Kalki : The final incarnation

Let's revisit

Because most of the discontinuities and confusion around Kalki and end of Kali is because of the disputed dates regarding Kali Yug.  So instead of searching about Kalki, I searched about kali and when his age is going to end. 

I was scanning through answers on hinduism stack exchange and ancient-origins and then i came to quora where I found several answers but one stood out because it was not about belief and copy pasting texts of Hinduism but it was about the calculation or rather conversion of Indian dates to Gregorian dates. 

His answer was based on the research and calculations of a blogger called Bibhu Dev Mishra, interested I too pulled up his blog. 

But when did the Kali Yuga begin? And when does it end? In spite of the elaborate theological framework which describes the characteristics of this age, the start and end dates of the Kali Yuga remain shrouded in mystery. The popularly accepted date for the beginning of the Kali Yuga is 3102 BC, thirty-five years after the conclusion of the great battle of the Mahabharata. This is remarkably close to the proposed beginning of the current "Great Cycle" of the Mayan Long Count Calendar in 3114 BC. It is of interest to note that in both of these cases the beginning dates of the respective cycles were calculated retrospectively. The Mayans had recomputed their ancient calendars sometime between 400 BC to 50 CE, at the ceremonial center of Izapa in Mexico, and fixed the starting date of the current Great Cycle of their Long Count Calendar. And in India, sometime around 500 CE, a major review of the Indian calendric systems had taken place. It was during this time that the renowned astronomer Aryabhatta had identified the beginning date of the Kali Yuga as 3102 BC. Why was it suddenly necessary for two ancient civilizations to re-calculate dates that should have been an integral part of their calendric systems? How did such important time-markers slip out of their collective memory? We will revisit these questions later.

It is generally believed that Aryabhatta had calculated the start date of the Kali Yuga on the basis of the information in the Sanskrit astronomical treatise, the Surya Siddhanta, according to which the five "geocentric planets" (i.e. the planets visible to the naked eye) – Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn – were aligned to 0° of Aries (near the star zeta Piscium) at the beginning of the Kali Yuga. He, thus, arrived at the date of 17/18 February, 3102 BC as the starting point of the Kali Yuga. However, modern simulations carried out by Richard Thompson show that on 17/18 February, 3102 BC, the five geocentric planets occupied an arc of roughly 42° in the sky and were scattered over three zodiacal signs – Aries, Pisces and Aquarius. This cannot be considered as a conjunction by any means. Far more spectacular 'alignment' of planets has occurred in the preceding and succeeding centuries. In other words, the conjunction of geocentric planets at 0° of Aries that was supposedly targeted by Aryabhatta did not take place in 3102 BC.

Does this mean Aryabhatta made an error in his back calculations? Not really. For, the Surya Siddhanta does not ever specify that such an alignment of planets took place at the beginning of the Kali Yuga. On the contrary, the Surya Siddhanta explicitly states that this conjunction of planets at 0° of Aries takes place at the end of the Golden Age (Satya / Krita Yuga). The text states: "Now, at the end of the Golden Age (Krita Yuga), all the planets, by their mean motion – excepting however their nodes and apsides – are in conjunction in the first of Aries" Unfortunately, however, this simple statement was misrepresented by some of the early commentators, in their eagerness to find an astronomical rationale for the 3102 BC date, and it has subsequently been promulgated as a fact.

 general understanding in ancient Hindu astronomy was that at the beginning of the present order of things, all the planets commenced their movement together at 0° of Aries; and all the planets return to the same position in the heavens, at certain fixed intervals, resulting in a universal conjunction. The Surya Siddhanta states that this conjunction takes place at the end of the Golden Age. However, there is also a prevailing belief in Hindu astronomy that this conjunction takes place at the beginning of a Day and Night of Brahma, comprising of a 1000 Yuga Cycles.