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Meru Beliefs :
Nowadays many people who wish for good things to happen to them keep a small image of the Meru Mountain, made of 5 different kinds of metal and painted gold in colour, in their puja room and worship it everyday. It is believed that Sri or Devi or Adi Sakthi is present on this mountain. Since that mountain is of a beautiful colour – Su Varna and since suvarna has come to mean gold over time because of its good colour, many people believe that SuMeru is a mountain of gold.
Possible Meru Locations outside India:
- There are two mountains named Meru in Africa and one named Meru in Sumeria, Iran-Iraq.
- There is a Meru mountain in Africa, in the middle of Kenya, 37.65 E longitude and 0.05N deg latitude. It is very near the equator also called bhu madhya rekha in sanskrit.
- There is another Meru mountain near Kilimanjaro mountain range. It is in the ‘Arusha’ (aRSa? RSa?) forest of Tanzania. It is approximately on the same longitude as the Kenyan Meru and slightly to the south of the equator. In our childhood the sound “R” was taught as “aru” in pronounciation. So aruSa could well be RSa. It is well knowm that RSis, Rshis, Rushis, Rishis, inhabit the Meru mountain amd meditate there.
- In Sumeria (Mesopotamia, Iran – Iraq) there is a great mountain called Sumeru. This is to the north west of the Himalayas and on the other side of Himalayas with respect to Mithila. Therefore this is a strong candidate to be the Meru Parvatham that is indicated in the Devi Bhagavatham. There is so much similarity in the languages, customs and stories of the Hebrews, Persians and the Ancient Indians. (See the post : Halloween, Karthika Pouranami, Yama Deepam). The word Yehovah is like the sanskrit yah vah, It means He is who has expanded into the universe. Just as Vaivaswatha Manu went north to the Himalayas when the east coast of dravida – andhra was flooded, similarly it is said that several millenia later, Noah also saved his people in a boat. (See also the post on : Pralaya Katha Vinayaka and Mata: Kruta Yuga Flood Narrations).
- There is an Asur town in Sumeria. The vedic word Asura originally meant strong. Even Indra has been described as Asura in 9 hymns. With time the word Asura took a negative meaning. There is an Arka and a RSanAbha in the stories of that region. They also have saptaRSis. Persians used to worship fire just as Brahmins do.
Searching For Meru in India :
We thought there must be a Meru Parvatham in India also and looked through our own ancient sanskrit texts. Knowledgeable people recognise that the more ancient texts have fewer data interpolations in them and preserve the data of that time more exactly.
Meru as the earth’s axis : Surya Siddhantam :
According to the SURYA SIDDHANTAM of Maya Danava, the father-in-law of Ravana, Meru is not a mountain at all. It is an axis of the earth that passes through the North and South Poles of the earth. The earth revolves around this axis and therefore it appears as if the sun and the moon revolve around this axis. (It is poetically said that the suna nd the moon do pradakshinams around Meru, since Devi is to be found there.) Our ancient astronomers connected the north and south poles of the earth along the surface of the earth through the Rohitaka peak, Kurukshetram and Lankapuri of Sri Lanka and called it the zer0 longitude. Everything to the east of this zero longitude was east and everything to the west of this line was west. It is believed that Meru is at the “centre of the earth”. This must have been the reason for that belief. Can you really think of a central point on the surface of a sphere? Any point can be defined as the centre.
Meru as a mountain to the North or North-West of Himalayas : Devi Bhagavatham, Mahabharatam
After Veda Vyasa completed his work of the compilation and division of the Vedas, he sat on the Meru mountain and meditated on Devi. (Vyasa’s meditation and Suka’s birth : Devi Bhagavatham : 10th and 14th Adhyaya of the First Skanda). When Vyasa’s son Suka, completed his education under Brihaspati, Suka was advised to visit Raja Janaka, Sita’s Father as per Devi Bhagavatham. Suka took 2 years to cross the Mount Meru and 1 year to cross the Himalayas to reach Mithila.
(Kisari Mohan Ganguli’s translation of the Mahabharatam, says he crossed 2 ‘varshas’ as in geographical areas and not ‘years’) Either way we can surmise that the Meru mountain is to the North or Northwest of the Himalayas.
The Mahabharatam tells us that there are 9 varshas in Jambudwipa of which Bharata Varsha is one and it is to the south of the Himalayas. The hiranmaya (golden) varsham is near the Himalayas. Nila, Sringa and Sveta Parvatas are there. In the centre of these parvatas is the Meru Parvatam., like the centre of a lotus. It was also considered the middle of mother earth. This means that Meru Mountain, was in the centre of Jambudwipa but not in India at all as per the Mahabharatam.
Meru as a mountain in South India : Valimiki Ramayanam , Bhavishya Puranam
The Valmiki Ramayanam tells us that there was a mountain on which gold could be found in Kishkinda. Kishkinda is to the south of the Vindhyas and today we believe it to be in the area of Karnataka-Andhra-Bellary (Hampi). Therefore the “golden mountain” must refer to Kolar. Kolar is very close to the ancient Indian zero longitude. (Interestingly Chanakya had said that gold and precious tones were to be found in the south and not in the north as some of his seniors had believed).
(The Sri Maha Vishnu Puranam tells us that the area to the south of the Himalayas and to the north of the seas is the Bharata Varsha.)
Of all the Puranas the Bhavishya Puranam is written in a unique style. Each new narrator of the Bhavishya Purana uses the voice of the original narrator and therefore some events are described as predictions. Thus the Bhavishya Puranam grew in size with time. Suka continues the narration after Vyasa and other narrators continue after Suka, in Suka’s voice.
This Bhavishya Puranam says that Meru Parvatam is in Tailanga Desam and that the Narmada River flows alon the Meru Parvatham and to the South of it. Thus the Bhavishya Puranam says that the Meru Parvatham is in the ‘middle’ of Bharata Varsha, India.
While the Europeans concluded that they came here, it is equally possible that we went there. This needs to be examined in a little greater detail.
The National geographic genographic project has given some maps of the routes which represent their conclusion that humans first originated in Africa and then spread to other parts of the world, first via land and then by boat and then by land again. (Look at the interactive map for a quick and easy grasp of their concept. Click here for a photograph of the Adaltu Skull found in Ethiopia, which is estimated to be 160,000 years old.) The basis given for this Out-Of-Africa theory is a study of genetic markers. There are some differences and some commonalities between the people of Africa and India. The people in the middle regions have some features belonging to both groups. Since people have already assumed that the first people originated in Africa, the direction of migration was assumed to be from Africa to India.
A very old part of the world is the forest of the Gonds, called Gond-Vanam or G0ndwana. The Narmada Valley Excavations, have revealed a human skull in the volcanic ash layers between 750,000 years to 75000 years old. The skull was located closer to the 750,000 year layer, and is estimated to be 600,000 years old. It is possible that first humans spread to all parts of the world from Narmada Valley in Gondwana (the forest of the Gonds). (In this context you may find this data also interesting : Myanmar fossil primate, Ganlea megacanina).
The Bhavishya Purana tells us that Adama was banished from a garden of 64 square yojanas, by his father Kardama along with his wife Havyavati (Eve). Their descendants are the ‘mlecchas’ of our puranas. It is recorded that after some years, their descendants Kasyapa and Aryavati returned to India and that their descendants and kinsmen came to be known as/ became Aryans (as their ancestors?) by learning the Vedas. The biblical flood occurred about a 100 years before the date given for Aryans arriving in Kashmir, as per the Bhavishya Purana., about a 1000 years after the Mahabharata war.
A researcher by name John Sassoon has written a book called, “From Sumeru to Jerusalem the forbidden Hypothesis”. This book tells us that initially the bible was preserved word for word and in later times, the percieved meaning was given more importance than the words. The original texts say that the Hebrews came into Sumer from the East. The later texts were altered to say that the Hebrews came into Sumer from the west.
“Ancient Traditions that have been preserved unaltered for thousands of years have an uncomfortable habit of turning out to be based on a core of truth” – John Sassoon.
If the Jews came to Sumer from the east and Adam was banished from Kardama Asrama in India to the west, the data fits pretty well.
Therefore, it is necessary to look for the Meru Parvatham in the Narmada Region, in what was once Gondwana. I also recommend interested readers to read : Indian History – A New Construct
Source : http://www.scotese.com/newpage8.htm
Location of Sumeru : Telugu Essay : Kavana Sarma, Satya Sarada.
Authorship and Copyright Notice : All Rights Reserved : Kavana Sarma, Satya Sarada Kandula
