
In Hindu Vedic and Puranic cosmology, a yuga is an extremely long time period, especially when measured on the human scale. The Hindu understanding of the yuga suggests that the experience of time, itself, differs for gods and humans. In the Mahabharata an entire human year translates into a single day for the devas.
Each of the four different yugas represent four general ages of the devas. As with the ancient Greek and Hebraic sense of time, these ages progress from an initial, ideal Golden Age (Krita/Satya Yuga) to increasingly corrupted ages. In the Hindu system, however, its believed that the “ages” are cyclic. That is, the universe evolves in great cycles. The four yugas and their human equivalents are:¹
Yuga | Deva Years | Human Years |
Krita/Satya | 4800 | 1,728,000 |
Treta | 3600 | 1,296,000 |
Dvapara | 2400 | 864,000 |
Kali | 1200 | 432,000 |
Mahayuga (Great Yuga) | 12,000 | 4,320,000 |
A single day for the creator god Brahma is 1,000 Mahayugas (4,320,000,000 human years). One year for Brahma is 1,555,200,000,000 human years. Brahma’s life span is 155,520,000,000,000 human years.
All this indicates that Brahma exists in an entirely different place and time frame than human beings.
An arguably mythical, quasi-scientific scheme like this may seem irrelevant to contemporary thinkers but it points to the notion, worth considering, that the universe contains different yet interacting regions of space-time, each region containing its own unique properties, beings or perhaps just consciousness.
The Swiss psychiatrist C. G. Jung alluded to this idea with his concept of the archetypes. Jung said the archetypes were powerful enough to eclipse ego consciousness and even drive a person mad. He also said that the archetypes were both biological and spiritual. This latter aspect tends to vex materialist thinkers, something that Jung was fully aware of in his time.
Also from the perspective of depth psychology is the notion that psychological development may progress in cycles. Some feel that comparing this idea to the notion that the universe, itself, moves in cycles is pushing it. Others say that there’s a structural correspondence between micro and macro events. The debate goes on…
Related Posts » Puranas, Ragnarok, Veda
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¹ A Mahayuga (Great Yuga) is one complete cycle of the four yugas. Table adapted and condensed from Keith R. Crim (ed.) The Perennial Dictionary of World Religions. New York: Harper & Row, 1989, pp. 818-819. Depending on who’s doing the naming, the names of the yugas vary a little. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuga
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http://www.ebookomatic.com/publish/AuthorLibrary.asp?Aid=241
http://www.cosmologytrust.blogspot.com
DR Vidyardhi Nanduri, 3, Vikaspuri, Hyderabad-500038-INDIA
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Your above Information:
A single day for the god Brahma is 1,000 Mahayugas (4,320,000,000 human years). One year for Brahma is 1,555,200,000,000 human years. Brahma’s life span is 155,520,000,000,000 human years.
Late SD Kulkarni edited a volume of work and mentions 10^17 Years as well. East West Interactions helps advancement of Science as well.
Cosmology- Modern Space Science -Space Data- interpretation of Vedas need a tremendous excercise and Support to put the record straight. A lot of money , I find, is wasted by dogmatic Scientists unable to search for dormant Energy existing from the Earth planet
Many Nobel Laureates are looking forward for an authentic
East-West Interaction centre for dialogues
Sponsors can contact me
Vidyardhi Nanduri
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Late SD Kulkarni edited a volume of work and mentions 10^17 Years as well.
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Thanks… I’d be surprised if there were no debate on this. Could you please, if possible, provide bibliographic info on the Kulkarni work you mention?
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Fascinating! The concept of time has always held a captive of my mind… to read on other interpretations and beliefs is a great and interesting venture…
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I have included in my books . All the above informationyou have mentioned is a copied part from the reference material, I have,Origin of the Universe-Problem of Indian Chronolgy- 1988 published by Late. SD Kulkarni -General Editor- with about 12 Scholars covering various aspects, that include Members from All India Philosophical Congress.
. You have to take 50 years of BRAHMA-already elapsed as a multiplier.
I have to retype information for you-Please wait.
Late Moparty Gopala Rao, Wisdom of Gods , has also worked out with a different perpsectve.
The reason why I request East-West Interaction is to protect original author’s works and interact for interlinks-Science,Philosophy, Cosmology and many other related fields
http://www.ebookomatic.com/publish/AuthorLibrary.asp?Aid=241
http://www.cosmologytrust.blogspot.com
DR Vidyardhi Nanduri, 3, Vikaspuri, Hyderabad-500038-INDIA
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Thank you very much. The deeper I study the more I realize that a lot of the same information is just passed around with slightly different wording. Sometimes it is properly referenced and other times not. That’s why I like to make it unique by adding my own views, interacting with people like yourself, and so on.
Incidentally, you may find my article “Farewell to Karma” interesting, as well as the comments that follow:
http://epages.wordpress.com/2008/06/20/farewell-to-karma-past-lives-are-just-so-yesterday/
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Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet writes that the 432,000 figure of the Yuga is actually seconds of degrees of celestial arc, NOT YEARS. A full 360 degree circle has 1,296,000 degrees of arc (360 degrees x 60 minutes of arc x 60 seconds of arc = 1,296,000″). In terms of the 25,920 year (360 degree) Precession of the Equinoxes, 432,000″ = ONE THIRD of the Precession = 8640 years. More explaination is given in ‘The Gnostic Circle’ and in the comments of the following link: http://pnb-controversies.blogspot.com/2006/11/yugas-precession-of-equinoxes.html
Additional Note: Ms. Norelli-Bachelet has recently begun a blog ‘Puranic Cosmology Updated’ that may be of interest to readers interested in Vedic and Puranic Cosmology. http://puraniccosmologyupdated.blogspot.com/
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