Sri Madhavendra Puri Disappearance
→ Ramai Swami

Before Lord Caitanya appeared He sent His eternal associates like Sri Advaita Acarya, Sri Jagannatha Misra, Saci Mata, Madhavendra Puri, Isvari Puri to earth. Sri Madhavendra Puri took initiation from Sri Laksmipati Tirtha in the Madhvacarya sampradaya. 

He had many but Sri Advaita Acarya and Sri Isvara Puri were the chief disciples of Madhavendra Puri. In one way or another, all the Vaisnavas in Bengal and Ksetra mandala (Jagan­natha Puri) were connected with Sri Madhavendra Puri. After Lord Caitanya came many of his disciples joined Mahaprabhu’s sankirtana movement. 

 “Madhavendra Puri’s body was completely full of divine love; so were his followers. He displayed uncommon love of God. Seeing a dark blue rain cloud, he would fall down unconscious. Day and night he was intoxicated from drinking the ambrosia of Krishna prema.” (Vrndavana Dasa Thakura)

 After making an extensive pilgrimage of Bharata-bhumi (India) he passed his life in Vrndavana and Orissa. He began the restoration work of Vrndavana that Sri Rupa and Sanatana Gos-vamis continued later. Wandering from grove to grove, remembering Radha-Krishna’s sweet Vrndavana pastimes, Madhavendra Puri would faint in ecstasy.

In a dream, Sri Gopala ordered Madhavendra Puri to uncover a buried Gopala Deity and install Him atop Govardhana Hill. Madhavendra Puri celebrated Gopala’s installation with an annakuta (grand festival offering a mountain of foodstuffs to Krishna). This Annakuta festival, also called Govardhana Puja, is one of the most important Vaisnava festivals in Vrndavana, in India, and around the world. The original Gopala Deity, known as Sri Nathaji, is now worshiped in Nathadvara, Rajasthan.

Madhavendra Puri introduced the conception of madhurya bhava (conjugal love) in the Madhvacarya sampradaya. Mad­havendra Puri sowed the seed of prema bhakti. And Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu became the towering tree dropping honey sweet fruits of prema upon everyone. He also revealed viraha bhava, the mood of love relished in separation from God. His branch of the Madhva sect distinguished itself by this ecstatic love of God. It is known as the Madhva-Gaudiya sampradaya.

Madhavendra Puri’s samadhi is in Remuna, Orissa just a walk down the road from the temple of Ksira-cora Gopinatha.

Fanning the Spark
→ Dandavats

I was in Bondi, Sydney, distributing books. I stopped a teenage boy. He looked very interested as I showed him Bhagavad Gita. He was very eager but was a little worried when I asked for a donation. I told him to give what he could. He dug out his wallet and had a few dollars
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Instead of actively taking part in politics, saintly persons should engage in the chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra
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Instead of actively taking part in politics, saintly persons should engage in the chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra. By the grace of Lord Caitanya, by simply chanting this Hare Krishna maha-mantra, the general populace can derive all benefits without political implications. (Srimad-Bhagavatam, 4.14.12 Purport)
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 Sri Krishna cleanses desire for material enjoyment from the heart of the devotee
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“Sri Krishna, the Personality of Godhead, who is the Paramatma (Supersoul) in everyone’s heart and the benefactor of the truthful devotee, cleanses desire for material enjoyment from the heart of the devotee who relishes His messages, which are themselves virtuous when properly heard and chanted.” (Srimad-Bhagavatam, 1.2.17)
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WSN January 2023 – World Sankirtan Newsletter
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By Mayapur Sasi dasa

For the pleasure of Srila Prabhupada this report contains the following results of book distribution for the month of January 2023 from the whole planet. World Totals, Monthly Congregation and Weekend Warriors, Monthly Continents, Monthly Top Ten Temples by Size, Monthly Top Ten Temples by Continent, Monthly Top Teams and Individuals, Monthly All Countries, Monthly All Temples, Monthly All Prabhupada Disciples, Cumulative Top Ten Countries, Cumulative Top Ten Temples, Cumulative Top 50 Individuals Worldwide Continue reading "WSN January 2023 – World Sankirtan Newsletter
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HH BHAKTI RAGHAVA SWAMI: CHIEF GUEST AT WORLD SANSKRIT CONFERENCE IN MANGALORE
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Feb 27th, 2023: Srinivas University, one of the leading private university in Mangalore organized WORLD SANSKRIT CONFERENCE-2023 the first of its kind in the state. It was a 3 day event which included research paper presentations in different aspects of Vedic knowledge, ancient arts,Sanskrit language, Vedic scriptures and their collaboration with modern scientific advances. HH
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Amnesty
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By Samapriya devi dasi There comes a time when human kind descends to most degraded. When basic need is fixed on greed and honesty’s dissuaded. A fallen age of selfishness when no one trusts another, And a life within the womb, is aborted by the mother. But the Lord who loves us all, hearing Sri
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Puranic Time and the Archeological Record
- TOVP.org

By Michael A. Cremo (Drutakarma Dasa): The Forbidden Archeologist

Providing a strong challenge to established academic perception and methodology, Drutakarma Dasa presents the Vaisnava Hindu worldview on the fundamental concepts to the approach to and interpretation of the archaeological record. His presentation is articulate and thorough and the extensive research he has undertaken to support his thesis is very impressive. He contrasts the currently accepted time concept, which closely resembles the Judeo-Christian model, with the ancient Puranic model and shows us how each tends to supports its own world view. But Drutakarma argues that the evidence offered by the archaeological record does not actually support the presently accepted model and thus questions its value in accurate historical analysis.

The time concept of modern archaeology and anthropology 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. Modern archaeology also shares with Judeo-Christian theology the idea that humans appeared after the other major species. The author subjectively positions himself within the Vaisnava Hindu worldview, and from this perspective offers a radical critique of modern generalizations about human origins and antiquity. Hindu historical literature, particularly the Puranas and Ithihasas, place human existence in the context of repeating time cycles called yugas and kalpas, lasting hundreds of millions of years. During this entire period, according to the Puranic accounts, humans coexisted with creatures in some ways resembling the earlier tool-making hominids of modern evolutionary accounts. If one were to accept the Puranic record as objectively true, and also take into account the generally admitted imperfection and complexity of the archaeological and anthropological record, one could make the following prediction. The strata of the earth, extending back hundreds of millions of years, should yield a bewildering mixture of hominid bones, some anatomically modern human and others not, as well as a similarly bewildering variety of artefacts, some displaying a high level of artistry and others not. Given the linear progressivist preconceptions of generations of archaeologists and anthropologists, one could also predict that this mixture of bones and artefacts would be edited to conform to their deeply rooted linear-progressive time concepts. A careful study of the archaeological record, and the history of archaeology itself, broadly confirms these two predictions. Linear-progressivist time concepts thus pose a substantial barrier to truly objective evaluation of the archaeological record and to rational theory- building in the area of human origins and antiquity.

The practically employed time concept of the modern historical scientist, including the archaeologist, strikingly resembles the traditional Judeo-Christian time concept, and equally strikingly differs from that of the ancient Greeks and Indians.

This observation is, of course, an extreme generalization. In any culture, the common people may make use of various time concepts, both linear and cyclical. Among the great thinkers of any given period, there may be many competing views of both cyclical and linear time. This was certainly true of the ancient Greeks. It can nevertheless be safely said that the cosmological concepts several of the most prominent Greek thinkers involved a cyclic or episodic time similar to that found in the Puranic literature of India. For example, we find within Hesiod’s Works and Days, a series of ages (gold, silver, bronze, heroic and iron) similar to the Indian yugas. In both systems, the quality of human life becomes progressively worse with each passing age. In On Nature (Fragment 17), Empedocles speaks of cosmic time cycles. In Plato’s dialogues there are descriptions of revolving time (Timaeus 38 a) and recurring catastrophes that destroy or nearly destroy human civilization (Politicus, 268 d ff). Aristotle repeatedly mentioned in his works that the arts and sciences had been discovered many times in the past (Metaphysics, 1074, b.10; Politics, 1329, b.25) In the teachings of Pythagoras, Plato and Empedocles regarding transmigration of souls, this cyclical pattern is extended to individual psychophysical existence.

When Judeo-Christian civilization arose in Europe, another kind of time became prominent. This time has been characterized as linear and vectorial. Broadly speaking, this concept involves a unique act of cosmic creation, a unique appearance of the human kind and a unique history of salvation, culminating in a unique denouement in the form of a last judgement. The drama occurs only once. Individually, human life mirrored this process; with some exceptions, orthodox Christian theologians did not accept transmigration of the soul.

Modern historical sciences share the basic Judeo-Christian assumptions about time: that the universe we inhabit is a unique occurrence and that humans have arisen only once on this planet. The history of our ancestors is regarded as a unique, although un-predestined, evolutionary pathway. The future pathway of our species is also unique.

Although this pathway is officially unpredictable, the myths of science project a possible overcoming of death by biomedical science and mastery over the entire universe by evolving, space-travelling humans. One group, the Santa Fe Institute, who have sponsored several conferences on ‘artificial life’, predicts the future transferral of human intelligence into machines and computers displaying the complex symptoms of living things (Langton 1991, p.xv) ‘Artificial life’ thus becomes the ultimate transfiguring salvation of our species.

One is tempted to propose that the modern human evolutionary account is a Judeo-Christian heterodoxy, which covertly retains fundamental structures of Judeo-Christian cosmology, salvation history and eschatology, while overtly dispensing with the scriptural account of divine intervention in the origin of species, including our own.

This is similar to the case of Buddhism as Hindu heterodoxy. Dispensing with the Hindu scriptures and God concepts, Buddhism nevertheless retained basic Hindu cosmological assumptions such as cyclical time, transmigration and karma.

Something else the modern human evolutionary hypothesis has in common with the earlier Christian account is that humans appeared after the other life forms. In Genesis, God created the plants, animals and birds before human beings. For strict literalists, the time interval is short – humans are created on the last of six of our present solar days. Others have taken the Genesis days as ages. For example, around the time of Darwin European scientists with strong Christian leanings proposed that God had gradually brought into existence various species throughout the ages of geological time until the perfected earth was ready to receive human beings (Grayson, 1983). In modern evolutionary accounts, anatomically modern humans retain their position as the most recent major species to occur on this planet, having evolved from preceding hominids within the past 100,000 or so years. And despite the attempts of prominent evolutionary theorists and spokespersons to counteract the tendency, even among evolution scientists, to express this appearance in teleological fashion (Gould 1977, p. 14), the idea that humans are the crowning glory of the evolutionary process still has a stronghold on the public and scientific minds. Although anatomically modern humans are given an age of about 100,000 years, modern archaeologists and anthropologists, in common with Judeo-Christian accounts, give civilization an age of a few thousand years and, again in common with Judeo-Christian accounts, place its earliest occurrence in the Middle East.

I do not here categorically assert a direct causal link between earlier Judeo -Christian ideas and those of the modern historical sciences. Demonstrating that, as Edward B. Davis (1994) points out in his review of recent works on this subject, needs much more careful documentation than has yet been provided. But the many common features of the time concepts of the two knowledge systems suggest these causal links do exist, and that it would be fruitful to trace connections in sufficient detail to satisfactorily demonstrate this.

I do, however, propose that the tacitly accepted and hence critically unexamined time concepts of the modern human sciences – whether or not causally linked with Judeo-Christian concepts – pose a significant unrecognized influence on interpretation of the archaeological and anthropological record. To demonstrate how this might be true, I shall introduce my own experience in evaluating this record from the alien standpoint of the cyclical time concepts and accounts of human origins found in the Puranas and Itihasas of India.

My subjective path of learning has led me to take the Vaisnava tradition of India as my primary guide to life and the study of the visible universe and what may lie beyond. For the past century or so, it has been considered quite unreasonable to bring concepts from religious texts directly into the realm of the scientific study of nature. Indeed, many introductory anthropology and archaeology texts make a clear distinction between ‘scientific’ and ‘religious’ knowledge, relegating the latter to the status of unsupported belief, with little or no utility in the objective study of nature (see, for example, Stein and Rowe 1993, chapter 2). Some texts even go so far as to boast that this view has been upheld by the United States Supreme Court (Stein and Rowe 1993, p. 37), as if the state were the best and final arbiter of intellectual controversy. But I propose that total hostility to religious views of nature in science is unreasonable, especially for the modern historical sciences. Despite their pretensions to a religious objectivity, practitioners unconsciously retain or incorporate into their workings many Judeo-Christian cosmological concepts, especially concerning time, and implicitly employ them in their day-to-day work of observation and theory building. In this sense, modern evolutionists share some intellectual territory with their Fundamentalist Christian antagonists.

But there are other ways to comprehend historical processes in nature. How this is so can be graphically sensed if one performs the mental experiment of looking at the world from a radically different time perspective, that of the Puranic time concept of India. I am not alone in suggesting this. Gene Sager, a professor of philosophy and religious studies at Palomar College in California, wrote in an unpublished review of my book Forbidden Archaeology (Cremo and Thompson, 1993): ‘As a scholar in the field of comparative religion, I have sometimes challenged scientists by offering a cyclical or spiral model for studying human history, based on the Vedic concept of the kalpa.

Few Western scientists are open to the possibility of sorting out the data in terms of such a model. I am not proposing that the Vedic model is true … However, the question remains, does the relatively short, linear model prove to be adequate? I believe Forbidden Archaeology offers a well-researched challenge. If we are to meet this challenge, we need to practice open-mindedness and proceed in a cross-cultural, interdisciplinary fashion’ (personal communication, 1993). The World Archaeological Congress provides a suitable forum for such cross-cultural, interdisciplinary dialogue.

This cyclical time of the Puranas operates only within the material cosmos. Beyond the material cosmos lies the spiritual sky, or brahmajyoti. Innumerable spiritual planets float in this spiritual sky, where material time, in the form of yuga cycles, does not act. Each yuga cycle is composed of four yugas. The first, the Satya-yuga, lasts 4,800 years of the demigods; the second, the Treta-yuga, lasts 3,600 years of the demigods; the third, the Dvapara-yuga, lasts 2,400 years of the demigods; and the fourth, Kali-yuga , lasts 1,200 years of the demigods (Bhagavata Purana, 3.11.19). Since the demigod year is equivalent to three hundred and sixty earth years (Bhaktivedanta Swami 1973, p. 102), the lengths of the yugas in earth years are, according to standard Vaisnava commentaries, 432 000 years for the Kali-yuga, 864,000 years for the Dvapara-yuga, 11,296,000 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 4,320,000,000 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 fourteen manvatara periods, each one lasting seventy-one yuga cycles. Preceding the first and following each manvatara 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-eight yuga cycle of the eighth manvatara period of the present day of Brahma. This would give the inhabited earth an age of 2.3 billion years.

Interestingly enough, the oldest undisputed organisms recognized by paleontologists -algae fossils such as those from the Gunflint formation in Canada – are just about that old (Stewart, 1983, p. 30). Altogether, 524 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. At the end of each Kali-yuga, the earth is practically depopulated.

During the yuga cycles, human species coexist with other human-like species. For example, in the Bhagavata Purana (9.10.20) we find the divine avatara Ramacandra conquering Ravana’s kingdom Lanka with the aid of intelligent forest dwelling monkey men who fought Ravana’s well-equipped soldiers with trees and stones. This occurred in the Treta-yuga, about one million years ago.

Given the cycle of yugas, the periodic devastation at the end of each manvatara, and the coexistence of civilized human beings with creatures in some ways resembling the human ancestors of modern evolutionary accounts, what predictions might the Puranic account give regarding the archaeological record? Before answering this question, we must also consider the general imperfection of the fossil record (Raup and Stanley, 1971). Hominid fossils in particular are extremely rare. Furthermore, only a small fraction of the sedimentary layers deposited during the course of the earth’s history have survived erosion and other destructive geological processes (Van Andel, 1981).

Taking the above into account, I propose the Puranic view of time and history predicts a sparse but bewildering mixture of hominid fossils, some anatomically modern and some not, going back tens and even hundreds of millions of years and occurring at locations all over the world. It also predicts a more numerous but similarly bewildering mixture of stone tools and other artefacts, some showing a high level of technical ability and others not. Given the cognitive biases of the majority of workers in the fields of archaeology and anthropology over the past one hundred and fifty years, we might also predict that this bewildering mixture of fossils and artefacts would be edited to conform with a linear, progressive view of human origins. A careful investigation of published reports by myself and Richard Thompson (1993) offers confirmation of these two predictions. What follows is only a sample of the total body of evidence catalogued in our lengthy book. The citations given are for the single reports that best identify particular finds. Detailed analysis and additional reports cited elsewhere (Creme and Thompson, 1993) offer strong confirmation of the authenticity and antiquity of these discoveries.

Incised and carved mammal bones are reported from the Pliocene (Desnoyers, 1863; Laussedat, 1868; Capellini, 1877) and Miocene (Garrigou and Filhol, 1868; von Ducker, 1873). Additional reports of incised bones from the Pliocene and Miocene periods may be found in an extensive review by the overly skeptical de Mortillet (1883). Scientists have also reported pierced shark teeth from the Pliocene period (Charlesworth 1873), artistically carved bone from the Miocene (Calvert 1874) and artistically carved shell from the Pliocene (Stopes, 1881). Carved mammal bones reported by Moir (1917) could be as old as the Eocene.

Very crude stone tools occur in the Middle Pliocene (Prestwich 1892) and from perhaps as far back as the Eocene (Moir, 1927; Breuil, 1910, especially p. 402). One will note that most of these discoveries are from the nineteenth century. But such artefacts are still being found. Crude stone tools have recently been reported from the Pliocene of Pakistan (Bunney, 1987), Siberia (Daniloff and Kopf, 1986) and India (Sankhyan, 1981). Given the current view that tool-making hominids did not leave their African center of origin until about one million years ago, these artefacts are somewhat anomalous, what to speak of a pebble tool from the Miocene of India (Prasad 1982).

More advanced stone tools occur in the Oligocene of Europe (Rutot, 1907), the Miocene of Europe (Ribeiro, 1873; Bourgeois, 1873; Verworn 1905), the Miocene of Asia (Noetling 1894), and the Pliocene of South America (F. Ameghino, 1908; C. Ameghino, 1915). In North America, advanced stone tools occur in California deposits ranging from Pliocene to Miocene in age (Whitney 1880). An interesting slingstone, at least Pliocene and perhaps Eocene in age, comes from England (Moir 1929, p. 63).

More advanced artefacts have also been reported in scientific and non-scientific publications. These include an iron nail in Devonian Sandstone (Brewster 1844), a gold thread in Carboniferous stone (Times of London, June 22, 1844), a metallic vase in Precambrian stone (Scientific American, June 5, 1852), and a chalk ball from the Eocene (Melleville, 1862), a Pliocene clay statue (Wright 1912, pp. 266-69), metallic tubes in Cretaceous chalk (Corliss 1978, pp. 652-53), and a grooved metallic sphere from the Precambrian (Jimison 1982). The following objects have been reported from Carboniferous coal: a gold chain (The Morrisonville Times, of Illinois, U.S.A., June 11, 1891), artistically carved stone (Daily News of Omaha, U.S.A., April 2, 1897), an iron cup (Rusch, 1971), and stone block walls (Steiger, 1979, p. 27).

Human skeletal remains described as anatomically modern occur in the Middle Pleistocene of Europe (Newton, 1895; Bertrand, 1868; de Mortillet, 1883). These cases are favorably reviewed by Keith (1928). Other anatomically modern human skeletal remains occur in the Early and Middle Pleistocene of Africa (Reck, 1914; L. Leakey, 1960d; Zuckerman, 1954, p. 310; Patterson and Howells, 1967; Senut , 1981; R. Leakey, 1973); the Early Middle Pleistocene of Java (Day and Molleson, 1973), the Early Pleistocene of South America (Hrdlicka 1912, pp. 319-44); the Pliocene of South America (Hrdlicka 1912, p. 346; Boman 1921, pp. 341-2); the Pliocene of England (Osborn 1921, pp. 567-9); the Pliocene of Italy (Ragazzoni, 1880; Issel, 1868), the Miocene of France and the Eocene of Switzerland (de Mortillet, 1883, p. 72), and even the Carboniferous of North America (The Geologist, 1862). Several discoveries have also been made in Californian goldmines that range from Pliocene to Eocene (Whitney, 1880). Some of these samples have been subjected to chemical and radiometric tests which showed that they are ages younger than suggested by their stratigraphical position. But when the unreliability and weaknesses of the testing procedures are measured against the very compelling stratigraphic observations of the discoverers, it is not at all clear that the original age attributions should be discarded (Cremo and Thompson, 1993, pp. 753-94).

In addition, human-like footprints have been found in the Carboniferous of North America (Burroughs, 1938), the Jurassic of Central Asia (Moscow News 1983, no.4, p. 10) and the Pliocene of Africa (M. Leakey, 1979). Shoeprints have also been reported from the Cambrian (Meister, 1968) and the Triassic (Ballou, 1922).
In the course of negotiating a fashionable consensus that anatomically modern humans evolved from less advanced hominids in the Late Pleistocene, scientists gradually rendered unfashionable the considerable body of compelling contradictory evidence summarized above. It thus became unworthy of discussion in academic circles. Richard Thompson and I have concluded (1993) that the muting of this evidence was accomplished by application of a double standard, whereby favored evidence was exempted from the severely skeptical scrutiny to which disfavored evidence was subjected.

One example from the many that could be cited to demonstrate the operation of linear progressive preconceptions in the editing of the archaeological record, is the case of the auriferous gravel finds in California. During the days of the California Gold Rush (which started in the 1850s), miners discovered many anatomically modern human bones and advanced stone implements in mineshafts sunk deeply into deposits of gold-bearing gravel capped by thick lava flows (Whitney, 1880). According to modern geological reports (Slemmons, 1966) the gravel beneath the lava dated back from nine to fifty-five million years ago. These discoveries were reported to the world of science by J. D. Whitney, state geologist of California, in a monograph published by the Peabody Museum of Natural History at Harvard University. From the evidence he compiled, Whitney came to a non-progressivist view of human origins – the fossil evidence he reported indicated that the humans of the distant past were like those of the present.

Responding to this thesis, W. H. Holmes (1899, p. 424) of the Smithsonian Institution stated: ‘Perhaps if Prof. Whitney had fully appreciated the story of human evolution as it is understood today, he would have hesitated to announce the conclusions formulated, notwithstanding the imposing array of testimony with which he was confronted, an attitude that still prevails even today. For example, in their college textbook on anthropology, Stein and Rowe assert that ‘scientific statements are never considered absolute’ (1993, p. 41). However, in the same textbook they also make this very absolute statement: ‘Some people have assumed that humans have always been the way they are today. Anthropologists are convinced that human beings have changed over time in response to changing conditions. So one aim of the anthropologist is to find evidence for evolution and to generate theories about it.’ Apparently, an anthropologist, by definition, can have no other view or purpose. One should keep in mind, however, that this absolute commitment to a linear progressive model of human origins, ostensibly areligious, may have deep roots in Judeo-Christian cosmology.

One of the things Holmes found especially hard to accept was the similarity of the purportedly ancient stone implements to those of the modern Indians. He wondered how anyone could take seriously the idea that ‘the implements of a Tertiary race should have been left in the bed of a Tertiary torrent to be brought out as good as new, after the lapse of vast periods of time, into the camp of a modern community using identical forms?’ (1899, pp. 451-2). The similarity could be explained in several ways, but one possible explanation is the repeated appearance in the same geographical region of humans with particular cultural attributes in the course of cyclical time. The suggestion that such a thing could happen is bound to strike those who see humans as the recent result of a long and unique series of evolutionary changes in the hominid line, as absurd ― so absurd, in fact, as to prevent them from considering any evidence as potentially supporting a cyclical interpretation of human history.

It is noteworthy, however, that a fairly open-minded modern archaeologist, when confronted with the evidence catalogued in my book, brought up, in a somewhat doubting manner, the possibility of a cyclical interpretation of human history to explain its occurrence. George F. Carter, noted for his controversial views on early man in North America, wrote in a letter to me dated 26 January 1994: ‘If your table on page 391 were correct, then the minimum age for the artefacts at Table Mountain would be nine million [years old]. Would you think then of a different creation – [one that] disappeared – and then a new start? Would it simply replicate the archaeology of California nine million years later? Or the inverse. Would the Californians nine million years later replicate the materials under Table Mountain?’

This is exactly what I do propose – that in the course of cyclic time, humans with a culture resembling that of modern North American Indians did, in fact, appear in California millions of years ago, perhaps several times. In his letter, Carter confessed that he found great difficulty with this line of reasoning. But that difficulty, which encumbers the minds of most archaeologists and anthropologists, may be the result of a rarely recognized and even more rarely questioned commitment to a culturally acquired linear progressive time sense.

It would, therefore, be worthwhile to inspect the archaeological record through other time lenses, such as the Puranic lens. Many will take my proposal as a perfect example of what can happen when someone brings their subjective religious ideas into the objective study of nature. Jonathan Marks (1994) reacted in typical fashion in his review of Forbidden Archaeology: ‘Generally, attempts to reconcile the natural world to religious views end up compromising the natural world.’

But until modern anthropology conducts a conscious examination of the effects of its own covert, and arguably religiously derived assumptions about time and progress, it should put aside its pretensions to universal objectivity and not be so quick to accuse others of bending facts to fit religious dogma. Om Tat Sat.

This paper was delivered at the Third World Archaeological Congress, New Delhi, India, 4 -11 December 1994.

 


 

References

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ISKCON Mayapur Master Plan Brochure
- TOVP.org

The Sridham Mayapur Development Foundation has released it’s ISKCON Mayapur Master Plan brochure for the development of Mayapur into a full-fledged city according to Srila Prabhupada’s vision and instructions. The new brochure is available to view and download below as a pdf file or as an online flipbook.

Please take this unique opportunity to help build the ISKCON city in Mayapur by contributing to the TOVP construction. In October this year we will reach our next milestone with the historic celebration of the completion and opening of the entire Nrsimhadeva Temple Hall. The Grand Opening of the TOVP will be celebrate during a three-month-long mega-event from December, 2024 until Gaura Purnima, 2025.

Go to the Give to Nrsimha 2023 Campaign page to sponsor a Nrsimha Brick with your name inscribed and placed under the Lord’s altar, or one of several other unique seva options.

Brochure Download: https://mayapur.com/downloads/Brochure-Mayapur-Master-Plan.pdf

Brochure Flipbook: http://mayapur.ngo/

 


 

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East Ukraine Tour March 2023
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Parasuram das One year into the Russian / Ukraine war, the local Ukrainian devotees are doing great service distributing Prasad, distributing Books and performing Sankirtan. All glories to their service. Let’s get behind them and show some support! You can donate via this link and all funds will be immediately sent to the official bank
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Launch of H.H.Tamal Krishna Goswami’s Lecture Video Library on YouTube with never-before-seen videos
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A video library of H.H. Tamal Krishna Goswami’s lectures is now available on YouTube. Most of these video lectures have not been available online till now. New lectures are being released three times a week on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. The dates of the lectures will range from 1988-2002. The lectures have been carefully curated
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NASN January 2023 – North American Sankirtan Newsletter
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By Mayapur Sasi dasa

For the pleasure of Srila Prabhupada this report contains the following North American results of book distribution for the month of January 2023. North American Totals, Monthly Temples, Monthly Weekend Warriors. Monthly Top 100 Individuals, Monthly Top 5, Cumulative Countries, Cumulative Temples, Cumulative Top 100 Individuals, Cumulative Top 5 Continue reading "NASN January 2023 – North American Sankirtan Newsletter
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Book distribution World records in various categories – 1979 to 2023
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World Sankirtan Newsletter WORLD RECORDS FOR INDIVIDUALS BOOK POINTS 1979 to 2023 Single Year Lifetime Top Individuals Book Points Top Individuals Book Points ---------------------------------- ---------------------------------- 1 Anirdesyavapuh d Mos Rus 105754.70 1993 1 Harinamananda d Zur Swi 596984.30 16yrs(83-17) 2 Anirdesyavapuh d Mos Rus 100980.60 1992 2 Paramesvara d Yps USA 573194.90 25yrs(98-23) 3 Vichitra
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The best of all fast days Amalaki-vrata Ekadasi and the TOVP, 2023
- TOVP.org

Amalaki-vrata Ekadasi is celebrated in Krishna Paksha (Waxing Phase) in the Phalgun month (February–March). ‘Amalaki’ or ‘Amla’ is the Indian gooseberry, and the tree is celebrated on this day. It is believed that Lord Vishnu resides in this tree, and this occasion also marks the beginning of Holi — Indian festival of colors.

This is also the final Ekadasi before Gaura Purnuma, 2023 (March 7 in India/March 6 in North America) and is an auspicious time to contribute financially towards the completion and opening of Lord Nrsimhadeva’s Temple Hall in October. There are many, many different types of sponsorships available and most are pledges which can be paid over two years. Visit the Give To Nrsimha page for more information. Visit the Give To Nrsimha 2023 Fundraiser page for more information.

  NOTE: Amalaki-vrata Ekadasi is observed on March 2 in most of the U.S. and on March 3 in India. Please refer to your local calendar through www.gopal.home.sk/gcal.

  View, download and share the TOVP 2022 Calendar​.

 

The Glories of Amalaki-vrata Ekadasi

From the Brahmanda Purana

This Ekadasi is described in the Brahmanda Purana in a conversation between King Mandhata and the great sage Vasistha.

King Mandhata once said to Vasishtha Muni, “O great sage, kindly be merciful to me and tell me of a holy fast that will benefit me eternally.”

Vasishtha Muni replied. “O king, kindly listen as I describe the best of all fast days, Amalaki Ekadasi. He who faithfully observes a fast on this Ekadasi obtains enormous wealth, gets free of the effects of all kinds of sins, and attains liberation. Fasting on this Ekadasi is more purifying than donating one thousand cows in charity to a pure brahmana. So please hear me attentively as I tell you the story of a hunter who, though daily engaged in killing innocent animals for his living, achieved liberation by observing a fast on Amalaki Ekadasi following the prescribed rules and regulations of worship.

The Kingdom of Vaidisha

“There was once a kingdom named Vaidisha, where all the brahmanas, kshatriyas, vaishyas, and shudras were equally endowed with Vedic knowledge, great bodily strength, and fine intelligence. Oh lion among kings, the whole kingdom was full of Vedic sounds, not a single person was atheistic, and no one sinned. The ruler of this kingdom was King Pashabinduka, a member of the dynasty of Soma, the moon. He was also known as Chitraratha and was very religious and truthful. It is said that King Chitraratha had the strength of ten thousand elephants and that he was very wealthy and knew the six branches of Vedic wisdom perfectly.

“During the reign of Maharaja Chitraratha, not a single person in his kingdom attempted to practice another’s dharma (duty); so perfectly engaged in their own dharmas were all the brahmanas, kshatriyas, vaisyas, and sudras. Neither miser nor pauper was to be seen throughout the land, never was there ever a drought or flood. Indeed, the kingdom was free of disease, and everyone enjoyed good health. The people rendered loving devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Vishnu, as did the king, who also rendered special service to Lord Shiva. Moreover, twice a month everyone fasted on Ekadasi. In this way, O best of kings, the citizens of Vaidisha lived many long years in great happiness and prosperity. Giving up all varieties of materialistic religion, they completely dedicated themselves to the loving service of the Supreme Lord, Hari.

Observing Amalaki Ekadasi

“Once, in the month of Phalguna (February – March), the holy fast of Amalakii Ekadasi arrived, conjoined with Dvadasi. King Chitraratha realised that this particular fast would bestow especially great benefit, and thus he and all the citizens of Vaidisha observed this sacred Ekadasi very strictly, carefully following all the rules and regulations.

“After bathing in the river, the king and all his subjects went to the temple of Lord Vishnu, where an Amalaki tree grew. First the king and his leading sages offered the tree a pot filled with water, as well as a fine canopy, shoes, gold, diamonds, rubies, pearls, sapphires, and aromatic incense. Then they worshiped Lord Parashurama with these prayers: ‘Oh Lord Parashurama, Oh son of Renuka, Oh all-pleasing one, Oh liberator of the worlds, kindly come beneath this holy Amalaki tree and accept our humble obeisances.’ Then they prayed to the Amalaki tree: ‘Oh Amalaki, Oh offspring of Lord Brahma, you can destroy all kinds of sinful reactions. Please accept our respectful obeisances and these humble gifts. O Amalaki, you are actually the form of Brahman, and you were once worshiped by Lord Ramachandra Himself. Whoever circumambulates you is therefore immediately freed of all his sins.’

“After offering these excellent prayers, King Chitraratha and his subjects remained awake throughout the night, praying and worshiping according to the regulations governing a sacred Ekadasi fast. It was during this auspicious time of fasting and prayer that a very irreligious man approached the assembly, a man who maintained himself and his family by killing animals. Burdened with both fatigue and sin, the hunter saw the king and the citizens of Vaidisha observing Amalaki Ekadasi by performing an all-night vigil, fasting, and worshiping Lord Vishnu in the beautiful forest setting, which was brilliantly illuminated by many lamps. The hunter hid nearby, wondering what this extraordinary sight before him was.

The Fortunate Hunter

“‘What is going on here?’ he thought. What he saw in that lovely forest beneath the holy Amalaki tree was the Deity of Lord Damodara being worshiped upon the Asana of a waterpot and he heard the devotees singing sacred songs describing Lord Krishna’s transcendental forms and pastimes. Despite himself, that staunchly irreligious killer of innocent birds and animals spent the entire night in great amazement as he watched the Ekadasi celebration and listened to the glorification of the Lord.

“Soon after sunrise, the king and his royal retinue – including the court sages and all the citizens – completed their observance of Ekadasi and returned to the city of Vaidisha. The hunter returned to his hut and happily ate his meal. In due time the hunter died, but the merit he had gained by fasting on Amalaki Ekadasi and hearing the glorification of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, as well as by being forced to stay awake all night, made him eligible to be reborn as a great king endowed with many chariots, elephants, horses, and soldiers. His name was Vasuratha, the son of King Viduratha, and he ruled over the kingdom of Jayanti.

King Vasuratha

“King Vasuratha was strong and fearless, as effulgent as the Sun, and as handsome as the Moon. In strength he was like Sri Vishnu, and in forgiveness like the Earth itself. Very charitable and every truthful, King Vasuratha always rendered loving devotional service to the Supreme Lord, Sri Vishnu. He therefore became very well versed in Vedic knowledge. Always active in the affairs of state, he enjoyed taking excellent care of his subjects, as though they were his own children. He disliked pride in anyone and would smash it when he saw it. He performed many kinds of sacrifices, and he always made certain that the needy in his kingdom received enough charity.

“One day, while hunting in the jungle, King Vasuratha strayed from the footpath and lost his way. Wandering for some time and eventually growing weary, he paused beneath a tree and, using his arms as a pillow, fell asleep. As he slept, some barbarian tribesmen came upon him and, remembering their long-standing enmity toward the king, began discussing among themselves various ways to kill him. ‘It is because he killed our fathers, mothers, brothers-in-law, grandsons, nephews, and uncles that we are forced to aimlessly wander like so many madmen in the forest.’

The Great Rescue

“So saying, they prepared to kill King Vasuratha with various weapons, including spears, swords, arrows, and mystic ropes. But none of these deadly weapons could even touch the sleeping king, and soon the uncivilized, dog-eating tribesmen grew frightened. Their fear sapped their strength, and before long they lost what little intelligence they had and became almost unconscious with bewilderment and weakness.

Suddenly a beautiful woman appeared from the king’s body, startling the aborigines. Decorated with many ornaments, emitting a wonderful fragrance, wearing an excellent garland around her neck, her eyebrows drawn in a mood of fierce anger, and her fiery red eyes ablaze, she looked like death personified. With her blazing chakra discus she quickly killed all the tribal hunters, who had tried to slay the sleeping king.

“Just then the king awoke, and seeing all the dead tribesmen lying around him, he was astonished. He wondered, ‘These are all great enemies of mine! Who has slain them so violently? Who is my great benefactor?’ At that very moment he heard a voice from the sky: ‘You asked who helped you. Well, who is that person who alone can help anyone in distress? He is none other than Sri Keshava, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, He who saves all who take shelter of Him without any selfish motive.’

“Upon hearing these words, King Vasuratha became over-whelmed with love for the Personality of Godhead Sri Keshava (Krishna). He returned to his capital city and ruled there like a second Lord Indra (king of the heavenly regions), without any obstacles at all.

Conclusion

“Therefore, Oh King Mandhata”, the venerable Vasishtha Muni concluded, “anyone who observes this holy Amalaki Ekadasi will undoubtedly attain the supreme abode of Lord Vishnu, so great is the religious merit earned from the observance of this most sacred fast day.”

Thus ends the narration of the glories of Phalguna-sukla Ekadasi, or Amalaki Ekadasi, from the Brahmanda Purana.

This article has been used courtesy of ISKCON Desire Tree

 


 

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