We have a reader question from Lavie
Earlier people used to live more than 100 years, I have seen so many older people died at 120 or 130 age. Why it get reduced and people hardly make it till 60-70 years.
This is a consequence of the present time which is the Iron age – the age of sin, vice, quarrel and conflict. We are living in Kali Yuga wherein everything is meant for destruction. Everything is decaying which includes moral values, purity, human values, age and substances are getting over thoughts and virtues.
Hindu prophecies have predicted that average life span of humans will decrease significantly in Kali Yuga, the least being only 23 years. The structure of a human body will also contract, a day will come when man will have to bring a ladder to climb a brinjal tree.
In Previous Yugas, men were tall, strong and well built. But in Kali Yuga, men will be lean, thin, weakling and not robust. If you see the structure and descriptions of people in Dwapar and Treta Yuga, you will find that they were extremely tall and well built.
Coming to age, Rama is said to have ruled Ayodhya for 10,000 years. But in the Yuga’s that followed, the average life span decreased by 10 times compared to the average life span in the previous Yuga.
- Satya Yuga:- Average human lifespan was 100,000 years.
- Treta Yuga: – Average human lifespan was 10,000 years.
- Dwapar Yuga: – Average human lifespan was 1000 years.
- Kali Yuga: – Average human lifespan will be 100 years, and will continue to decrease as we run through Kali Yuga.
Now you may wonder, what is the reason of this deterioration?
The primary reason is corrupt nature that prevails and wins in Kali. Everything you see around you is corrupt. Men are corrupt, systems are corrupt, food is polluted, water is polluted, every single thing that exists in Kali Yuga is not pure. This includes human hearts, thoughts, desires, values, ethos and the spirit.
The Age Of Instant Gratification
We have degraded so much in materialism and filthy thoughts that we have destroyed the true nature of everything.
- Go to a music store and you will most likely hear loud music with no soul in it but raging instruments giving temporary excitement.
- Go to a medicine shop and you will most likely buy a medicine which doesn’t cure your disease but offers a temporary solution that heals for the short term but makes you sick for the longer term so you buy that medicine again and again. Business, you see.
- Go to a school or college and you will most likely end up studying just for getting marks, clearing papers and doing stupid things which you don’t want to do in life.
- Go to a book store and you will see bestsellers on “Love”, “Fiction”, “Novels” but rarely you will see a good book which teaches you something, gives you true knowledge about a subject. There are books but very few people read them.
This list is endless and I can go on and on.
How can you expect man to live long when everything around it is corrupt, polluted and commercialized? The food that you eat, the water that you drink, the air that you breathe, the thoughts that you think, the books that you read, the college you went to, the employer you work for — every single thing is polluted, corrupt and swimming in some kind of business.
This plague of materialism is destroying the world. We have to shell out money to drink water at times, just imagine. A time will come when we will have to shell out money to breathe fresh air. That time is coming soon. Kali Yuga predicts that at the end of Kali Yuga, the only food humans will eat is Meat. No animals will be alive and humans will be forced to adopt Cannibalism. People will be crawling in streets and the weaker people will be killed by the stronger ones for food.
Just for the sake of comparison, if you visit an interior village in India, you will find people who live close to 80-100 years. Elders in villages often reach 100 years of age but in Cities, you will rarely find people living in their 80’s. This is a very interesting contrast as to why people in rural villages live longer.
The reasons are
- They have access to natural water, food and clean air, compared to cities.
- They have learned how to live with little resources
- They are not greedy but simple in nature.
- They have to work hard which keeps their physique in proper order.
- They do not harm others.
- They are kind, soft hearted and not anxious about the future or want to “advance” their lives.
This is one of the reasons why people in very interior villages live longer than people who live in cities, in general. Yes, there are exceptions to this due to medical aid and other diseases which are found in rural villages and not easily curable. But prima facie, this is the observation.
In this age of instant gratification, human beings are nothing but objects of materialism. Everything we consume and subscribe to is corrupt and hence a system whose foundations are corrupt is not meant to live longer.
This decay will continue for another 4000 years and then one day, we will be extinct and gone forever.