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Yuga

 

(South and Central Asian mythology)

In Hindu cosmology, an age of the world. The four ages—Krita, Treta, Dwapara, and Kali–are preceded and followed by periods of twilight, whose duration is each one-tenth of a yuga. Krita Yuga, the first age of the world, lasts 4,000 divine years; Treta Yuga, the second age, 3,000; Dwapara Yuga, the third, 2,000 years; and Kali Yuga, the fourth, 1,000 years. The entire cycle of ages and intervals of twilight extends over 12,000 years, which equals, allowing for the fact that a year of the gods is reckoned at 360 years of men, a total of 4,320,000 years. This unit of cosmological time is known as a mahayuga, 2,000 of which constitute a kalpa, a day and night of Brahma, or 8,640,000,000 years. Though Brahma re-creates the universe at the beginning of each kalpa, this process lasts for not more than a para, a century of such days and nights. According to Hindu tradition, the life of Brahma and the universe lasts for a para. Our present kalpa is at the beginning of the second half of the para, making Brahma fifty years old. Only one Hindu school of philosophy has ever denied that the world is finite in time, and shared with Jainism the idea of an eternal, uncreated universe.

During the Krita Yuga righteousness is supreme. People are virtuous and fulfil their duties without malice, sadness, pride, or deceit; there is nothing to disturb the calmness of this age. In the Treta Yuga changes in relationships start to occur. Duties are no longer the spontaneous laws of human behaviour, but have to be learned. Sacrifices are needed; people follow truth and devote themselves to righteousness through ceremonies, which are regarded as a means of obtaining specific objects. Dwapara Yuga witnesses increased imbalance along with a steady decline in righteousness. The Rig Veda appears. Diseases, desires, and disasters harass the people, some of whom seek release in austerities or ritual practices. Finally, Kali Yuga, the dark age of today, is riven with quarrels, dissension, wars, and strife. Love and sex are separated. Few know truth. Possessions, not righteousness, confer rank and the outer trappings are confused with inner religion. Our period, which began in 3102 BC, has another 427 centuries to run.

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n. Hinduism
One of the four ages constituting a cycle of history.

[Sanskrit yugam, yoke, pair, era.]


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Yuga (Devanāgari: युग) in Hindu philosophy is the name of an 'epoch' or 'era' within a cycle of four ages. These are the Satya Yuga (or Krita Yuga), the Treta Yuga, the Dvapara Yuga and finally the Kali Yuga. According to Hindu cosmology, life in the universe is created, destroyed once every 4.1 to 8.2 billion years[1] [2], which is one full day (day and night) for Brahma. The lifetime of a Brahma himself may be 311 trillion and 40 Billion years.[1] The cycles are said to repeat like the seasons, waxing and waning within a greater time-cycle of the creation and destruction of the universe. Like Summer, Spring, Winter and Autumn, each yuga involves stages or gradual changes which the earth and the consciousness of mankind goes through as a whole. A complete yuga cycle from a high Golden Age of enlightenment to a Dark Age and back again is said to be caused by the solar system's motion around a central sun.[citation needed]

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Sri Yukteswar's teachings on the yugas

An alternative view of the yuga cycle and time scale was taught by the 19th/20th-century Indian yogi Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri, guru of Paramahansa Yogananda.[3]

In his book, The Holy Science, Sri Yukteswar explained that the descending phase of Satya Yuga lasts 4800 years, the Treta Yuga 3600 years, Dwapara Yuga 2400 years, and the Kali Yuga 1200 years. The ascending phase of the Kali Yuga then begins, also lasting 1200 years. The ascending phase of the Kali Yuga began in September of 499 AD. Since September 1699, we have been in the descending phase of the Dwapara Yuga, according to Sri Yukteswar.[3]

In The Holy Science, Sri Yukteswar wrote that the traditional or long count view is based on a misunderstanding. He says that at the end of the last descending Dvapara Yuga (about 700 BC), "Maharaja Yudhisthira, noticing the appearance of the dark Kali Yuga, made over his throne to his grandson [and]...together with all of his wise men...retired to the Himalaya Mountains... Thus there was none in the court...who could understand the principle of correctly accounting the ages of the several Yugas."[3]

According to Sri Yukteswar, nobody wanted to announce the bad news of the beginning of the ascending Kali Yuga, so they kept adding years to the Dvapara date (at that time 2400 Dvapara) only retitling the epoch to Kali. As the Kali began to ascend again, scholars of the time recognized that there was a mistake in the date (then being called 3600+ Kali, even their texts said Kali had only 1200 years). "By way of reconciliation, they fancied that 1200 years, the real age of Kali, were not the ordinary years of our earth, but were so many daiva (or deva) years ("years of the gods"), consisting of 12 daiva months of 30 daiva days each, with each daiva day being equal to one ordinary solar year of our earth. Hence according to these men 1200 years of Kali Yuga must be equal to 432,000 years of our earth."[3]

Sri Yukteswar explained that just as the cycle of day and night is caused by a celestial motion (the earth spinning on its axis in relation to the sun), and just as the cycle of the seasons are caused by a celestial motion (the earth with tilted axis orbiting the sun) so too is the yuga cycle (seen as the precession of the equinox), caused by a celestial motion. He explained this celestial motion as the movement of the whole solar system around another star. As our sun moves through this orbit, it takes the solar system (and earth) closer to and then further from a point in space known as the "grand centre" also called 'Vishnunabhi', which is the seat of the creative power, 'Brahma', [which]...regulates...the mental virtue of the internal world." He implied that it is the proximity of the earth and sun to this grand centre that determines which season of man or yuga it is.[3]

Quoting from The Holy Science, Sri Yukteswar states that our sun revolves round a grand center called Vishnunabhi, which is the seat of the creative power, Brahma, the universal magnetism. Brahma regulates dharma, the mental virtue of the internal world. Sri Yukteswar states: ...the sun, with its planets and their moons, takes some star for its dual and revolves round it in about 24,000 years of our earth.... Essentially, When the sun in its revolution round its dual comes to the place nearest to this grand center, the seat of Brahma...the mental virtue, becomes so much developed that man can easily comprehend all, even the mysteries of Spirit." Further, ...when the sun goes to the place in its orbit which is farthest from Brahma, the grand center...the mental virtue, comes to such a reduced state that man cannot grasp anything beyond the gross material creation. Paramahansa Yogananda, devotee of Sri Yukteswar, dates his forward in the book as 249 Dwapara (1949 AD). The period of 2400 years during which the sun passes through the 2/20th portion of its orbit is called Dwapara Yuga. Dharma, the mental virtue, is then in the second stage of development and is but half complete; the human intellect can then comprehend the fine matters of electricities and their attributes which are the creating principles of the external world.

See also

References

  1. ^ Sagan, Carl (1985). Cosmos. Ballantine Books. ISBN 978-0345331359.  p. 258.
  2. ^ Capra, Fritjof (1991). Tao of Physics. Shambhala. ISBN 978-0877735946.  p. 198
  3. ^ a b c d e Sri Yukteswar, Swami (1949). The Holy Science. Yogoda Satsanga Society of India. 

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World Mythology Dictionary. A Dictionary of World Mythology. Copyright © Arthur Cotterell 1979, 1986, 2003. All rights reserved.  Read more
Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
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