Dear Subscribers,

Tomorrow, we are celebrating the anniversary of the survival of a small group of Puritan separatists who left England in quest of religious freedom. We learned that in school, but there is much I don't recall having heard as a child.

With all the descendents of Mayflower, you would have thought that there were a lot of passengers, but officially there were 102 passengers plus crew. The destination was Virginia but they landed near present day Cape Cod. The Puritans, later referred to as Pilgrims, signed a compact on board the ship. The compact was signed by 41 passengers, all men. They swore loyalty to King James and vowed to organize a community based on fairness and cooperation.

This little piece of history is actually complicated. The Puritans had for a time (1608) fled England and lived in Leiden, part of the present Netherlands. There, they created a spiritual covenant and they became known as Separatists. Outside the common bond of faith, they constituted a group of a rather diverse swath of society that included many occupations but no one of the nobility. Some years later, they obtained permission of the crown to settle in Virginia but never reached there due to the seas and shortage of supplies. Because they did not land where permission had been granted, they were faced with uncharted conditions. They navigated these by cultivating friendly relationships with the First Nation People: Wampanoag, the Mohegan and the Mohican, many of whom had died of diseases contracted from Europeans who arrived earlier. These diseases included smallpox, plague, yellow fever, and possibly also leptospirosis, a spirochetic disease. This was however a two-way street since many Europeans succumbed to malaria, especially those who settled further south. It was the Wampanoag people who aided the Pilgrims, only 53 of whom survived the first year. There were only four adult women at the first Thanksgiving. The rest were men and children. There were 90 male members of the Wampanoag, including one named Squanto who spoke fluent English due to having been captured and enslaved and sent to England. The chief was also present and the celebration lasted three days with the men sharing what they hunted.

Thanksgiving did not become a national holiday until Lincoln supported legislation to create a holiday that would possibly heal the bitter divide that resulted in the Civil War. This is obviously a thumbnail sketch of the highlights of a piece of American history. The menu from the first Thanksgiving may have differed significantly from what is now regarded as traditional, but the colony did survive along with at least a few of the critical principles constituting the foundation of the new religio-political community.

Photo Credit: Photowitch | Dreamstime.com

Motivation

The first issue that was stated as the reason for separating from the European Continent was religious freedom. That is what we learned in school. At the time, there were Sephardic Jewish people, Moslems, Catholics of various orders, and a new wave of Protestants. The Albigensian Crusade sought to annihilate the Cathars, a Gnostic group of Christians who were peaceful and vegetarian. Some survived, but many were killed or burned at the stake. Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492 and from England in 1290. Moriscos, Moslems, were expelled by King Philip III in 1609. Heretics were burned, books were burned, and property was confiscated. On top of these persecutions, the Black Death had not completely run its course, and there was poverty, disease, as well as endless warfare. This is what the Pilgrims sought to escape, but did they create Heaven on Earth or just another version of the European society from which they were fleeing, this at great peril to themselves and their families and brethren.

What do we have today in America? It is the most diverse but possibly also most divisive I can remember. After the Europeans came the Africans and then various East Asians and now people from almost everywhere but have we learned to grant freedom of faith to all? Have we learned to get along with each other? Have we learned what social justice means? These topics are the fodder of social movements and political positions, but it is anyone's guess whether divide and conquer will result in strong leadership — and possibly domination and control — or whether a new social policy will emerge out of the present chaos.

Eras and Epochs

The era of colonization of the Americas, Australia, and New Zealand is sometimes called the Age of Exploration or Age of Discovery. It is also referred to as the Age of Reason, the beginning of science and end of superstition, and it overlaps, of course, with the Renaissance, which could be considered the time of the liberation of humanity from helplessness and the awakening of creativity. That is often how it is depicted in history books, but that particular wave required immense patronage by the wealthy elite who were, of course, prospering by robbing the wealth of the New World.

Kali Yuga

Today, we are on the brink of another era. Depending on the point of reference, we are either at the beginning of the Age of Aquarius or the end, perhaps, of Kali Yuga, the era of strife. Let's start with Kali Yuga. This is a concept from the Vedas and begins with the Mahabharata and death of Lord Krishna. Kali Yuga is the age of degeneration. The ancient literature, all in Sanskrit, the mother of Indo-European languages, describes four ages. In what we would call the Golden Age, there is no sin, no worship, no illness, no crime, no disease, and no war. People are truthful, very tall, live very long, and everything is harmonious. As civilization degenerates, life spans are shortened and people are themselves shorter. There is much lying, violence, disease, and sickening immorality. People could conceivably live 120 years but as matters deteriorate even further, the average life span may decrease to twenty years.

Various pundits, both Eastern and Western, have tried to calculate when Kali Yuga ends. This is far more difficult than most people think because of numerous calendric reforms and errors in calculations. Both the Mayan and Indian calendars were recalculated roughly 2000-2500 years ago. As mentioned in many previous posts, it was traditional in the past to relate the calendar to the reigns of kings, pharaohs, emperors, and so on. To make this clear, we need only look at modern Japan to see that the oldest monarchy in the world dates back to 645 AD. The modern era began with the Meiji in 1868 to the present which is called Reiwa. So, 2019 marked the end of the reign of Akihito, 1989-2019, and then became the first year of the rule of Naruhito. It is very impolite in Japan to refer to the emperor by name so one refers to the era, i.e., to Reiwa, not to the prince who recently became emperor.

This system dates back thousands of years so the calendar was political, not astronomical. Not to make this overly complicated, but the Indian calendar dates from 6676 BC and had 153 kings between then and Chandragupta Maurya who received a Greek delegation in 314 BC. In short, dating has been approached both by reference to the reigns of each king as well as by astronomers and astrologers, the profession being one and the same in ancient times.

Yuga Cycle

The yuga cycle has a descending and ascending arc, not circular. We start with a deep memory of our divine state and degenerate into an abyss from which we have to ascend. This requires knowledge of the truth and ethics. It is said that during Kali Yuga, 75% of humanity is degenerate and only 25% are truthful and ethical. There are numerous scholarly treatises on the yugas, but the prevailing sentiment is that Kali Yuga either ended or is about to end in our lifetime. Dates vary considerably. Some believe that the Mayan system of baktuns and the Vedic system of yugas coincided in 2012 and that this launched the new cycle in which Dwapara Yuga begins. Various other dates have also been proposed, but this might be a topic for another time.

The shifts are usually dramatic in some manner. For instance, it is said that a meteorite storm ended the ice age which today is considered the demarcation of prehistoric and "historic"times. Archeological evidence, of course, suggests the existence of earlier civilizations, but they were not "historic" in the sense that records survived.

The next major shift came when the Mediterranean Sea swelled due to melting of glaciers and overflowed its normal boundaries and poured into the Black Sea which had been a fresh water lake prior to that event. That was another transition point between yagis. There have been many such events in history which is no doubt why it is possible to stir up archived memories of catastrophes through the use of prophecies and science.

In my view, it is not necessary to detail all the events and their consequences. What they teach us is that Nature is stronger than humanity so we must temper our egos and their impact on public policies to reflect the fact that in the world of manifestation, there is always change. In my writings over the last 45 years, I have referred to the interaction of Space and Time as these are the main characteristics of third dimensional reality. Last night, I listened to a very short talk by Nassim Haramein in which he stated that Time is actually inseparable from Memory. It is an electrifying concept that immediately resonated as straight fact since memory always has a reference point whereas in the Eternal Now, no such point exists since nothing is becoming or ending so the concept of change cannot actually exist.

While this topic may seem to be a digression, I think it is tangentially related to the ethics of freedom to pursue one's bliss, and I see glimmers of hope in the current contests affecting our wider civilization. We are discussing — humanity as an entity — what are our inalienable rights and how the rights of one person affect the rights of others. More and more options are coming into focus so while I believe I am seeing the end of the old, I am cautiously optimistic about the beginning of the new. If we superimpose the concept of degeneration and epochs, then the ranks of populace that have remained truthful and ethical appear to be swelling and demanding the right to insist on reorganization of the manner in which we approach life. For this I am grateful, and I do believe the seeds that were planted in the New World are germinating and having an impact throughout the world. In this, I include not just the Puritans but also the many who left their homes to pursue a dream they believed could not become reality in the original homes. The next step, I believe, is repair of relationships between the original inhabitants and the immigrants so that respect and harmony with Nature can develop.

Many blessings,

Ingrid

Copyright by Ingrid Naiman 2019

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