Time duration mentioned in scriptures

[animesh]

This question has been bothering me for long. How do scholars correlate between the units of time duration mentioned in scriptures and the units used at present. English translations of many shlokas talk in terms of "years". Does this mean that there are some Sanskrit words that translate to a given no. of years? If not, then what other way is used to do the correlation? If yes, then how do we know that those who authored these scriptues (Ved Vyasa and others) meant the same thing by "year" (i.e. its Sanskrit equivalent) as we mean now? In other words, how do we know that they also used the time taken by Earth to complete one revolution around Sun to mean one year?

[animesh]

I am reading Bhagwad Puran. I have one question. I have read that one day of Brahma is equal to 1000 cycles of the four yugas and that there are 14 Manus in one day of Brahma. This means that, on an avaerage, there are 71 + 6/14 cycles of the four yugas.

My question is:

How many cycles of these four yugas have elapsed during the reign of the present manu?

[animesh]

Sorry, I left one sentence incomplete:

This means that, on an avaerage, there are 71 + 6/14 cycles of the four yugas during the reign of one Manu.

 

[animesh]

One more:

How many days and nights of the current Brahma have elapsed? Or, is the first day still continuing?

[shvu]

Hi Animesh,

 

You have asked a lot of questions. Let me jog my memory.

 

As far as I know, the duration of a year is almost the same around the world. The westerners and some parts of India like Punjab and Tamilnadu use solar calendars where the duration is 365 days. The Muslims use a lunar calendar of 12 months, where every month is one revolution of the moon [360 days]. The rest of India use a Luni-solar calendar which comes close to this figure. They have a concept of adding an extra 13th month sometimes to balance the figure. I have forgotten the logic behind that.

 

All the new years in all calendars used to begin sometime during march/April when the sun entered Aries, which is considered the first month. That is why we have Sept [seven], Oct [eight], Nov [nine] for the months which were named so when the March used to be the first month of the year. Then Julius Ceasar shifted the new year to January.

 

The answer to your question is that the sanksrit year is not exactly solar, but Luni-solar and comes close to that same duration as that of a solar year.

 

I remember reading somewhere that this is the 28th Kali-yuga of the present Manu. The present Manu is Vaivasvata manu. He is the person in the Dashavatara story who went on a boat during the flood. It has to be the day of Brahma. The night is when everything is submerged in the great flood. I have forgotten when a Brahma gets destroyed and a new one is created.

 

Cheers

[animesh]

Hi Shvu,

Thanks for the reply. Devotees consider puranas to be very old. So, I was thinking that there might be some difference between the definition of year used at present and then. If there is diference, then we need some formula to correlate the two.

 

Bhagwad Puran says that Brahma lives for 100 years. 1 year of Brahma is equal to 360 days and nights. His one day is equal to 1000 cycles of the four yugas. Same is the duration of his one night.

[shvu]

Hi Animesh,

 

Yes, devotees consider the Puranas to be very old. But history says otherwise. Of course, the history that we know could be wrong, but there is nothing that we can do about it.

 

I remember reading somewhere that the years mentioned for Yugas were not actual years. This was the theory of some scholars who claimed that 400 of these years mean one calendar year. According to which, if the text says Dasharatha lived for 33,000 years, it actually means that he lived for 80 years. I don't know how they arrived at that logic. Perhaps they were trying to make it part of history.

 

The same figures for durations of Yugas is also present in some other civilization (Babylonia? ). I have to check that. The flood tradition is present in almost every country. They all have a story of God warning a person about an impending flood and telling him to carry all the species on a special boat, which would be kept safe.

 

Cheers

[animesh]

Hi Shvu,

>I remember reading somewhere that the years mentioned for Yugas were not actual years. This was the theory of some scholars who claimed that 400 of these years mean one calendar year.

 

This is exactly what I want to know. As an example, I have read that the duration of one kaliyuga is equal to 432000 years. What is the meaning of "year" here? Is it the same as it is now? If not, then what? If yes, then how did scholars of vedas and puranas come to this figure? They must have translated sanskrit verses to arrive at this logic. But based on those verses, how do we know what the authors of our scriptures meant by the word year (i.e. its Sanskrit equivalent).

Please note that I want to know the opinion of devotees here and not of archaelogists. Archaelogy does interest me. But since I have read these numbers (432000 etc.) in bhagwad Puran, so I think that the answer of devotees will be very important here.

In general, I want to know how to correlate between the unit of time mentioned in scriptures and the unit used at present.

 

[animesh]

jndas ji, Jayasriradhey ji, viji ji,

Please throw some light on this.

[Dasha]

Dear Animesh Prabhu,

 

You said:

 

 

"Please note that I want to know the opinion of devotees here and not of archaelogists. Archaelogy does interest me. But since I have read these numbers (432000 etc.) in bhagwad Puran, so I think that the answer of devotees will be very important here."

 

Here is an excerpt from a purport of Srila Prabhupada on Srimad Bhagavatam (1-3-5):

 

"...Within one day's duration of the life of Brahma (which is calculated by our SOLAR YEARS as 4,300,000 X 1,000 years) there are 14 Manus...etc...

 

Here is what said one great devotee on the subject matter.

 

This is not to proove anything, but just to partake what I red this morning.

 

Yours in Krsna consciousness.

[animesh]

Dear jayasriradhey ji,

Your reply was really very nice. From where do you get all these quotes? Maintaining some diary, huh?

 

Dasha ji,

About one week back, I started reading Srimad Bhagwatam. Before that also, I knew about most of the stories in that from different sources, but I had never read Bhagwatam itself. It is a really interesting reading. I am really becoming engrossed in it.

Bhagwatam maintains that there are 14 Manus during the life-time of Brahma. And that life time of Brahma is equal to 1000 cycles of the four yugas. The duration of one cycle is equal to 432000 years. So lifetime of Buddha is 432000*1000 years. I have also read that here one year is equal to 360 days and not 365/366. So, if we consider the modern definition of one year, the actual no. will be a little less thatn 432000*1000 years.

Anyway, my doubt is this:

Presently we use units like year, month, day, hour, minute, second, fractions of second (like millisecond, microsecond, nanosecond, picosecond etc.) to measure time. What units are used in vedas and puranas? Are they same? If not, how do scholars in scriptures correlate between the units used in scriptures and the units used at present?

I am not asking for the proof that the technique they use is correct. I just want to know the technique used by them.

[animesh]

Sorry, I made a mistake.

I wrote "The duration of one cycle is 432000 year".

In reality, the duration is 4320000 years (I had missed one zero). This makes lifetime of Brahma as 4320000*1000 years.

[shvu]

Hi Animesh,

 

The common factor is the duration of a day as counted from sunrise to sunrise. Since 360 days make a year in the Hindu calendar, it is close to the solar year of 365 days.

 

Cheers