What Yuga are we in?

The full article can be found here on Wikipedia.

 

Actually it isnt just the Sai followers that say that, pretty much every Hindu organisation follows that same second arrangement of yugas. And if you look around you, it is obvious enough that we are in the kali yuga.

 

Depends what Loka you're living on.

 

how so?

 

Sorry - just an attempt at humour.

 

ok...

 

'This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius' they sang in my youth.

 

"Kali Yuga we really are in it, heavy metal Age, where Spiritual common sense seems like magic because we're ensnared in brainwash network--the mechanical conditioning of our unconditioned consciousness." -Allen Ginsberg excerpt from the Bhagavad Gita AS IT IS

 

Oops. I was accidentally logged in as my sister. The above post by MountainGirlie was written by me. Just in case you were going to PM me for some reason.. I didn't want to confuse the heck out of her.

 

Question!

Why is it obvious? What about looking around one makes it obvious that the Yuga we are living in is Kali?

One of the problems I have with new equipment at work, like our phone system which is IP based telephones that run off their own server, using their own specially designed operating system, is that when I have questions about the operations of the system, the designers talk to me like I was supposed to have been one of the designers. So I suspect you are treating the readers as if they were / are supposed to know what a Yuga is, much less that we are living in a particular Yuga based on obvious observation without knowing what the last Yuga was like in order to base comparisons.

So, why do you say it's obvious we are living in Kali Yuga? Have you lived in Kali Yuga prior to this one in order to compare it to a previous Kali Yuga to make certain observations of "Yeah, this is Kali Yuga because it is just like the last one"?

???

Darrell

 

Darrell, if you read the first post on this thread, it explains exactly what a yuga is. The kali yuga is an age of spiritual darkness, where the vast majority live in ignorance, hatred, intolerance, where the true essence of religion is hidden from most people and they follow gross misinterpretations of it. It is an age of moral decay and violence, where basic values in life are lost.

In the fourteenth chapter of the last canto of the "Paramahamsa
Samhita" portion of the Vayu Purana, named "Sri Gauranga Candra
Udaya", Lord Brahma prays to the Supreme Lord Sri Hari thus:

"In the age of Kali, people are spontaneously attracted to sinful
activities and are devoid of the regulations of the scriptures. The
so-called "twice-born" are degraded by their low-class activities and
those who are born in low-class families are alway s hostile to
brahminical culture. The twice-born are low-class by quality and do
business by selling mantras. These so-called learned men are
absorbed in their intestines and genitals and their only
identification is the thread they wear. Indulging in overeating,
absorbed in bodily consciousness, lazy, intellectually dull and
greedy for others properties, they are consistantly against God-
consciousness. Due to being overly inclined towards false paths
without essence, they manufacture their own processes for self-
realisation. Neglecting their actual duties they are expert in
blaspheming You (the Supreme Personality of Godhead) and the saintly
persons; hence again Mother Earth is in tears due to this burden.
Therefore, Oh Lord of the Universe, destroyer of the miseries of the
destitute, please mercifully do what is befitting for the protection
of the Earth and the living entities."


One quick visit to India will tell you that this is exqctly what is happening in a lot of places with the priests and brahmins selling mantras etc.

O learned one, in this iron age of Kali men have but short lives.
They are quarrelsome, lazy, misguided, unlucky and, above all, always
disturbed." (Srimad-Bhagavatam 1.1.10)


There is a lot more of it, http://www.adishakti.org/forum/kali_yuga_the_conciousness_of_lower_chakras_8-11-2004.htm. It is scary, it is very obviously happening. Note that all this was forecast in Srimad Bhagavatam, written eons ago.

 

Really who can say what yuga this is? Or if yugas actually exist outside human calculation.

To view this as a dark age, as trad Hinduism does, seems to mean a kind of depressive approach to life - if things go wrong we can always blame it on kali yuga.
But maybe Sri Yukteswar was correct - or maybe its the age of aquarius, the eon of horus or even emmanuel swedenborg's new age. Depends what book you're using at the time.
But also, where the trad Hindu system of yugas goes, it is hardly to be taken as historical fact - certainly it flies in the face of scientific discoveries.

 

it IS a dark age. Mankind is comitting atrocities undreamt of in the past. To not see it is to turn a blind eye to what goes on.

 

Really it's only the scale of things that is different now. The NAZI attempt at genocide is shocking, for example, but only because of the scale. Other nations - the Brits and the US tried the same thing on a smaller scale in the 19th c.
There has always been opression and injustice.

My point is that things are not worse intrinsically now compared to the past - its just that its all bigger. And of course, because of the real progress that has taken place, we're all that much more informed of what is going on in the world.

Also, although people in the past tended to believe in a 'golden age' that once existed on earth, there is very little evidence for this, and much that contradicts it. Unless we believe in such a past golden age, it seems pointless to call this a dark age. Unless we say the dark age began with the advent of mankind on this planet.

You say one has to turn a blind eye not to see this is a dark age - but don't turn a blind eye to the good in the world either, or to the fact that to-day, we posses far more of the resources needed to deal with things like global poverty than was the case even 50 years ago. There are many problems, there is much that is bad, but there is also a lot that is good.

It is even possible that we are living at the beginning of a new age in terms of spiritual knowledge and so on. Many have suggested this. Even the fact that this inter-action here is taking place is symptomatic of that even - in a very small way.

But in the end, who can say? Just the fact that there is a disagreement with the traditional view from one of the stature of Sri Yukteswar ought perhaps to make one accept that this is all far from written in stone.

 

We have the resources to battle poverty. So how come more almost half of India is still below the poverty line? How come people are starving in Africa? In fact the problems of poverty were minimal in India. Even in the reign of the Guptas, which was not too long ago, it was a great flourishing golden age. In a lot of ways the world is advanced now, but spiritually, without a doubt there is a huge decline. The world is far far more materialistic. Spiritual knowledge was a part of education a generation ago. Today many children dont even know basic mantras and prayers. Vegetarianism is on a decline. With the advent of factory farms (another wonderful result of modern science) animals are being tortured and brutally exploited by the million. The environment is a shambles.

There is still a lot of good in the world. The world is perfect, as it always was. All Im sying is that, when the current state was described so very accurately, several centuries ago, those guys knew what they were talking about obviously. It is happening right now, every word of it is coming true.

Our fundamental disagreement is you dont believe that avatars actually came to earth, you dont accept a lot of what the scriptures say. I do. It is fine, like some wise person said earlier, show me the love. Reason is irrelevant.

 

It's no good to view things at a local level. We have to begin to think globally. During the rule of the Guptas in India, hardly a 'golden age', much other stuff was going on in other parts of the world.


As to poverty etc. and it's relief - just this last week the British chancellor has announced debt relief for African countries, and during Britain's presidency of the G7 the intention is to try to deal with this. How successful this will be remains to be seen. But even if it's not, the fact is that there are enough rescources to tackle these problems. All it needs is the will on the part of the world's rich nations.

Just a generation ago, very few outside of India had even heard of Mantras, Meditation etc. Now, there is interest in the west.This must be progress.

As you know from past postings, I don't accept the idea that the world is perfect. However, it may be perfectible through human effort. Certainly conditions for millions can be improved.

Avatars have come - I'm not denying that. But not all speak of the Kali Yuga.
But I'm not saying it's not Kali yuga - only that there are grounds for doubt, that we can't be certain. Also, I am far from convinced that this is functional view. It could lead to a sense of hopelessness. We are victims once again - of the very age into which we were born.

 

We are not victims at all. Bhakti yoga has been described as the perfect tool for self realisation in the kali yuga, since it is easiest to practise. Also the end of the kali yuga will come with the coming of the 10th avatar of Vishnu, which is kalki avatar. What greater hope can there be, than to know that the entire concentrated tejas of brahman is going to take form and come to protect dharma?

And also, rather than be demoralised and hopeless, we must be further driven to rise beyond these seeming imperfections and realise the atma swaroopa.

 

delete

 

The post that was here previously I have deleted as Philuk deleted the post to which it was a response.

 

PS


Dear Bhaskar,

It is an unfortunate fact that many people do think of themselves as victims. In a way, its a psychological device - it is one of the ways in which people avoid having to deal with the negativity etc in themselves which causes them unhappiness. Instead, they look for external causes. - "It's his fault!"
"Its the system!" - "It's my parents!" etc. Lets not add "well, what do you expect - we live in the dark age".

This idea was something I encountered a few years ago when I met a group of spiritual healers. I was surprised when I looked at this just how much I myself have done it over years. Blamed everything , including the time-frame in which I was born for my problems and difficulties.
I know that we are all living under external conditions which are far from ideal. But the difficulty comes if we then begin to slip into 'victim consciousness'. It just makes us even less able to deal with things, and can lead even to physical illness. We have to be like Arjuna, and fight the good fight.

Sorry if this is off topic.