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From the Bhakti List Archives

sampath kumar • February 10, 2000 


Dear friends,
Here is one interesting view received from another
member on the question of the age of Kuresan. It is
quite noteworthy.

He wrote:

 Your statement about life
> expectancy in our land prior to the 19th century is
> also possibly true - as a matter of fact, the life
> expectancy in Roman times was only 22 years!  The
> present life expectancy of humans is at an all-time
> high.  Perhaps we should take the traditionally
> accepted lifespans of purvacharyas like nathamuni,
> alavandhar, ramanuja, desika etc. in the right
> perspective (i.e. as our sampradayic way of showing
> respect to them) instead of trying to pin down the
> exact number and establish historical accuracy.
> 
> Sri. Chakravarthi Rajagopalachari has
> commented
> in his Ramayana book, that although Hindu tradition
> says kings of the Ikshvaku clan (such as Dasaratha)
> lived several thousand years, we should only take
> these
> numbers literally in a mythological sense.  In
> reality,
> Sri. Rajaji says that it only represents Ramayana's
> way of respecting their seniority and wisdom.
> 
> Many thanks for your response 


Adiyen's response to the above: 

Sir, How right you are. Thank you for recalling
Sri.Rajaji's wise words.

Sometimes it is better to leave dates alone and
concentrate instead on the main events of history.

Regards,
Sampathkumaran
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