to orbit it (our sun does it in 50,000 plus years). In fact there are some 100 new stars, ‘born’ and evolved near the centre and scientists are baffled as to why this happened if a blackhole exists near to them.
No-one is absolutely sure how far away the centre of the galaxy is away from us presently. In the great scheme of things it could be trillions of kilometres away or ‘just around the corner’. For all we know, it could take the solar system a twinkling of time to cover the enormous distance, or it will not never happen in our lifetime. So far, so good as far as science is concerned
The creation of our galaxy
Now, our ancients had a good idea of what’s happening in the galaxy. Let’s look at our so-called mythology and see what these ancients have been trying to tell us.
Our galaxy is called the Milky Way, because of the dusting of the white that accompanies its spiral formation. And Lord Vishnu, the all-pervading, lies in the ocean of milk (Ksheer Sagar) on the endless coils of the serpent Anantha/Shesha Naag. The allegory is so right: the Ocean of Milk for the Milky Way, the coils of the serpent to indicate the spiralling nature of the galaxy. And Vishnu (the name means that which pervades all) right in the middle of it all, or forming the basis of it.
Vishnu in his preserver role, is either non-active or active, depending on whether creation (shristi) is in progress, or is in abeyance. When creation is in abeyance, Vishnu rests and the serpent lies coiled. Come creation, the serpent uncoils and everything starts happening, including the spinning off of solar/star systems and galaxies.
To start creation, a lotus pops out of Vishnu’s navel on which is borne Brahma, the creator. This is called Vishnu Naabhi and correlates to the centre of the galaxy (the seat of Brahma). And planets, suns, star and systems are spawned out of this centre. It is all a matter of expansion, for creation is expansion. As the systems evolve, they start their elliptical journey from the centre in an outward direction, growing, spawning and ‘living’.
For our solar system, this journey takes some 26,000 years before it comes back to the periapsis or pericentre( the point of closest approach to the centre) and it will take a similar timeframe to do the circuit in the opposite direction. Many of our astrologers are saying the elliptical journey for the sun is halfway done now and it is approaching the centre, where the solar system will be the closest to the Naabhi in the past 26,000 years.
Now all this galaxy creation is a microcosm of the greater role of creation, where Vishnu pervades the universe and Brahma starts creation of the galaxies and systems (or lokas). The process of creation is passed down intact to the lowest level so that any small creation is similar to the ultimate creation and vice versa. What is above is below and what is inside is outside. Or is our galaxy really the centre of the universe if it actually has the Vishni Naabhi at its centre?
The end of creation
And with creation comes dissolution, as it should be. The Naabhi started the creation and its here where dissolution must take place. As stars and systems spawned out of the centre, so must they come to the centre to be ‘consumed’.
The blackhole can be said to be the destroyer of the trinity, Shiva. The tandav dance of Shiva is the crackling, electrifying, super heavy, all-swallowing, x-ray emitting processes of a blackhole. It is the ultimate dissolution and destruction. Nothing escapes Shiva when he sets out to destroy something, not even light.
But dissolution is an ongoing business, not a one-time event only. Of course, for a planet about to be destroyed, it is a one-off thing but there are myriad of planets and each will eventually be destroyed. And each destruction will be termed a pralaya (dissolution).
Alternatively, followers of Shiva believe it differently. Shiva is the creator, preserver and destroyer all rolled in one, as represented by Natraja. The Tandav is itself the ongoing story of creation, preservation and destruction; a creation ringed by fire, keeping rhythm to the Anahat Sound, represented by Shiva’s damaru (drum).
Each of Natraja’s four arms symbolises the four aspect of divinity: beating the rhythm of the universe with the damaru; blessing us and telling us not to fear anything (abhayahasta); holding fire to show the destruction of both the universe and the ego; and, most importantly, pointing to the demon pinned under his foot that is not upraised in dance. The demon Apasmera represents ignorance, especially ignorance that is an offshoot of dualism. Others call the dwarf demon, Mara (illusion) or Maya (illusion).
Whichever way one will have it, the ancient knew a thing or two and tried their best to pass it on to us. Wrapped in allegory, metaphor and downright-in-your-face imagery, the workings of the universe was told to us. Yet, we failed to understand them.
Now, as science counts down the headlong rush of planet Earth to the centre of the galaxy, it is an apt time to look to our mythology and see what happened in such situations, and find counters to it, if we can. And to ask questions that we have dared not ask before.
Are we heading right into the jaws of this suppermassive blackhole? Is it Earth’s time to experience pralaya?
According to our scriptures, NO. The benign blackhole will certainly exert a force, a tremendous force but not enough to break the sun’s orbit of the centre. There is a great chance of survival for the Earth. But for the people and the other species that reside on Earth, it may be another thing.
Like I said, from the point of view of Earth, the adjustments to the planet may be minor indeed. But the trickle down effect on things living on it may be enormous. What awaits mankind as we speed ahead to this tryst?
The things that have been predicted could happen to us:
Cataclysms – major upheavals, including monster volcano eruptions (there is talk of the nine mountain gods erupting in several mythologies), Earthquakes, tsunamis of giant proportions. A vast majority of humanity will suffer and the planet will reface itself (resurfacing).
Cleansing - a virtual wiping out of many species without much damage to the planet itself. This includes solar winds that pass through the Earth’s protective magnetic shield and change the very molecular structure of things on the planet. It may also just burn every thing up, leaving no chance of cultivation on the surface, and thus little chance of civilisation surviving for very long. Electrical storms would disrupt communications and cut off everyone from everyone.
Consciousness – several cultures and several noteworthy scholars believe the closer we come to the centre of the galaxy the more in tune we become to the pervading consciousness of the universe (God, Brahman, Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti, etc). This rise in consciousness will, of course, come at a price. We will need to give up our body awareness (maybe even our bodies?) – either voluntarily or be forced to do so.
Our ancients have been calling for a new way of living for millennia, in which we are to go beyond body consciousness into the unified field consciousness. Our body is only a vehicle and we have to realise our real self to understand the part we must play in understanding the workings of the universe.
Has the time arrived for major upheavals to take place in our lives, in our very existence? If yes, are we ready for it? Most probably, no. The unrelenting sequels of natural disasters taking place on Earth should teach us something but we are too enamoured by life to see the deadly destruction. It is Yuddhistar who said (when asked by Yama) what was the most astounding thing on Earth: “Thousands are dying everyday but people believe that they will go on living forever. This is the most astounding thing”.
It is the killing of ignorance, especially of the duality of this world, that Shiva’s tandav is teaching us. Maybe it is time to actually look at what we really need to do and see how we can actually live while we still have a body and a mind to understand things.
Asato maa, Sad gamaya
Tamaso maa, Jyotir gamaya
Mrityo maa, Amritam gamaya
NOTES
Black holes
The intense gravity of the black hole prevents any light from escaping it, and it is therefore invisible. Its vicinity, however, contains a fairly high density of stars, including one big star--about 15 times the mass of the Sun and 7 times its radius--which was recently found to go around the centre with an orbital period of only 15.2 years. That star, designated S2 by astronomers, follows an ellipse which at its closest comes within about 124 astronomical units (1 AU=mean Sun-Earth distance) of the centre of the galaxy. At that time it speeds up to about 5000 km/sec--close to 2% of the velocity of light! Its side facing the black hole is somewhat closer to the black hole than the side facing away, and is therefore pulled more strongly; on a very close approach, such a difference could tear a star apart, but S2 would have to get some 70 times closer before that would happen, at a distance comparable to the orbital radius of Mars.
Galactic Centre of Milky Way
The central parsec around Sagittarius A* contains thousands of stars. Although most of them are old red main sequence stars, the Galactic Center is also rich in massive stars. More than 100 OB and Wolf-Rayet stars have been identified there so far. They seem to have all been formed in a single star formation event a few million years ago. The existence of these relatively young (though evolved) stars was a surprise to experts, who expected the tidal forces from the central black-hole to prevent their formation. This paradox of youth is even more remarkable for stars that are on very tight orbits around Sagittarius A*, such as S2.
A world-ending prophesy
Pope Leo IX (Pope from 1513-1522) wrote in 1514 of what is coming: "I will not see the end of the world, nor will you my brethren, for its time is long in the future, 500 years hence." 500 years hence would be 2014, just two years after the Mayan Prophecy End Date, and as Leo was obviously rounding the date to a full sum, it is very possible he is even referring to the year 2012.
Mayan Calendar and yuga separation of the Hindus
The now famous date December 21, 2012 is the date that the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, used by the preColumbian Maya civilization, and known by them and by the Aztecs as the Fifth Sun, completes a "great cycle" of thirteen b'ak'tuns. This means that since the last creation date on August 11 3114. or 13.0.0.0.0 in the Long Count calculation, the "clock hand" will have reached 13.0.0.0.0 again for the first time, marking the completion of this cycle.
Yet this period, lasting c. 5125 years, is just one last (fifth) part of an even longer cycle that turns out to be the same as the Great Year. Knowledge of the Great Year is found in other ancient astrological-astronomical records (i.e. in India) and so with further study the Mayan 2012 calendar end finds roots in other cultures too. With the ending of the last part of this age, the Mesoamerican cycle of five ages also completes. Herewith a large time period of five x 5,125 (c. 25,625 years) is also drawing to a close.
The second coming?
Mention of nine godlike figures is found in many ancient cultures - Maya, Egyptian, Chinese and Tibetan and if you do enough reading of the ancient texts it is quite clear that these nine were volcanic mountains.
They were connected to a very ancient plan that has been copied and kept alive in different areas of the world (you can begin to recognize the connection by reading on Nine Tibetan Mountain Gods). The Return is, then, of fallen or lost mountains, which might cause a certain amount of Earthquakes, tsunamis and eruptions. Moreover they were connected in the plan to one central volcanic mountain that marked the centre of the whole Earth, a mountain that has completely disappeared, sunk below the seas and into our own subconscious
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