Re: Why I Cannot Believe in the Brahma Kumaris' 5,000 Year C
Posted: 19 Jan 2013
Roy wrote:Why not! You believe the world probably came about by chance ... if it did not, why shouldn't it be 5,000 years exactly?
It's a question of probability, nothing in nature is as neat, tidy and regular as the BKs want to make the Universe with their symbolic numbers ... and there are no known mechanisms in the universe to bring about such changes within such a short and regular time frame like a heart beat. Further more, we know how long trees take to grow, simple volcanic rocks take to harden, DNA to mutate etc, and from that we can extrapolate likely timescales.
Unless you introduce "wand waving magic", there is no way you can fit it all in. Of course, there may well be wand waving magic, it may well be that this entire universe if just 'imagined' and can be 're-imagined', that it is not real at all ... but that is not what the BKs teach either.
Actually, I probably think the world came about *before* chance even existed but, yes, it has developed since in a more highly random manner than we can conceive ... which is why we look to religions such as the BKs to give us simple, symmetrical answers and to make a feel more mentally comfortable.
You could try reading, 'Endless Universe: Beyond the Big Bang' - Rewriting Cosmic History by Professors Paul J. Steinhardt and Neil Turok. It's another more scientific view of cyclic cosmology that discusses the problems of inflationary cosmology (simple Big Bang theory).
Or listen to a radio show, here: Forget the Big Bang Theory. Notice how mild and humble even Turok, professor of mathematical physics at Cambridge University, is. Far from the picture you painted.
I think the challenge we’re raising is that the usual picture of the Big Bang is based on an assumption which is that time, space, matter, energy, everything began at the Big Bang. And that assumption was made in the 60s when people got the first strong observational evidence that the Big Bang happened. But it's really just an assumption and our point of view has come out of new development in physics which are enabling us to describe the behaviour of matter in very extreme conditions such as were present around the Bang. And what we’re seeing is that the Big Bang doesn’t have to be the beginning of time. It’s perfectly possible that the Big Bang was just a violent event in a pre-existing universe.
- Neil Turok
Personally, I don't have a strong interest in any theory. For me, there is today, tomorrow and perhaps another 20 years. It's not my job.
Or so you believe! Where did they get these numbers from? ... myself and others, have no trouble at all with a 5000 years cycle.
They dreamed their myths and legends and imagined their symbolic numbers. There are load of symbolic numbers in every culture of the world which don't crop up in BK Knowledge, where did they get their numbers from?
I know what you are going to say here, what the BKs teach, that Hinduism is a partial memory of BKism. I say BKism has just turned Hinduism on his head and gave it a good shake, stole a few of its easier terminologies and symbolic numbers and made a religion out of them with Lekhraj Kirpalani as its god.
Time is correct as it is. BKism comes after and has borrowed from Hinduism. It continues to take its cues from outside sources and then claims them for itself. Today I learned that the term "sevadhari", which the BKs used, is used in Sufism ... and, of course, Sufism was common in the Sind where Lekhraj Kirpalani came from. From that, as with the idea of "Maryadas" coming from Sikhism, I can surely accept that the words and concepts came from outside and elsewhere.
Again, it comes down to very high probabilities. Krishna was a terrible thief. All the stories in Hinduism tell you so. Look out for the clue.