In almost all the puranas and other ancient Indian texts we find the duration of yuga specified as 4320000 years or 12000 divine years. A divine year in these texts is defined as equal to 360 human years that validates this conversion (12000 x 360 = 4320000 years). Reason for choosing these figures is specified nowhere though.
4320000 years is a too big figure, indigestible for personal or other historical reasons, the reason we have debates that try to prove that 12000 divine years were meant to be 12000 human years only. The people favoring this stance find the support from Sri Yukteshwar too who has also defined a cycle of 24000 years comprising two cycles of yugas of 12000 years each, put together back to back i.e. while all the ancient texts define the transition within a mahayuga from Krta to Treta to Dwapar to Kali and immediately back to Krta in the next mahayuga, the transition in the Yukteshwar theory is from Kali to Dwapar to Treta to Krta in the second cycle of 12000 years yuga.
Apart from this in some of the texts we also find small figures like 5 years yuga, 19 years yuga etc.
In some of the debates that I have personally observed and participated in, I found that people are unable to answer the simple question “what is yuga?”
Unless and until we have a definition of the yuga how can we debate whether it has to be 5 years or 12000 years or 4320000 years? We can certainly improve upon the mentioned figure of 4320000 years in the ancient texts using modern facts but before trying anything we need to first define “what is yuga?” Isn’t it?
I have been asking this question for a long time, but am yet to get any answer from anybody. So, let me answer it myself.
The next question would obviously be “which astronomical phenomenon?”
We can have a yuga based on the metonic cycle of 19 years; we can have a yuga based on the cycle of eclipses; we can also have a yuga based on the precession cycle etc.
But when we move on to the big figure of 4320000 years, it makes us bite our nails since it is really quite big to relate it to any astronomical phenomenon in the first go. Some scholars have tried to relate this figure to all the planets by terming it as the L.C.M. of all the planets making their journey back to the initial point together as per the siddhantic theory. But this is not true since L.C.M. of all the planets coming back to the initial point based on mean values is 1080000 years and not 4320000 years in the surya siddhantic concept.
There is another theory as well that tries to first define the kaliyuga figure (1/10th of yuga i.e. 432000 years) as two cycles of 216000 years each like the Yuktehwar’s theory of two cycles of 12000 years back to back. In this theory, the figure of 216000 years is arrived at by assuming precession cycle to be of 27000 years and assuming a dark star cycle of 24000 years that creates yuga of two cycles of 12000 years as per Sri Yuktehwar’s theory. When these two assumed cycles of 27000 years and 24000 years meet, we get the figure of 216000 years. And so on.
Summing up, they don’t have any concrete reason behind the figure of 4320000 years even involving all the planets.
1. Yuga is the coming together of certain astronomical phenomena.
2. All yugas are based on mean values.
3. All yugas are based on Sun and Moon only.
After we have understood this basic concept, we can move on to find why 5 years is a yuga, why 19 years is a yuga and so on. Any person looking for an answer to any yuga figure (including 12000 years or bigger) has to remain within these core boundaries to find the answer.
And yes, even 4320000 years is a yuga based on the siddhantic figures and the three core pillars as defined above. My book "Taming the Untamed" has all the details of how it is.
April 26, 2016
Devinder Dhingra
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