This Puranic concept is virtually the Hindu theory of evolution of life on earth. According to this concept, we are now approximately 5000 years into the Kali-yuga which started at the death of Lord Krishna, the 9th incarnation, and marked the end the third eon, the Duwaper-yuga. Rama was the 7th and the last of the three incarnations in the preceding Treta-yuga and followed the 6th incarnation of Parsurama in the same eon. It is interesting to note that the Ramayana story mentions both these incarnations. The story describes a face to face confrontation between Lord Rama and Parsurama at the occasion of Rama’s wedding. Lord Parsurama retires to the heavens after getting convinced of Rama being the next incarnation. Working backwards in time from the current period in Kali-yuga we can estimate the Puranic time of this change over from 6th to the 7th incarnation. We are almost five thousand years into the Kali-yuga which is believed to have started at the end of Duwaper-yuga with the death of Lord Krishna, the ninth incarnation. Adding 864,000 years of the Duwaper-yuga, brings us to 869,000 years back at the end of the Treta-yuga of which Rama was the last incarnation. Thus the period of changeover from the sixth incarnation of Lord Parsurama to the 7th incarnation of Lord Rama may be easily placed at 900,000 years back in time.
Parsurama armed with axe may, in fact, represent the evolutionary stage of tool using hunter gatherers. Rama’s skills in using bow and arrow makes the evolving man the master of the animal kingdom leading to the start of the civilization as we know it. This may, to some extent, explain the meaning of the suggestion by the divine sage Narada for sage Valmiki to base his story on the first hero of the civilization according to the Puranic concepts, thus providing a time stamp for the epic.
The story of Ramayana may have been inspired by the Puranic incarnations but appears to have been composed much later to serve as a guide to the mankind for right conduct. Story of the Ramayana is played in the form of amateur theater every year in every nook and corner of India. The story is repeated time and again in daily pursuits of the population so that everybody becomes thoroughly conversant with the conduct of each character of the story. Conduct of the characters appearing in the story of Ramayana covers almost all aspects of day to day life. These characters define virtual laws for right conduct for the people thus providing suitable role models for the people to base their actions upon.
Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human says that humans are bipedal primates belonging to the species Homo sapiens (Latin: "wise man" or "knowing man") in Hominidae, the great ape family.[2][3] They are the only surviving member of the genus Homo. Humans have a highly developed brain, capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem solving. This mental capability, combined with an erect body carriage that frees the arms for manipulating objects, has allowed humans to make far greater use of tools than any other species. Mitochondrial DNA and fossil evidence indicates that modern humans originated in Africa about 200,000 years ago.[4] Humans now inhabit every continent and low Earth orbit, with a total population of 6.8 billion as of November 2009.[5]
Like most higher primates, humans are social by nature. However, humans are uniquely adept at utilizing systems of communication for self-expression, the exchange of ideas, and organization. Humans create complex social structures composed of many cooperating and competing groups, from families to nations. Social interactions between humans have established an extremely wide variety of values, social norms, and rituals, which together form the basis of human society. Humans have a marked appreciation for beauty and aesthetics which, combined with the human desire for self-expression, has led to cultural innovations such as art, literature and music.
Humans are noted for their desire to understand and influence their environment, seeking to explain and manipulate natural phenomena through science, philosophy, mythology and religion. This natural curiosity has led to the development of advanced tools and skills, which are passed down culturally; humans are the only extant species known to build fires, cook their food, clothe themselves, and use numerous other technologies.
B.C., which stands for "Before Christ," is used to date events before the birth of Jesus. A.D. is the abbreviation for the Latin phrase anno Domini, which means "in the year of our Lord," and is used for dates after Jesus's birth. This system of dating has been used for many years by Western archaeologists. Today, however, with a growing understanding that not all archaeologists are Christians, some archaeologists prefer to use the terms: Before the Common Era (B.C.E.) and the Common Era (C.E.), which are exactly the same as B.C. and A.D. but have nothing to do with Christianity.
An illiterate woodcutter, from deep Satpura region remembers full Ramayana since birth. Most intriguing is the fact that it is a gift betowed to him since birth. He can not read and write. And he never heard anyone read it to him. His parents never could read and write either. He knows "Sri Ramayana" inside out. One can read out three consecutive words from anywhere in Ramayana and he can recite the rest of the full Epic in Sri Tulsidas ji's words. He has been gifted with the Ramayana since his birth. Since he could speak. He can not still read it in the book but lives, dreams and worships it. Hats off to the yogis of this great nation. I for one, never believed it and when I did, I could not help but put it in front of the world to aknowledge the power of the unknown. We as humans know so little and are so remote from the ultimate truth. A glimpse I got to see in Osaka, Japan as well- but then that's another story.....
The concept of describing dates astronomically has been a practice in India since days bygone and thus lot of Indian literature are embedded with such astronomical data. This is a technique of charting the future or past sky using a scientific tool. This tool helps to arrive at planetary positions given a date in future or past and vice-versa i.e. given a set of planetary configurations, arrive at the date either in future or in the past. Such tools are collectively called Planetarium software. There are probably over 50 such different software available. Each software can be used specifically for a particular application, like, plotting the current night sky chart, predicting eclispes and the likes. When spacecrafts are launched to visit far-off planets like Jupiter and Saturn, it would take a travel time of well over 12 years for the spacecraft to reach these planets. This software helps determine orbital positions of the planets when the spacecraft reaches their orbits. For this, a high level of precision is required in the software. Unlike any other civilization so far, the literature of the Indian civilization is characterised for being embedded with night sky observations. Feeding the observations of the planetary configurations into the Planetarium software gives us the English calender dates when these configurations could have occured in the past. When these dates are logically arranged along with the events, it helps us to scientifically assign dates to events mentioned in Indian legends and historical texts, and validate them. Thus the astronomical remains left behind in our literature can be analysed scientifically to arrive at historic dates for various events. This approach is parallel to archaeology where physical remains are analysed to arrive at historic dates and hence gives rise to a new branch of scientific dating which may be called Archaeo-astronomy. Various modern day researchers have made use of this software to arrive at such historic dates for various events described in the Indian literature. We have collated the outputs of such credible work which are worthy of standing up to cross validation. In the context of the Historicity of Rama, the works of Shri. Pushkar Bhatnagar, as brought out in the book "Dating the Era of Lord Ram" form the basis of what is presented here to understand the dates of the events in Rama’s lifetime. This particular text, Ramayana, when analysed from a scientific perspective using such Archeo-Astronomy techniques, shows tremendous internal consistency between the events described astronomically and the storyline based elapse time between those events. This method puts forth the below mentioned dates for the events that occur in the Ramanaya legend.
Sri Rama Navami - Birth day : 10th January 5114 BCE
Birth of Bharatha : 11th January 5114 BCE
Pre coronation eve : 4th January 5089 BCE
Khar, Dushan episode : 7th October 5077 BCE
Vali Vadham : 3rd April 5076 BCE
Hanuman's Visit to Lanka : 12th September 5076 BCE
Hanuman's Return from Lanka : 14th September 5076 BCE
It is indeed noteworthy to observe that these dates are internally consistent. While the purpose of this software was different, it has now thrown open a potential for a new branch of science which can be named Archeo Astronomy as just like archeology it can help date events as described in literature. This software has now become declassified and is available for public use. This modern method of – Archeo Astronomy is still not accepted or practiced by traditional historians as it requires knowledge of traditional astronomy, mathematics as well modern day sky chart reading techniques all of which go into the realm of science. This branch of archeology requires and will create a new breed of archeologists and has the potential to date more events from our vast store of literature than traditional archeology can.
OK, even if these texts are to be considered historic texts and the events mentioned therein to be dated as close to 7000 years ago based on Archeo Astronomy, there seems to be an inconsistency with the time period pronounced as 17,50,000 years ago, based on NASA’s satellite image? Why this mismatch? I fact being an author and researcher I strongly do believe that the Setu to Lanka was present before Ramayana. Now question arises if it is then we have to check whether there was any civilization 17,50,000 years ago who could really develop such long bridge?
Physical Observation : Today the bridge measures approx 35 km in length Vs 3.5km in breadth from Dhanushkodi to Talaimannar which is a 100:10 ratio.
Throughout history, there has been catastrohic events (i.e. ice ages, extinction, etc.). Could it be possible that with the 4.5 billion year old planet (oldest rocks on Earth date to around that time) we are living on it could have had at one time ancient civilizations, ones that had a superior intelligence like or even greater than our own?
If you think that creation recycling is possible then please refer to the following :
Earth Born : 4,500,000,000 years ago
Life Started : 4,000,000,000
Last Universal Ancestor : 3,900,000,000
First appearance of oxygen creating bacteria : 3,000,000,000
First Appearance of oxygen using bacteria : 2,500,000,000
Multicelluar life appears : 1,000,000,000
First vertebrates : 500,000,000
First plants on land : 475,000,000
Evolution of the egg, first reptiles : 300,000,000
Dinosaurs extinct : 65,000,000
Man seperates from great apes : 5,000,000
Man uses tools : 2,000,000
Modern humans appear : 100,000
First settlements : 15,000
According to theory, it took 500 million years for life to start, but for the next 3 billion years, only single cells existed. Seeing as though Earth is 4.5 billion years old, for 3/4 of its life, only single celled life existed.
Point 001. Man seperates from great apes : 5,000,000
Point 002. Man uses tools : 2,000,000
Point 003. The legends as well as Archeological studies reveal that the first signs of human inhabitants in Sri Lanka date back to the a primitive age, about 1,750,000 years ago and the bridge´s age is also almost equivalent.
Point 004. Modern humans appear : 100,000
Thus points 1,2,3 and point 4 contradictory. Lord Rama was educated - he was modern - he knew Sanskrit. Modern human appears 100,000 years back. So how the bridge took place 1,750,000 years ago? I think Ramayana took place around 8000 years back. Lord Rama just used it and renovated before the time of war.
Again I mention about the traditional timescale. The traditional timescale of the yugas suggests that the Satya Yuga lasts 1,728,000 years, the Treta Yuga 1,296,000 years, the Dvapara Yuga 864,000 years and the Kali Yuga 432,000 years. As this list indicates, each yuga is progressively shorter. In total, a complete cycle constitutes 4,320,000 years, a period of time which is known as a mahayuga (or "great Yuga"). One thousand mahayugas are said to constitute a day in the life of the creator god Brahma, also known as a kalpa, which is the fundamental cosmic cycle in Hinduism. You multiply 4,320,000 years by thousand and the result is 432 billion years nearly equal to 4,500,000,000 years i.e. the age of earth. In each kalpa earth destroys according to Purana. Since our earth's current age is greater than 1000 mahayugas = 1 kalpa = 4.32 billion years = 432 crores years so our earth could be destroyed meanwhile according to the facts described in Purana.
But it didn't happen so.
Next Lord Rama used so many tools in the war and again to mention that Purana says that Satya Yuga lasts 1,728,000 years, the Treta Yuga 1,296,000 years, the Dvapara Yuga 864,000 years and the Kali Yuga 432,000 years. Point to note that Matsya (the fish), Kurma (the turtle), Varaha (the boar) and Narasimha (the man-lion), the first four incarnations of Vishnu, appear in this epoch i.e. in Satya Yuga. It means that that time there was no sign of human. Man seperates from great apes : 5,000,000 years ago. So if from the birth of earth yuga calculation starts then Stya Yuga started 4,500,000,000 years ago and ended 4,500,000,000 - 1,728,000 = 3,998,272,000 years ago. So 3,998,272,000 years ago was it possible for Matsya (the fish), Kurma (the turtle), Varaha (the boar) and Narasimha (the man-lion) to occur? And clearly Narasimha (the man-lion) doesn't exist anymore. It has been a rare animal many years back. We know that oxygen creating bacteria appeared 3,000,000,000 years back. So it is not possible. So the way we count years can't be used in order to understand the traditional timescale described in Purana.
One more point.
Mahayuga consists of 4,320,000 years. Each Mahayuga consists four yugas and from Treta Yuga we use to find out the traces of human. Since earth's present age is 4.5 billion years so more than 10 mahayugas are supposed to take place. Think about the first Mahayuga's Treta Yuga. Did any human born that time? Never. Not possible.
So the traditional timescale must have spiritual meanings. The inner meanings are hidden. Suddenly I have found that 30x60x24x10=432000 (span of Kalyuga) . 432000x2=864000 (span of DwaparaYuga). 432000x3=1296000 (span of Treta Yuga) 432000x4=1728000 (span of Satya Yuga).
Span of (satya:treta:dwapara:kal) yuga = 4:3:2:1. Total span of these four ages = 4,320,000 years. Man seperates from great apes : 5,000,000.
From this thing I conclude that calculation of Yuga started from that day when man seperates from great apes i.e. 5,000,000 years ago. The authors who mentioned the traditional timescale, they must have started from that age. Before that probably they didn't consider.
So now one thing is clear from when the Yuga calculation started.
Now we can take into account the time period pronounced as 17,50,000 years ago, based on NASA’s satellite image. It is possible.
Assumption : Satya Yuga started 5000000 years back and ended 5000000 - 1728000 = 3272000 years back. Treta started 3272000 years ago and ended 3272000 - 129600 = 1976000 years ago and during this period Ramayana took place. This calculation nearly supports the knowledge that Man uses tools : 2,000,000. During the war many tools were used. Dwapara started 1976000 years ego and ended 1976000 - 864000 = 1112000 years ago and kalyuga started since then whose span is 432000 years. It seems that Kalyuga has ended and we are presently at Satya Yuga. But no. As per the characteristics of the epoch, the inhabitants never die until they are wiling to do that, I think that Kali Yuga is not ended. It is the fagend. Some residuals in the calculation i.e. some lakh of years is not a major fault when we are considering 1/2 billion years. Again I have started the calculation from the time when man seperates from great apes i.e. 5,000,000 years back. And one mahayuga consists of 4320000 years. So at the first stage of back tracing I have taken 7 lakhs of years as error factor.
Finally I find it is very unnatural that Ramayana took place 17 lakhs of years back. The humans were not so much advanced. How could they handle equipments like arrow-bow, gada etc by their grips? How could they invent Missiles? It is said that Valmiki wrote Ramayana during the time it happened. How funny is it? Did we know to write epics, novels, poems 17 lakhs years back?
Never. If we believe that then our Bio - Science is wrong. Whatever we know - all are wrong. So long long span of Mahayuga, Kalpa has other inner meaning. I believe that each yuga consists 5000 years. Thus Ramayana held nearly 8000 years back. Against this I will surely post some logics.
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