Namaste. I trust that we're now about 311 years into an ascending Dwapara Yuga. But I've heard many other spiritual teachers or those that're regarded as Masters/Gurus/Avatars by their followers, say that we are in a Kali Yuga. I believe in one version of Autobiography of a Yogi, it indicated that though we're in Dwapara of the 24000 cycle, we are in Kali of a much larger cycle. Could these other teachers be referring to this larger cycle or because they're wrong, it's simply a sign that they're not true Masters?
—John C, USA
Dear John,
In 1894, when Sri Yukteswar wrote The Holy Science and described the 24,000 year yuga cycle, the tradition in India was that the world was not only still in Kali Yuga but it had over 300,000 more years to go! Although Sri Yukteswar’s 24,000 year cycle is rapidly gaining adherents, this far longer traditional cycle remains the most widely accepted.
Sri Yukteswar addressed the discrepancy between his 24,000 cycle and the traditional Indian cycle in The Holy Science. He said that toward the end of descending Dwapara Yuga (roughly 900 to 700 B.C.) errors had crept into the Indian almanacs that were used to calculate the length of the yugas. Compounding this problem was the darkening effect of the descending yuga which led unenlightened people to adjust the calculations, which resulted in the far longer cycle of current Indian tradition.
So, while it is quite possible that there is in fact a longer yuga cycle of which the 24,000 year cycle is a sub-cycle, it is unlikely that the current traditional cycle, which was derived erroneously, accurately describes that longer cycle. My co-author, David Steinmetz, has been researching the longer cycle for some time and may one day be able to present us a description of the longer cycle that has become obscured by the current tradition.
Warm regards,
Joseph (Puru) Selbie
