Uttarayana, Pulp Dharma, and Some other things..

Uttarayana is one half of the luni-solar year, it being the "day" for devas (celestials). Dakshinayana is the other half, it being the "night" for devas. A human luni-solar month is, by the way, a full day for pitrus (our ancestors that have departed the earth). Shukla paksha and Krishna paksha of the month (fortnights) are the "day" and "night" of pitrus.

Many associate the start of Uttarayana with Makara Sankaranthi. However, these are not the same. There are minor time differences (ayanamsha or small time period differences, which I am not familiar enough with to describe here) that add up every year to put the start of Uttarayana further and further from Makara Sankaranthi every year. Of course, the furtherance only impacts us when the differences add up to a full day. In fact, over several thousand years, Uttarayana will move towards June and then again towards December and January, with this cycle repeating itself.

In Uttarayana (uttara means north and dakshina means south) the sun moves in the northerly direction (not literally) among the astrological signs.

Prabhasa, one of the Vaasus (a group of 8 celestial beings) visits the ashrama of Vasishta, and urged by his wife steals his cow Kamadhenu (or was it Nandini, the calf?). The vaasus are then curses by Vasishta to incarnate on earth as humans.

The curse of incarnation on earth as humans is interesting. This must means that Vasishta's ashrama was in one of the upper worlds (not bhu-loka [earth], but suvar-loka or other).

Incarnating during any of the yugas but Krita (Satya) Yuga must be a hellish time for devas because of the lack of dharma and all the evil. i.e., even during Rama rajya in Treta Yuga or when Krishna in walking the earth during Dwapara Yuga. Of the 8 vaasus, the first 7 get lenient punishments. Ganga would incarnate as their mother (wife of King Shantanu) and kill them off as infants. The 8th vaasu who was the actual thief would incarnate as a very illustrious Kshatriya and live a long life, thus suffering Dwapara Yuga, along with the witnessing of his clan get destroyes, while on earth.

Interestingly enough, the wife of Prabhasa (the vaasu that incarnates as Bhishma) doesn't seem to be getting any punishment. Does it mean that among the devas the husband shares punishment for the wife's crimes too? It is she that urged him to steal. Among the humans, the husband shares his punya with his entire family, including the wife. Oh well!  

Shantanu, his father, grants Bhishma the boon of choosing to die whenever he wishes to (for having chosen a life of celibacy to get the fishergirl married to him father). When he is felled on the battlefield by Arjuna (read the role of Shikhandi elsewhere on the blog), he chooses to end his life after Uttarayana starts, instead of the less-than-auspicious Dakshinayana.

Dharma forbids suicide, which leads to a pishacha existence post-death. This is why Bhishma does not choose to end his life prior to being felled on the battlefield. The only time he is ready to lay down his arms (barring in front of the invalid Shakuni) is when Krishna rushes at him with his chakra when Arjuna is unable to dispose of him.

Yesterday I read an interesting account of Bhishma's promise to Duryodhana during the Mahabharata war. When Duryodhana confronts Bhishma about his hesitance to kill the Pandavas (barring Bhima, he would be able to easily rid everyone else), Bhishma promises that the next day either the Pandavas would be dead or he would force Krishna to draw a weapon. i.e. indicating that his onslaught would be so severe that Krishna would break his vow of not drawing a weapon during the war. The next day, however, when Arjuna is unable to make any impact in his battle with Bhishma (a combination of disinclination and inability), Krishna rushes at Bhishma to kill him with his sudarshana chakra. Bhishma begs krishna to kill him, for what better blessing than to be killed on the battlefield by the supreme being Himself. Bhishma is also moved by Krishna's action, because he knew that Krishna was not going to kill him. He would let Arjuna do it. However, the act of drawing his sudarshana chakra to kill Bhishma helped Bhishma keep his promise to Duryodhana. Krishna, out of fondness for his devotee (even though he has committed sins like watching Draupadi be insulted), helps keep his promise. He also uses the opportunity to swing Arjuna's mood in the right direction. Arjuna and the rest of the Pandavas then go to Bhishma's camp and ask him for advice on killing him. The Shikhandi episode then ensues.   

(back to why Bhishma does not choose death at any other time) Dharma forbids suicide because God has given the soul an opportunity to take birth on earth, the saadhana bhoomi, where the soul can experience good and bad, choose to follow dharma or adharma, and progress through the stages in attaining its goal (salvation in moksha or eternal damnation in tamas). Just because a particular birth is too painful, the person should not decide to end their life, but actually look to take away the right learning from it.

Svarga (heaven) and Naraka (weaker than the eternal tamas) are temporary, and stints here may be meted out even to otherwise good or bad people for their material actions. 

As the Yugas progress, Krita Yuga gives way to Treta Yuga, to Dwapara Yuga, and finally to Kali Yuga. Kali Yuga is the period we are in currently, where dharma is teetering on its last leg (of 4). Even within this Yuga, the puranas describe a gradual weakening of dharma, a growth of individualism, a focus on material and physical (including sexual) indulgence, tyranny. Some accounts put the number of good (Saatvik) souls taking birth in the Kali Yuga at 2 crores (10 million).

The Bhagavata Purana (or just Bhagavata)  describes Krishna telling Ganga to stay on earth for 5000 years of Kali Yuga, to allow people (good and bad) to wash away their sins in her. (Most of our calendars indicate that we are 5100+ years into Kali Yuga, which must be wrong in some way.) For another 5000 years, His devotees (Saatvika) would be present on earth. Given the constant weakening of dharma, the number of Saatvikas must also be concentrated in earlier periods, with the last centuries of this 10,000 year period essentially being the time before which the flood gates of Kali open before the remainder of the 422,000 years of Kali Yuga play out. At the end of Kali Yuga, people are described to be tiny, with no chaste man or woman on earth, and only poisonous food and water. 

Several puranas also describe Kalki avatara as being set to occur towards the end of Kali Yuga (so people claiming to be Kalki avatara can stop the nonsense). Vishnu would be born to Vishnu Yasha, an incarnation of Swayambhuva Manu (who also incarnated twice before as the fathers of Rama and Krishna), and he then goes on to destroy the world before setting Krita Yuga in motion again.

I wonder how a good man such as Vishnu Yasha could still remain more than 4000 centuries from now; especially when Krishna tells Ganga that the last of his devotees will depart the earth before 10,000 years of Kali Yuga. If the Lord if set to be born to him, he must be of a pure lineage with chastity at any point never in question. More on this later.