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2012: The End of the Mayan Calendar:
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I created this page in September 2009. There are already two books on the end of the Mayan Calendar, there will shortly be a glut of books, as this looks as if it will become a full-blown hysteria. Since mass hysteria is difficult to deal with and quite possibly rather dangerous, I thought that in addition to reviewing these books individually, I would group them & point out features in common.First, All books of this type postulate an Ultimate Authority. As this is not new, we will make comparisons with the Book of Revelation, the prophecies of Edgar Cayce, and those of Nostradamus.
In Revelations we have a dire End of the World scenario, with mass slaughter & final judgement. The book was allegedly written by the Apostle John while depressed & drunk out of his mind after a nasty breakup (or make up your own excuse), which modern scholarship is not quite able to refute. Edgar Cayce's prophecies concern the collapse of the east & west coasts of the North American continent, with the US Midwest emerging as the new east & west coasts. When I was a boy I read Cayce's prophecies many times. The dates were firm: Mid 1960's to mid 1980's. The prophecies of Nostradamus are so well known I need hardly mention them.
Such prophecies always boldly state that Doom & destruction is about to happen. Huge loss of life. The Authority Has Ordained it, therefore it Must Be True.
Needless to say, neither John's nor Edgar's visions ever came to pass. Nostradamus, who wrote by far the most prophecies & in the greatest detail, is another matter. I am satisfied that at least some of his have come to pass, and, from what I can tell, many of them more than once, since there seems no one in charge of crossing them off once they do. As a result, they lay in wait, like mines in the river, waiting for passing boats to set them off, all over again. I am not interested in debating why these prophecies never arrived, or arrive again & again. The hard-core, true-believers are exactly those I want to exclude, as that is precisely what the problem is: Belief in Ultimate Authorities. Rather than one's own common sense.
Second, Having established an All-Seeing God & His Holy Doomsday Writ, advocates then set about finding evidence to support their thesis. And because the world is filled with facts & because the advocates' analytical abilities are already fatally compromised, a plethora of convincing facts are always at hand. The resulting presentation (Sacred Word with supporting evidence) is guaranteed to overwhelm the casual observer, who has not studied, nor has the raw intellectual ability to see through the charade. The result generates fear. The only question if this fear is a secret, silent gnawing at one's conscience, or a full blown national panic. Revelations is at this time a full-blown national panic, at least, in the US. I fear the Mayan Calendar may well be piggy backing on it. I am not sure the world has ever before seen the conflation of two independent Doomsday scenarios.
With Revelations, advocates are continually showing how current events, such as the existence of the Israeli state, or wars in the Mid-East, support Revelation dogma. This is not a new story. The Jehovah's Witnesses got started in 1870 expressly looking for something they could hang on Revelations & thus be the first & best prepared for The End of The World. As luck would have it, they had to wait until August of 1914 & the outbreak of World War I. That was to be the End of the World, but when the world ignored them, faithful Witnesses declared it would be the Men of 1914, and, as the decades passed, the Memory of 1914. Which is where I found them in the late 1960's. Witness folk are such sad people (I have a brother who was ensnared & lost, years ago) that I haven't wanted to see what their latest rationalization may be.
Step Three: Parts One (Holy Writ) and Two (Best Available Evidence) are then combined to create a Forecast. This is usually quite straight-forward. Proponents simply dump all their hopes & dreams, all their fears & longings, all their secret regrets & unresolved urges for revenge, into one giant pot & stir. The more ghastly the result, the better. Good People are always Saved. Evil & bad people always perish. Sometimes horribly. Authors pride themselves on long lists of do's & don't's, what to pack, what to leave behind.
Before you get sucked up into this malestrom (and thereby lose a lot of money as well as your family, friends & sanity) stand back and ask yourself some simple questions. In this, you may be reliably guided by Common Sense:
I could go on forever, but the drift should be clear. If it ain't never happened before, why, Praise Allah, would it be happening now?
- The Earth is a very old place. Recorded history alone goes back a good four thousand years. Has anything like this ever happened before?
- Have flying saucers ever landed & asked to be taken to your leader?
- Have massive chunks of the Earth ever simply disappeared beneath the waves? (Leave aside Atlantis, which might, or might not, have been mythical.)
- Has God - your God, my God, their God, or any God, ever put in a direct appearance? In front of more than, say, a small crowd of True Believers? (See Lourdes.)
- Have people ever died in their thousands without a clear physical cause? And,
- Have natural disasters (earthquakes, tsunamis, etc.) ever occurred without ordinary physical causes?
- The poles are going to shift? Since nothing happens of itself & as the Earth appears reasonably stable, by what physical means, precisely, will this, or any other result, occur?
According to some sources, the Mayan calendar started on what today would be known as August 13, 3114 BC. Clever observers will note the Maya were not here to see the beginning of their calendar, and, so far as their civilization goes, will not be here to see the end of it. So far as I am aware, the date of August 13, 3114 BC, is unknown in the history books. And, of course, the previous Maya calendar had ended the very day before. What happens when the calendar ends? Well, what happens when the year ends? What happens when the century ends? When the millennium ends? Why, the very next morning the sun comes up in the east and we get up & go about our business. Just like the day before.
On the other hand, there is never smoke without fire. The recently concluded 20th century saw the worst wars & upheavals in all human history. Did these happen from supernataural means? No. Was there supernatural intervention? No. Humans created these messes. Humans fought through the messes. Which killed good & bad alike. Humans survived these messes. Maybe there's a God up above, maybe not, but if there is, he is more than content to see us jolly our way through our own troubles. It's known as Free Will, and whatever it is, it's well-known that he's big on it. Always has been. Right now, fall of 2009, the winds of world-wide economic collapse are blowing at gale force. Rather than hope for Help from the Sky, you & your precious Free Will have a choice:
Me, I'm itching to be out in the trenches, but if I did, I wouldn't last longer than a glass of water in a hurricane. So stop looking for God to tell you what to do, however seductive it might be. Keep yourself abreast of current events, and make your way in life as best you can.
- Get out in the streets & make your voice heard, or,
- Batten down the hatches & wait for the storm to blow over.
Now on to books on The End of the Mayan Calendar -
David R. Roell
September 3, 2009
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Tel: 410-638-7761; Toll-free (orders only): 800-475-2272
Home | Author Index | Title Index | Subject Index | Vedic Books | Tarot | E-Mail: |
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