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continental drift theory and age of Ramayana

prasad1

Active member
In terms of narrative time, the action of the Ramayana predates the Mahabharata. However, the general cultural background of the Ramayana is one of the post-urbanization periods of the eastern part of north India, while the Mahabharata reflects the Kuru areas west of this, from the Rigvedic to the late Vedic period.

By tradition, the text belongs to the Treta Yuga, second of the four eons (yuga) of Hindu chronology. Rama is said to have been born in the Treta Yuga (869,000 years ago) to King Dasharatha in the Ikshvaku dynasty.

The names of the characters (Rama, Sita, Dasharatha, Janaka, Vashista, Vishwamitra) are all known only in the late Vedic literature. For instance, a king named Janaka appears in a lengthy dialogue in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad with no reference to Rama or the Ramayana. However, nowhere in the surviving Vedic poetry is there a story similar to the Ramayana of Valmiki. According to the modern academic view, Vishnu, who, according to Bala Kanda, was incarnated as Rama, first came into prominence with the epics themselves and further, during the Puranic period of the later 1st millennium CE. Also, in the epic Mahabharata, there is a version of the Ramayana known as Ramopakhyana. This version is depicted as a narration to Yudhishthira.

So the oldest date of Rama is about 869,000 years ago. (that is stretching the truth).

Geologically, the Indian subcontinent was first a part of a largely oceanic Greater India Basin, a region of Gondwana that drifted away from East Africa about 160 million years ago, around the Middle Jurassic period. The region experienced high volcanic activity and plate subdivisions, creating Madagascar, Seychelles, Antarctica, Australasia, and the Indian subcontinent basin. The Indian subcontinent drifted northeastwards, colliding with the Eurasian plate nearly 55 million years ago, towards the end of Paleocene. The zone where the Eurasian and Indian subcontinent plates meet remains geologically active, prone to major earthquakes.

Physiographically, it is a peninsular region in south-central Asia delineated by the Himalayas in the north, the Hindu Kush in the west, and the Arakanese in the east. It extends southward into the Indian Ocean with the Arabian Sea to the southwest and the Bay of Bengal to the southeast. Most of this region rests on the Indian Plate and is isolated from the rest of Asia by large mountain barriers.


The supposition in the post

is not right.
I just want to set the record straight.

The Indian sub-continent was formed 55 million years ago.
Rama may have been born 869,000 years ago. But this can not be right if the fossil evidence is to believe.
If Humans did not arrive till about 300,000 years ago, how can Rama be older than that?

Homo sapiens (sometimes also known as "modern humans") are thought to have diverged in Africa from an earlier hominin around 300,000 years ago, with the earliest fossil evidence of Homo sapiens also appearing around 300,000 years ago in Africa.

The peopling of India refers to the migration of Homo sapiens into the Indian subcontinent. Anatomically modern humans settled India in multiple waves of early migrations, over tens of millennia. The first migrants came with the Coastal Migration/ Southern Dispersal 65,000 years ago, whereafter complex migrations within the south and southeast Asia took place. West Eurasian hunter-gatherers migrated to South Asia after the latest Ice Age, but before the onset of farming. Together with a minor number of ancient South Asian hunter-gatherers, they formed the population of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC).
 
This is where I strongly believe that one of the two so called evidences is wrong. I strongly dispute the Charles Darwin theory of evolution. At the outset, it seems a valid proposition. But looking at the various evolution stories across the planet, not just from India but various other communities, the Charles Darwin evolution theory falls flat.

Was there a race before us (us as in the modern humans)? Were they advanced in all aspects? Did inter-breeding erase them?

History is all about the victors. So, were the ancient texts, over the years, modified to remove their existence?

Hanuman and his monkeys played a key role in Ramayana. But scientifically monkeys are not capable of it. Unless they are not monkeys but more of a humanoid species.
 
In terms of narrative time, the action of the Ramayana predates the Mahabharata. However, the general cultural background of the Ramayana is one of the post-urbanization periods of the eastern part of north India, while the Mahabharata reflects the Kuru areas west of this, from the Rigvedic to the late Vedic period.

By tradition, the text belongs to the Treta Yuga, second of the four eons (yuga) of Hindu chronology. Rama is said to have been born in the Treta Yuga (869,000 years ago) to King Dasharatha in the Ikshvaku dynasty.

The names of the characters (Rama, Sita, Dasharatha, Janaka, Vashista, Vishwamitra) are all known only in the late Vedic literature. For instance, a king named Janaka appears in a lengthy dialogue in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad with no reference to Rama or the Ramayana. However, nowhere in the surviving Vedic poetry is there a story similar to the Ramayana of Valmiki. According to the modern academic view, Vishnu, who, according to Bala Kanda, was incarnated as Rama, first came into prominence with the epics themselves and further, during the Puranic period of the later 1st millennium CE. Also, in the epic Mahabharata, there is a version of the Ramayana known as Ramopakhyana. This version is depicted as a narration to Yudhishthira.

So the oldest date of Rama is about 869,000 years ago. (that is stretching the truth).

Geologically, the Indian subcontinent was first a part of a largely oceanic Greater India Basin, a region of Gondwana that drifted away from East Africa about 160 million years ago, around the Middle Jurassic period. The region experienced high volcanic activity and plate subdivisions, creating Madagascar, Seychelles, Antarctica, Australasia, and the Indian subcontinent basin. The Indian subcontinent drifted northeastwards, colliding with the Eurasian plate nearly 55 million years ago, towards the end of Paleocene. The zone where the Eurasian and Indian subcontinent plates meet remains geologically active, prone to major earthquakes.

Physiographically, it is a peninsular region in south-central Asia delineated by the Himalayas in the north, the Hindu Kush in the west, and the Arakanese in the east. It extends southward into the Indian Ocean with the Arabian Sea to the southwest and the Bay of Bengal to the southeast. Most of this region rests on the Indian Plate and is isolated from the rest of Asia by large mountain barriers.


The supposition in the post

is not right.
I just want to set the record straight.

The Indian sub-continent was formed 55 million years ago.
Rama may have been born 869,000 years ago. But this can not be right if the fossil evidence is to believe.
If Humans did not arrive till about 300,000 years ago, how can Rama be older than that?

Homo sapiens (sometimes also known as "modern humans") are thought to have diverged in Africa from an earlier hominin around 300,000 years ago, with the earliest fossil evidence of Homo sapiens also appearing around 300,000 years ago in Africa.

The peopling of India refers to the migration of Homo sapiens into the Indian subcontinent. Anatomically modern humans settled India in multiple waves of early migrations, over tens of millennia. The first migrants came with the Coastal Migration/ Southern Dispersal 65,000 years ago, whereafter complex migrations within the south and southeast Asia took place. West Eurasian hunter-gatherers migrated to South Asia after the latest Ice Age, but before the onset of farming. Together with a minor number of ancient South Asian hunter-gatherers, they formed the population of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC).


Well...guess what! Science says there were other universes before this present universe.
Another universe or other universes existed before the big bang.
If this is true may be the dates wont match anything we know cos we only know this Yuga.
May be Ramayana happened in a different Universe era.


 
hi

even i dont beleive in darwin's theory of evolution.....our dasavatharas are mainly human evolution...

if we go very deep analysis of 10 avatars of vishnu....we can easily understand evolution....but

hinduism is not able to prove as science...more religious evolution...there are many universe

in this brahmanda.....even many earth like planets explained in vedas....many human life

available in other worlds too...hinduism is more experienced religion....our rishis/yogis/ancestors

understand of many universes....but its not physical matter...
 
hi

even i dont beleive in darwin's theory of evolution.....our dasavatharas are mainly human evolution...

if we go very deep analysis of 10 avatars of vishnu....we can easily understand evolution....but

hinduism is not able to prove as science...more religious evolution...there are many universe

in this brahmanda.....even many earth like planets explained in vedas....many human life

available in other worlds too...hinduism is more experienced religion....our rishis/yogis/ancestors

understand of many universes....but its not physical matter...

but why no religion talks about Dinosaurs?
 
but why no religion talks about Dinosaurs?
Because there was no organized religion at that time. Even the earliest human did not live during the dinosaurs periods. Ancient humans did not have the knowledge of that far in History.
Similarly, they did not have the knowledge of far space.
 
This is where I strongly believe that one of the two so called evidences is wrong. I strongly dispute the Charles Darwin theory of evolution. At the outset, it seems a valid proposition. But looking at the various evolution stories across the planet, not just from India but various other communities, the Charles Darwin evolution theory falls flat.

Was there a race before us (us as in the modern humans)? Were they advanced in all aspects? Did inter-breeding erase them?

History is all about the victors. So, were the ancient texts, over the years, modified to remove their existence?

Hanuman and his monkeys played a key role in Ramayana. But scientifically monkeys are not capable of it. Unless they are not monkeys but more of a humanoid species.
Charles Darwin's theory is valid and is being proven every day. It may have to be tweaked to account for some anomaly.

There may have been other universe before the one we know. There might be an alternate Universe and a parallel universe, we do not know about it.
Vanara to be translated as Monkey may have been a mistake.

Vanara​



Vanar are mentioned in the Ramayana. Lord Rama took an army of vanars with him when he attacked Ravana's Lanka.
Vanara in Sanskrit can mean one of three things
  1. vana nara meaning humans living in forests
  2. va-nara meaning humans with monkey like tails.
  3. vaa-nara also means nara-like or human-like. Thus it is the animal that is man-like, or an ape.
Vanaras are often referred to as monkeys and the common portrayal of Vanaras in TV show them as such. In Sanskrit, however, monkeys are vana kapi or simply kapi or markata.

 
Dashavatar is NOT the Theory of Evolution/

“No. All of these avatars are portrayed as having interacted with humans. Even during the first avatar of fish, the existence of human beings had been recorded. Then how come it can be compared with evolution theory?”

What’s more, Avatars were not strictly in chronological or evolutionary order of the occurrence. There were 24 Avatars of the Vishnu, according to Srimad Bhagvatam, the authentic scripture followed in Vaishnava tradition. Among those, third one is boar (Varaha) and 11th one is Fish (Matsya) – that itself is in clear contradiction with the evolutionary theory.

There are lot of contradictions and confusions in the order of occurrences.

– Parashuram extirpated Kshatriyas (warriors) many times by going around the earth. Hence the lineage of both Ikshvaku’s, to which Rama belonged, and Nimi’s, to which Sita belonged to, must have been broken. But Sage Valmiki, who wrote Ramayana, did not mention about breakage of those lineages!

– Mahabali, Prahlad’s grandson, was the king of the Asuras, at the time of the churning of the ocean. If that’s true, Narasimha Avatar (that appeared to save young boy Prahlad) has to pre-date the Kurma avatar, where Vishnu came in the form of a giant tortoise to help in the churning of the ocean.

– The people of Kerala state believe that Mahabali ruled that state. They celebrate Onam festival to commemorate King Mahabali, who attained moksha (liberation) by Vamana. But they also believe that the state was created by Parashuram from sea-bed by throwing his battle-axe! Here also order of occurrences contradicts. (Obviously either Mahabali was not a King in Kerala or Parashuram didn’t found Kerala. According to Puranas Mahabali ruled earth (Bhuloka), not just Kerala, from somewhere in Gujarat.)

 
Dashavatar is NOT the Theory of Evolution/

“No. All of these avatars are portrayed as having interacted with humans. Even during the first avatar of fish, the existence of human beings had been recorded. Then how come it can be compared with evolution theory?”

What’s more, Avatars were not strictly in chronological or evolutionary order of the occurrence. There were 24 Avatars of the Vishnu, according to Srimad Bhagvatam, the authentic scripture followed in Vaishnava tradition. Among those, third one is boar (Varaha) and 11th one is Fish (Matsya) – that itself is in clear contradiction with the evolutionary theory.

There are lot of contradictions and confusions in the order of occurrences.

– Parashuram extirpated Kshatriyas (warriors) many times by going around the earth. Hence the lineage of both Ikshvaku’s, to which Rama belonged, and Nimi’s, to which Sita belonged to, must have been broken. But Sage Valmiki, who wrote Ramayana, did not mention about breakage of those lineages!

– Mahabali, Prahlad’s grandson, was the king of the Asuras, at the time of the churning of the ocean. If that’s true, Narasimha Avatar (that appeared to save young boy Prahlad) has to pre-date the Kurma avatar, where Vishnu came in the form of a giant tortoise to help in the churning of the ocean.

– The people of Kerala state believe that Mahabali ruled that state. They celebrate Onam festival to commemorate King Mahabali, who attained moksha (liberation) by Vamana. But they also believe that the state was created by Parashuram from sea-bed by throwing his battle-axe! Here also order of occurrences contradicts. (Obviously either Mahabali was not a King in Kerala or Parashuram didn’t found Kerala. According to Puranas Mahabali ruled earth (Bhuloka), not just Kerala, from somewhere in Gujarat.)

\
I love this book - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003P9X73K/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i2

He is one of the authors who gave me moolah for my mind when I was keen on topics like this. I have read all his books, except for the most recent one.

While his views might have some prejudice, I feel our ancient history / lineage have not been really understood for it. There is a lot of contractions and confusions that makes it more mind boggling than anything.
 
We need to look at Ramayana in a geographically and historically wider concept. Greeks too have two great ithihasas like works by Poet Homer. The first one 'Iliad' describes a spartan (Greek princes / wife of Kings brother) running away with a Trojan prince. Spartans took an army with 1000 ships and destroyed Troy. This shows that there are other similar stories in the ancient world in different forms. lliad by Homer, and Ramayana by Valmiki and Kambar (in Tamil) survived because of valuable poetic style.

A well known prince named Rama(n) and a valiant king by the name Ravana(n) may have lived. Since Four ancient Easwarams are located in the four edges of Lanka, we know that the kings of Lanka were siva worshipers. If Ranana existed he is likely to have been a siva devotee.

From Rig Veda, we know that there were conflicts between Aryans and Dravedians (ancient Tamils). Rig Veda says about Indra helping to defeat dark skinned 'Dasas' and destroying their forts and dykes. Unlike today's Tamils with some Aryan mx (less than 45%), the Adivasis of Tamil Nadu and rest of India are much darker skinned. These are the people described as Dasas and later as Asuras and Rakshas.

From Rig Veda, we know about the rituals for invoking Indra’s help in defeating ‘Dasas’. These must have attracted attention as preparation of attacks and led to pre emptied strikes. We also know about it as Visvamitra requesting and taking Rama and Lakshman to defend the ritual oblations to Indra.

There are elements of these conflicts too in the Ramayana story. However, the parts played by monkey men is part of interesting poetry.

The Ramayana story may have existed for a long time in different forms. However, Sanskrit scholars attribute the composition of Valmiki Ramayana to between 750 – 500 BC. This was based on the nature of poetry.
 

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