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When the invitation of the Beloved
reaches your mind and heart to “come and see”, you must be prepared to
venture forth, without attachment to anything or anyone you have known or seen
in this world. You must walk with light yet firm step, through the fields of
life with your vision ever centered on that truth. “Come and see where I
dwell.” Thus your mind will be uplifted and the burden will become light. You
will ascend in consciousness as though on invisible wings bearing you to your
true abode. The voice of the Beloved will resound in the air, and you will not
know whence it came, for you will hear it everywhere. ~SWAMI
SHANKARANANDA
"For some people, God's existence is not
vague. For the pure
devotees of the Lord He is always visible. But not everyone is on that
level. Why not? Krishna explains in the Bhagavad-gita that
as people surrender to Him He rewards them accordingly. As much as we
desire to see Krishna, He will make Himself visible. And as much as we
want to forget Him, He will enable us to forget Him. If we want to
perceive God, He will enable us to do so. Although there is a process
for that, God will not force us to take it up. We have freedom, and
without freedom there can be no love. The original relationship of the
soul with God is one of love, and love must be free, not forced. So our
forgetfulness is a function of our own exercise of our free will in our
loving relationship with God..."
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"Originally, we have spiritual senses that can
perceive God directly. These
spiritual senses have now been covered by the material energies.
Therefore our
perceptions are now material. There are processes for removing the
covering energies.
In our current state, the covered senses are like a mirror covered with
dust. Although
the mirror is capable of reflecting clear images, it cannot because of
the dust. But
when the dust is removed, the mirror properly reflects images. Our
material consciousness
is like that. Pure consciousness, and pure sense perception are there.
But they have
been covered with the "dust" of the material energy. So there
are processes given in the
Vedic literature, and in other world religions, for removing the dust.
One of these processes
is meditation (contemplation). The Vedic literature recommends mantra
meditation, and
prescribes different mantras for different ages. In this age, the Vedic
literature recommends
chanting names of God, such as the names Krishna, Rama, and Hara. If one
likes, one
can meditate on other names of God, like Jehovah, Allah,, etc. The
process is characterized
in Sanskrit as ceto darpana marjanam. Cetah means consciousness, darpana
means
mirror, and marjanam means cleanse, i.e. cleansing the mirror of
consciousness. The
mantras are invested with spiritual energies that have the power to
restore consciousness
to its original pure state, in which it is possible through
spiritualized senses to perceive the
form of God." ~Michael Cremo
From:
Cremo, Michael A. (1999) "Puranic Time and the Archeological
Record." Chapter 3 in Time and Archaeology: Vol. 37,
One
World Archaeology Series, edited by Tim Murray, Routledge, London
"The time concept of
modern archeology, and modern anthropology in general, resembles the
general cosmological-historical time concept of Europe's
Judeo-Christian culture. Differing from the cyclical
cosmological-historical time concepts of the early Greeks in Europe,
and the Indians and others in Asia, the Judeo-Christian
cosmological-historical time concept is linear and progressive.
"Hindu historical
literatures, particularly the Puranas and Itihasas,
place human existence in the context of repeating time cycles called
yugas and kalpas, lasting hundreds of millions of
years. During this entire time, according to the Puranic
accounts, humans coexisted with creatures in some ways resembling
the earlier toolmaking hominids of modern evolutionary
accounts."
The Yuga Cycles*
"Each yuga cycle
is composed of 4 yugas. The first, the Satya-yuga,
lasts 4800 years of the demigods. The second, the Treta-yuga,
lasts 3600 years of the demigods. The third, the Dvapara-yuga,
lasts 2400 years of the demigods. And the fourth, Kali-yuga,
lasts 1200 years of the demigods . Since the demigod year
is equivalent to 360 earth years, the lengths of the yugas in
earth years are, acording to standard Vaishnava commentaries,
432,000 years for the Kali-yuga, 864,000 years for the Dvapara-yuga,
1,296,000 years for the Treta-yuga, and 1,728,000 years for
the Satya-yuga.
"This gives a total of
4,320,000 years for the entire yuga cycle. One thousand of
such cycles, lasting 4,320,000 years, comprises one day of Brahma,
the demigod who governs this universe. A day of Brahma is also
called a kalpa. Each of Brahma's nights lasts a similar
period of time. Life is only manifest on earth during
the day of Brahma. With the onset of Brahma's night, the
entire universe is devastated and plunged into darkness. When
another day of Brahma begins, life again becomes manifest.
"Each day of Brahma is
divided into 14 manvantara periods, each one lasting 71
yuga cycles. Preceding the first and following each manvantara
period is a juncture (sandhya) the length of a Satya-yuga
(1,728,000 years). Typically, each manvantara period
ends with a partial devastation. According to Puranic
accounts, we are now in the twenty-eighth yuga cycle of the
seventh manvantara period of the present day of Brahma."
"This would give the
inhabited earth an age of about 2 billion years. Interestingly
enough, the oldest undisputed organisms recognized by
paleontologists - algae fossils like those from the Gunflint
formation in Canada - are just about that old.** Altogether,
453 yuga cycles have elapsed since this day of Brahma began.
Each yuga cycle involves a progression from a golden age of peace
and spiritual progress to a final age of violence and spiritual
degradation."
*This material
is from the Srimad Bhagavatam, Canto 3, Chapter 11, with
translation and commentary by A.C. Bhaktivedanta
Swami Prabhupada (1973), Los Angeles: Bhaktivedanta Book Trust.
**Stewart,
Wilson N. (1983) Paleobotany and the Evolution of Plants. Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press.
http://www.humandevolution.com/hdintro.html
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