Rite and Ritual

2012 : THE TRUTH!

Posted on September 21st, 2009 in Important Matters apocalypse, prediction, signs, stupid, tv

A few weeks back I watched a History Channel documentary about 2012 – called, I think, “2012, End of Days” – which gave all the evidence for the coming catastrophe. Evidence present in the I Ching, the Mayan calendar, Nostradamus, prophecies by the historical Merlin and by “Mother Shipton” – and of course, lets not forget the Bible. But I’m going to pick up on some of these sources, so we get the real facts clear, once and for all.

Firstly, the I Ching doesn’t mention an end of a world or an apocalypse at all. In fact, the idea of an “end of the world as we know it” it is unheard of in the Chinese world-view and philosophy. Existence is cyclical and an eternal circle of change and flux. There is no real connection between the I Ching and 2012, at all. There is only one person that says so: Terence McKenna.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to troll Mr. McKenna, because he’s been a part of a lot of interesting stuff, in psychotropic research, (neo)shamanism and counterculture movements that I appreciate. He also has some interesting theories out there, and yes, Time Wave Zero is one of them. But lets get one thing straight: Time Wave Zero is McKenna’s baby, nothing ancient, nothing Asian, and certainly not I Ching.

What is Time Wave Zero? Well, I would suggest a google search on it for deeper stuff, you can check out Wikipedia and FusionAnomaly as well on it, but I’ll give you the basics:

The Time Wave Zero “theory proposes that the universe is an engine designed for the production and conservation of novelty.” * Let me explain this in the best way I know how and how I understand it. McKenna saw the universe as made of energy, energy in flux, energy that can either be stagnant, leading to entropy, or in complex dynamism, leading to extropy or change. The universe exists on this change and the possibility of change, it is what keeps things going. This possibility of change, this newness, is what McKenna called novelty, akin to Richard Pirsig’s (Zen of Motorcycle Maintenance) ideas.

What McKenna did was take the 64 hexagrams of the I Ching, rate them in their content of novelty or change, and then, using a computer, plot them in sequence over history and the future, kind of overlapping them with a timeline of history. Now, the most evident problem with this is: when to start? As far as I know, McKenna started around 5000BCE, which is around the age of the oldest I Ching artifacts we have.

With this Time Wave Zero program – which can be downloaded from somewhere on the net, since I used to have it – you can plot the amount of novelty for any given day from 5000BCE onwards. Now, according to its fans, this novelty has an uncanny ability to fall on those days of great global change (remember, all it does is plot novelty on dates, not in locations). The “graph appears to show great periods of novelty corresponding with major shifts in humanity’s biological and cultural evolution.” (Wikipedia.) This graph has a lot of fluctiations over its course, but according to McKenna hits an asymptote, a kind of end, at precisely Dec. 12, 2012, after which there is nothing but novelty, and no entropy exists any longer. According to Terrence McKenna, this signifies a lasting, final, global peace – the happily ever after.

Now, this isn’t I Ching. This isn’t even a very good theory in my opinion. Its not a theory at all. To start with, there’s no definitive date to choose as a starting point – we don’t know exactly how old the I Ching is, we don’t even know the exact beginning of “civilization”. There’s no way to know – less than 5% of the globe has had thorough archeological research – and that’s the portion that isn’t covered with water, and water levels are constantly rising over most of the globe. I also think that the timewave graph was artificially ended because a “singularity” event like this was expected, and 2012 seemed like a good date for it. Most of all, it has nothing to do with the I Ching, and in fact goes contrary to its philosophy.

Nostradamus I won’t even get into. There’s a million and one interpretations of his cryptic proetry, and he certainly didn’t give any dates. According to one reading of his prophecy, this present pope will get assassinated – let’s see if that ever happens. But one thing is for certain: he never mentions 2012.

Prophecies by the historical Merlin and by Mother Shipton are most likely forgeries, but in any case they have been fulfilled all over the world, many times over. All their prophecies speak about are flood, drought, war, famine, lawlessness… the usual shebang. And why are these prophecies similar? Well, because they’re from the bible! No wait… Why are they identical to biblical end-of-times? Because they’re guaranteed to happen! Regardless of what we in our first world paradise like to believe about the world, at any given time there are nations of people dying from starvation, pestilence, war and human visciousness. At any given time, be it now, in 50 years from now, 50 years ago or 500 or 1500 years ago. Its a guaranteed no-brainer of a prophecy. I’m certainly adding it to mine!

Now, the bible is the same deal. In fact, the new testament was written under the constant, imminent threat of the apocalypse. According to the christian bible, the apocalypse was scheduled for the first century C.E. and is running badly behind schedule. Go to the source, and read the words of the main character himself on the topic, book of Mark, Chapter 13, especially paragraph 30, where he says (and I quote from biblegateway.com): “Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be done.” And I’m sure there are more quotes like this.  The Bible also says there’ll be dragons and 144,000 survivors, and all sorts of very cool, but slightly fanciful stuff.

So, what about the Mayan calendar? Well, I hate to be repeating myself, but the Mayan calendar doesn’t end in a catastrophe. Well, yes and no. The Mayan world view is an interesting one. Their calendar, their astronomy, saw and tracked their myths being retold on a cosmic stage. Every day and every month had a mythical meaning, and the passing of the years told the story of their myths. The moon in this astrological quarter retold this story. The sun rising in that part of the sky means that hero is having that adventure.  This calendar was quite complex and very extensive. Its popularly believed to begin around 3114 BCE and end at 2012CE. But because the calendar is cyclical in nature itself, retelling the myths over and over again along millenia, its fair to say that the ending wasn’t an end either – it would just mean you start again.

On the other hand, the Mayan’s were believers in an apocalypse. According to Mayan myth, we are the third or fourth race of humans that have been on earth. The first race of man was created out of mud, but they fell apart when it rained so they were destroyed as imperfect. The second race of man was created out of wood, but they had no soul and forgot the gods that made them; they were destroyed. The current race of man was created out of maize, and are perfect. There is a distinct point made in the myths that the wooden race of man were destroyed because they forgot the gods. Just like in Babylonian, Sumerian and Egyptian myth, men are created as servants of the gods. Their one and only purpose is to praise their creators through prayer and offering. The wooden race forgot to do this and so was destroyed.

So, its very possible that the Mayans did consider as an end of the world by the time their calendar would end – by this time, surely, people will have forgotten their gods, like the race of wooden men, and thus incur the wrath of the gods. Another deluge will come and wipe them away. Another race will be created.

However, like I previously said, the calendar is circular. It “does not have a generally-recognized start and end.” (Wikipedia.) There is no reason to say that 2012 is the end of the calendar itself – it is just an end to a period. In fact, it is the end of the 13th Baktun. See… this is how the Mayan Calendar is organized:

The base unit of the Mayan calendar is a day, or a ‘kin’. Next is called a ‘unial’, which is 20 days (or ‘kins’). After that comes a ‘tun’, which is 18 ‘unials’ (or 360 kins/days). 20 Tuns resolve themselves into 1 katun (or approximately 7,200 days, 360 unials). The so called long-count, or Baktun, is the largest denomination, consisting of 20 Katun (394 years). Because the Baktun is the largest denomination, it doesn’t have a number of cycles. In fact, by all accounts it would seem that if there is a limit to Baktuns, then it should be either a count of 18 or 20 Baktuns. (here’s a source, and here) (and here).

Now, I’m not an expert on Mayan myth by any means. Most of what I read was so long ago I don’t remember any of it. However, I do read the I Ching regularly, and am actively fascinated by its philosophy. I am also familiar enough with bible studies and Nostradamus to say that neither of those can be authoritative on anything, nor do they supply anything than vague and wildly fantastical prose and poetry. All good for a nights inspirational reading, but nothing to stock your pantry on.

None the less, I’m looking forward to the next few years end of the world movies, books, and paraphernalia. And I do believe in an extremely likely collapse – whether in a few years or a few centuries. All the more reason for people to come to my blog and send me money.