World Ages and Their Demise
cont. from page 1
Also seemingly in lockstep with Hesiod and other world traditions, the Hopi elders alleged that each time humankind revived itself after an apocalypse, the new landscape and caliber of men paled in comparison to the previous era. While the paradise of the Golden Age had remained a part of human consciousness, the fortunes of man appeared to be regressing backwards.
The suggestion that human cultures have actually worsened over the millenia runs squarely afoul with the Darwinian view taught in schools today. We've been told that history comprises a steady "march of progress"all the way back to the Big Bang. Yet virtually all other cultures dating back to antiquity, in both western and eastern traditions, believed that the opposite was true. Since the Golden era, each world age has started off in more dire straits than the last.
Fortunately, a silver lining lurks within this ominous cloud. A Vedic scripture known as the Vishnu Purana has this to say about the passage of time:
"The four ages are the Krita, Treta, Dwápara, and Kali; comprehending together twelve thousand years of the gods. There are infinite successions of these four ages, of a similar description, the first of which is always called the Krita, and the last the Kali. In the first, the Krita, is that age which is created by Brahmá; in the last, which is the Kali age, a dissolution of the world occurs."
As the passage indicates, four ages comprising 12,000 years are followed by another set of four ages. The current Kali (aka Degenerate) Age is followed by the Krita (or Golden Age). John of Patmos says as much in the Bible's Book of Revelation. And here's Virgil in the Eclogues:
"Now is come the last age of the song of Cumae; the great line of the centuries begins anew. Now the Virgin returns, the reign of Saturn returns; now a new generation descends from heaven on high. Only do thou, pure Lucina, smile on the birth of the child, under whom the iron brood shall first cease, and a golden race spring up throughout the world."
Likewise, the ancient Mayans looked forward to the beginning of the next world age, as the authors of many 2012-related books are quick to point out. Obviously, the claim that December 21, 2012 marks the "end of days" is inaccurate. It's more likely the Mayans were attempting to calculate the end of one world age and the beginning of another. Moreover, before humankind can reap the benefits of a new golden era, it first must slog through a protracted and difficult time of transition.
In his 2009 book, Unlocking the Secrets of the Ancient Mayans, Guatemalan author Carlos Barrios notes:
"Very little attention has been paid to the importance of earlier cycles, particularly the end of this one, Kajib Ajaw, or the Fourth Sun. It is during this period — right now — when we run the greatest risk of large-scale conflicts and natural disasters. The catastrophic side of the prophecy has unfortunately been misinterpreted as an inexorable, apocalyptic event...We may be facing the self-destruction of much of humanity, but an ever-increasing number of us are also aware of the damage we have caused to the environment and what we must do to change this."
atlantiantraveler.ning.com
Whither Did Atlantis Go?
If advanced cultures did exist in previous world ages, they should have left behind some evidence. Complex architecture, streets laid out in a grid, sewage and water pipes, bathtubs and showers, sophisticated art forms, etc. -- all this has actually been uncovered at a few notable sites around the world. Places like Jericho (8000 B.C.), Crete (4000 B.C.), Catal Huyuk (6000 B.C.), Puma Punko (13000 B.C.). Many more sites are thought to exist underwater. If correct, the notion would disprove the "march of progress" theory and give credence to the older view that time repeats itself in recurring, up and down cycles.
In 1882, Philadelphia lawyer Ignatius Donelly turned Charles Darwin on his head with the book Atlantis: The Antediluvian World. ("Antediluvian", which means before the Great Flood, was a term of art commonly used by geologists in the 19th century.) In his runaway bestseller, Donnelly recounted the story about Atlantis told by Plato in the Timaeus and Critias, adding other sources and his own compelling argument that the utopian continent had flourished at the end of the last ice age. The book spawned a Holy Grail-like quest by treasure hunters and explorers that continues to this day.
Five years before the book's publication, Helena Blavatsky penned her own pageturner, Isis Unveiled, making the case that ancient cultures like the one in Egypt had emerged from the ashes of Atlantean civilization:
"The perfect identity of the rites, ceremonies, traditions and even the names of the deities among the Mexicans, ancient Babylonians and Egyptians is a sufficient proof of South America being peopled by a colony which mysteriously found its way across the Atlantic," Blavatsky wrote. "There are scattered throughout the world a handful of thoughtful and solitary students who pass their lives in obscurity. These men believe the story of Atlantis to be no fable, but maintain that at different epochs of the past huge islands and even continents existed where now is but a wild waste of waters."
Apparently, one of Plato's ancestors, Solon, first learned of Atlantis during a pilgrimage to Egypt. Solon claimed that one of the high priests there showed him a book in a library documenting the history of Atlantis.
Mainstream archaeologists still scoff at the suggestion that an advanced culture existed as far back 9000 B.C. (Plato's date), and then left its legacy to the Egyptians and Mayans. In particular, they argue that the absence of artifacts to account for the period between 9000 to 4000 B.C. precludes the possibility of any connection.
However, Graham Hancock and other history detectives counter that the Great Pyramids and Sphinx are a lot older than the 2500 B.C. date generally attributed to their construction. (After examining water erosion on the stonework, geologist Robert Schoch put the date of the Sphinx at no later than 7000 B.C.) Approaching the mystery from another angle, author and engineer Robert Bauval has proposed that the Gizeh complex was built whenthe constellation Orion rose at a certain point in the sky to shape the construction. He puts the date at 10200 B.C. While this claim is considered a stretch, Egyptologists do agree that the pyramids were built with astronomical coordinates in mind. And Bauval was the first to notice that the three pyramids are aligned in the same manner as the stars in Orion's belt.
Photo: Masaaki Kimura
Ancient, pyramid-like structures were discovered off the coast of Japan, near Yonaguni Island, by archaeologist Dr. Masaaki Kimura in the 1990's. The civilization here has been dated to 6000 B.C.
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Bauval and Hancock expound on their pyramid theories at length in the book Keepers of Genesis. In two of his other works, Underworld and Heaven's Mirror , Hancock presents loads of other evidence of artifacts and monuments to fill in the 9000-4000 B.C. gap between the fall of Atlantis and the rise of Egypt. Like Captain Nemo in the Jules Verne classic, 20,000 Leagues Beneath the Sea, Hancock and his wife, photographer Santha Faiia, spent two years diving at the site of prehistoric ruins around the world. Hancock alleges that modern man is the victim of amnesia when it comes to his own family tree.
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2012 Guide Home
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Copyright 2009-2011 TheCityEdition.com
More Resources
Articles of Interest
"The Succession of World Ages." (PDF) By Jane B. Sellars. From The Death of Gods in Ancient Egypt (1992).
"The Lost City of Dwarka; Rewriting our Common History." By Malini Alexander. Tasmanian Times 12/27/10
"World's oldest Copper Age settlement found." Indo-Asian News Service 11/15/10.
"Twilight of the Gods." Chapter excerpt from the book Hamlet's Mill. By Giorgio De Santillana and Gertha von Dechend (1969)
"Seven Eras of the World." Excerpt from The Wheel of Time by Luis Goitizolo.
"Prehistoric Origins of Electricity." By Roger Coghill.
Websites
Ages of the WorldBooks
Underworld: The Mysterious Origins of Civilization (2003) by Graham Hancock.
The Mythical World of Atlantis (1915) by Preston Whitmore.
Gateway to Atlantis: The Search for the Source of a Lost Civilization by Andrew Collins, David Rohl
Lost Cities and Ancient Mysteries (series beginning in 1984) by David Hatcher Childress.
Fingerprints of the Gods (1999), Keepers of Genesis (1996) and Underworld (2003) by Graham Hancock.
Lost Science of the Stone Age: Sacred Energy and the I Ching (2004) by Michael Poynder.
The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age (1999) by Richard Rudgley
Forbidden Archaeology (1993) by Richard Thompson and Michael Cremo
Book of the Hopi (1963) by Frank Waters.
The Works and Days by Hesiod. Best English translation is by Richmond Lattimore.
The Metamorphoses by Ovid.
Vishnu Purana, Book VI, Chapter 1. Text available online.
DVDs and TV Programs
History Channel: Journey to 10000 B.C. and 2012- End of Days.
The Mysterious Origins of Man: Rewriting Human History (1996) Based on the book Forbidden Archaeology. (Available for rental on Netflix.)
NOVA: America's Stone Age Explorers. (2004) Research into the origins of the Clovis people, circa 15000 - 11500 B.C.