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Hindu Moon
A guide to the festivals of south India
Soumya Aravind Sitaraman
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Look to this page for festival tips, calendar dates and other goodies
In
the Ramayana, Rama carries out an incredible, romantic and
duty-bound undertaking to rescue his wife from Ravana, a magnificent king,
devout Shaivite Brahmin, whose obsession with Sita propels him to his
downfall. Kidnapping Sita he flees
Sitharam
Gurumurthi presents another version in his book Ramayana Temples.
While the main route remains rather consistent with Daniel Smith’s
version, there are deviations as Rama approaches the southern tip of
Many
believe the Ramayana to be a true life story, a historical record
of an ancient time in India. Others debunk this theory and relegate the epic to a mere work of
fiction. However, there is an interesting global stream of research in the
Absolute and Cultural Sciences that is discovering more and more of the
pieces of this ancient puzzle. Scientists mapping the Earth with satellite
and other technology are finding truth in ancient claims of a fantastic
and heretofore unimaginable natural disaster. Astronomers and physicists2 are
beginning to discover links between the origin of the cosmos and the Hindu
concept of time and creation. Ecologists who believe in evolution are
tracing parallels between the avatars and the stages of evolution.
Rama’s existence is gaining credibility and validity with recent
scientific mapping and research. For example:
‘Adam’s
Bridge or Rama’s Bridge, a chain of shoals, c.18 mi (30 km) long,
in the Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. At high tide, it is
covered by c.4 ft (1.2 m) of water. A steamer ferry links
This
curved link between
NASA Images Find 1,750,000 Year Old Man-Made Bridge
Washington
(PTI): The NASA Shuttle has imaged a mysterious ancient bridge between
Rama
is said to have lived in the Treta Yuga of our current Maha Yuga cycle.
This puts his existence somewhere roughly between 869,103 and 1,296,0006 years.
Correlated to modern geology, this puts us at the Pleistocene Epoch of the
quarternary period 1.81 to 0.01 mya (million years ago) based on
radiometric dating; a period characterised by glaciation and referred to
as an Ice Age.
A
huge body of ongoing palaeo-climatological research reveals a dramatic
drop in eustatic sea levels during these periods of glaciation. Various
studies across different scientific genre using data from ice core samples
and oxygen isotope records in marine sediment cores arrive at similar
conclusions. One research paper by Eberli et al states, ‘Most of
the known major sea-level falls in the Neogene are recorded in the strata
along the Bahamas Transect. Examples include the sea-level fall in the
earliest Miocene, the first two falls in the middle Miocene, the fall at
the Miocene / Pliocene boundary, and most of the Pliocene-Pleistocene
major sea-level falls.’7 Changes
in the sea level due to glacial ice build-up or melt-down are therefore
part of the Earth’s history. The possibility of the sea level being low
(some estimates go up to 80m below current levels) during Rama’s life on
Earth seems high. We also know from the receding waters that were the
prelude to the recent tsunami, the current submerged land bridge is just
below current mean sea level. As an engineering feat therefore, it seems a
highly feasible project to accomplish given enough labour. To buttress the
idea of the bridge being artificially created, the monkey clan that helped
Rama is now seen not as real monkeys, but as tribes who bonded under a
flag or banner with the emblem of a monkey. These Vanaras are deduced to
have come from
In
the Ramayana, Rama carries out an incredible, romantic and
duty-bound undertaking to rescue his wife from Ravana, a magnificent king,
devout Shaivite Brahmin, whose obsession with Sita propels him to his
downfall. Kidnapping Sita he flees
Sitharam
Gurumurthi presents another version in his book Ramayana Temples .
While the main route remains rather consistent with Daniel Smith’s
version, there are deviations as Rama approaches the southern tip of
‘Adam’s
Bridge or Rama’s Bridge, a chain of shoals, c.18 mi (30 km) long,
in the Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. At high tide, it is
covered by c.4 ft (1.2 m) of water. A steamer ferry links
This
curved link between
NASA Images Find 1,750,000 Year Old Man-Made Bridge5
Washington
(PTI): The NASA Shuttle has imaged a mysterious ancient bridge between
Rama
is said to have lived in the Treta Yuga of our current Maha Yuga cycle.
This puts his existence somewhere roughly between 869,103 and 1,296,0006 years.
Correlated to modern geology, this puts us at the Pleistocene Epoch of the
quarternary period 1.81 to 0.01 mya (million years ago) based on
radiometric dating; a period characterised by glaciation and referred to
as an Ice Age.
A
huge body of ongoing palaeo-climatological research reveals a dramatic
drop in eustatic sea levels during these periods of glaciation. Various
studies across different scientific genre using data from ice core samples
and oxygen isotope records in marine sediment cores arrive at similar
conclusions. One research paper by Eberli et al states, ‘Most of
the known major sea-level falls in the Neogene are recorded in the strata
along the Bahamas Transect. Examples include the sea-level fall in the
earliest Miocene, the first two falls in the middle Miocene, the fall at
the Miocene / Pliocene boundary, and most of the Pliocene-Pleistocene
major sea-level falls.’ Changes
in the sea level due to glacial ice build-up or melt-down are therefore
part of the Earth’s history. The possibility of the sea level being low
(some estimates go up to 80m below current levels) during Rama’s life on
Earth seems high. We also know from the receding waters that were the
prelude to the recent tsunami, the current submerged land bridge is just
below current mean sea level. As an engineering feat therefore, it seems a
highly feasible project to accomplish given enough labour. To buttress the
idea of the bridge being artificially created, the monkey clan that helped
Rama is now seen not as real monkeys, but as tribes who bonded under a
flag or banner with the emblem of a monkey. These Vanaras are deduced to
have come from
Ugadi
/ Vishu / Varusha Pirappu
Soumya Aravind Sitaraman
Copyright © 2007. All rights reserved.
A Random House
India Publication
Soumya Aravind Sitaraman (c) 2007. All Rights Reserved