History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c95.65

v7.c95.65

The theory of yugas, mahāyugas, manvantaras and kalpas has already been dealt with in vol. III. pp. 885-896 and above pp 686-692. The dissolution of the world was called *pralaya* which was said to be of four kinds (vide above pp. 693-95), two of which are *naimittika pralaya* (which occurs at the end of a day of Brahmā, that is equal to 1000 mahāyugas) and Prākṛtika (when everything including Prakṛti is dissolved in Paramātman). The Gītā (VIII. 17-18) and Manu I 73 state that the day of Brahmā is equal to one thousand yugas and the night is also of the same duration, that all manifested things spring from the unmanifested (First Principle) at the beginning of the day (of Brahmā) and at the coming of the night (of Brahmā) they merge in the same unmanifested (Principle). The present author does not like the disagreeable task of comparing Sanskrit cosmology with the theories in other religious scriptures such as the Bible, but will only refer to some Western writers on that subject. About these ideas of creation and dissolution of the universe René Grousset in the work mentioned above observes (p. 96) 'the same power of synthesis appears in the ancient Indian cosmogonies which transcend in their breadth all that the Ionian philosophers or Lucretius have left us. In them the world alternates between periods of creation (which correspond to the activity of the Demiurge) and of dissolution (which correspond to the slumber of the God)'. Similarly, Gerald Heard remarks (in 'Is God evident' Faber and Faber, London, 1950) 'Final and most helpful fact is that Sanskrit cosmology not only gets rid of intellectual difficulties such as the crude Hebrew Geology and Astronomy fossilized in the Christian dogmas, but it gets rid likewise of those more serious moral difficulties such as eternal damnation, pre-destination and that this life is man's only chance' (p. 51).