Last December, the whole world waited with trembling for the end of the world, because according to the ancient Mayan calendar, December 21 was supposed to be the last day of life on Earth. Fortunately, the apocalypse did not happen, and mass psychosis gradually faded away.

However, for a hundred years now, humanity has been waiting for the beginning of the end and arguing about how it will happen. Aliens or a nuclear explosion? Let's try to figure out how realistic it is to destroy all life on the planet from certain threats. We present to your attention the 9 biggest myths about the apocalypse.

1. A giant asteroid will turn the Earth into a fireball

65 million years ago, a meteorite changed the climate on the planet and destroyed the dinosaurs, and a century ago another cosmic rock destroyed part of the Siberian taiga. Threats from space are not as illusory as they might seem at first glance, and another confirmation of this is the recent incident in Chelyabinsk.

It is believed that the asteroid, upon entering the atmosphere, will burn everything in its path. However, it is much more likely that a giant cosmic body will simply punch a hole in the Earth’s atmospheric layer, which will be the beginning of the so-called nuclear winter: the temperature on the planet’s surface will drop sharply, and a greenhouse effect will arise in the upper atmosphere.

2. Humans are doomed to extinction

Another common myth is that humans as a species will one day reach an evolutionary dead end and die out, like mammoths.

It is unlikely. In fact, man is a very tenacious creature. Like sharks, ancient animals that adapt well to environmental changes, humans are not at risk of mass extinction.

First of all, there are 7 billion of us. It's a lot. We live in almost every corner of the planet - from the Arctic to the jungle. Secondly, we eat anything. Of course, we prefer steaks, but if necessary, we can also eat a worm. So it is more likely that in the future people will evolve into a new, more advanced species than die out.

3. Global climate change is a deadly threat of the next century

The extinction of animals and the disappearance of plants is one of the most terrible apocalyptic scenarios: if 75% of the flora and fauna die, the planet will die.

The decline in populations of flora and fauna most often occurs due to climate change, that is, changes in weather parameters under the influence of natural and anthropological factors; however, the disappearance of one or another species of plants and animals does not occur instantly. According to the most conservative estimates of scientists, this process takes 100–200 thousand years.

So there is no need to fear a mass extinction of all living things for this reason in the next hundred years - climate change is much more dangerous in the form of natural disasters.

4. People can anticipate global threats

Seismologists observe vibrations in the earth's crust, so they can predict an earthquake several hours in advance. Meteorologists monitor temperatures and winds to warn of impending storms and storms. With the current pace of development of technology and technology, you can be sure that scientists can predict other types of hazards, for example, meteorite falls. Forewarned is forearmed. Such research is very important from the point of view of human safety: the sooner we know about an impending disaster, the greater our chances of surviving and saving our property.

5. Less people - more oxygen

Many people believe that if humanity goes extinct, the problems will disappear. The planet will return to its virgin state: there will be no wars, cataclysms and disasters, paradise will reign on Earth.

Alas, this is not true. There will still be temperature swings, floods and droughts. Bloody wars will not go anywhere, with the only difference that it will not be people who attack each other, but animals. Diseases and pandemics will also not fade into oblivion. But we will have to fight viruses not with chemicals, but with natural means.

Yes, human economic activity causes colossal damage to nature, but who said that the world would be better without us?

6. Hunger is a normal factor of natural selection

As has already been said, there are many of us - over 7 billion. In this regard, some representatives of homo sapiens believe that famine in underdeveloped African and Asian countries, which claims thousands of lives, is not a problem, it is just one of the factors of natural selection: the survival of the fittest. Otherwise, the planet faces overpopulation.

Fortunately, this cynical myth was destroyed by the Indian economist, Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen, who proved that hunger is unnatural and is the result of inefficient distribution of resources. The causes of hunger are not natural, but economic. Inflation and depreciation of money lead to rising food prices, causing 13% of the world's population to go hungry.

7. You can survive a supernova explosion

According to recent scientific research, supernovae produce active isotopes of aluminum, the decay of which creates hard radiation. At the same time, ordinary people are convinced: radiation is not scary, because you can hide in a bunker! A couple of meters underground - and you're safe. Of course, you will have to live in underground tunnels for quite a long time, going out only occasionally to get food, wearing special protective suits, but who thinks about the inconveniences after a space disaster?

Although such reasoning sounds funny, it is not without logic. After all, deep-sea marine animals survived the explosion of a radioactive star 45 million years ago.

8. Zombie

Zombies are fictional characters found only in films and literature. They are very popular in modern popular culture, but have absolutely nothing to do with reality. So there is nothing to worry about: an uprising of the dead certainly does not threaten the Earth.

Terrible natural disasters and earthquakes reminiscent of the End of the World have already occurred several times in the distant past. Information about alternating catastrophes is found in the Hindu holy book “Bhagavata Purana”, the Buddhist treatise “Visuddhi Magga” (chapter “World Cycles”), the collection of sacred books of Zoroastrianism “Avesta”, the collection of ancient Norse songs “Edde”.

There are descriptions of terrible disasters in the legends of the Incas, Aztecs and Mayans, in Mexican codes, Chinese chronicles, the works of the ancient Greeks and Slavs - that is, in almost all the peoples inhabiting the Earth. According to most historical sources, we live in the age of the seventh Sun (era). Each change of eras is accompanied by global destruction: floods, earthquakes, hurricanes and fires, during which almost the entire population of the Earth perishes.

Plato in the text of the dialogue “Timaeus” mentions the Egyptian priests of the goddess Neith in Sais, who claimed that the terrible cataclysms that occurred in ancient times destroyed almost all the inhabitants of the planet. He received this information from the great-grandson of Dropidas, Critias the Younger. Dropidas was a relative and friend of the “wisest of the seven sages” of Ancient Greece, Solon, who told him this amazing story. Solon, in turn, heard it during his 10-year journey through Egypt from the Egyptian priests.

“You are all young in mind,” he (the priest) answered, “for your minds do not retain in themselves any tradition that has been passed down from time immemorial from generation to generation, and no teaching that has grown gray with time. The reason for this is this. There have already been and will continue to be multiple and various cases of death of people, and, moreover, the most terrible ones - due to fire and water, and other, less significant ones - due to thousands of other disasters... in fact, bodies rotating in the vault of heaven around the Earth , deviate from their paths and therefore, at certain intervals of time, everything on Earth dies from a great fire..., (or) is flooded... with waters...

Whatever glorious or great deed or generally remarkable event may happen, whether in our region or in any other country about which we receive news, all this is recorded from ancient times in the records that we keep in our temples; Meanwhile, among you and other peoples, whenever writing has time to develop, again at the appointed time, streams fall from the heavens, like a pestilence, leaving all of you only illiterate and unlearned. And you start all over again, as if you were just born, knowing nothing about what happened in ancient times in our country or in your own country...

The Jewish philosopher and theologian Philo of Alexandria wrote:
Due to the repeated destruction caused by water and fire, later generations did not receive from previous generations the memory of the order and sequence of events.
Disasters on our planet occurred with a certain frequency.

The Aztecs, one of the most ancient peoples of the New World, counted eras by the names of the Suns, and, accordingly, cataclysms in which almost the entire population of the Earth perished. They were called Sun-Water (with a period of 4008 years), Sun-Earthquake (4010 years), Sun-Hurricane (4081 years) and Sun-Fire (5056 years).
The era of the first "Sun" began 17,141 years before this legend was told to the Spaniards. We live in the era of the “fifth Sun”; the Aztecs called it the “Sun of Movement” and believed that during this period a certain “movement” would occur, from which the whole world would perish.

Our ancestors undoubtedly possessed esoteric knowledge about the causes of cataclysms that occurred in the distant past. It is not for nothing that the pentagram is used in occult sciences to protect against Satan, whose possessions are in the underworld. When he breaks free (leaves the confines of the pentagram), the world faces terrible devastation.

The daily and annual displacement of the core depends on the position of the night and daylight relative to the Earth. Korovyakov expresses fears that the planet’s center of mass may shift. And then, as a result of the “bell effect” (mutual collisions of the inner core and solid rocks of the mantle), the Earth’s poles can shift towards the equator, and the magnetic field can disappear for an indefinite period.

The reason for the displacement of the inner core is most likely the Moon. Its mass is only 81 times less than the mass of the Earth. The Earth–Moon system is unique in the solar system in terms of its mass ratio. Under the influence of the Moon's gravity, the core of our planet periodically shifts from the axis of rotation and, as a result of the influence of centrifugal force on it, gradually moves away from the center of the Earth, overcoming the resistance of the viscous outer liquid core. There are no forces that would return the inner core to its original state. There is only one possibility to return to a state of stable equilibrium - a displacement of the Earth's rotation axis.

Myths and legends of different nations mention similar events. The ancient Sumerian “Myth of Erra” tells how “the statutes of heaven and earth” were canceled, “the heavens shook, the constellations shifted” and “did not return,” and then a flood fell on the land. The ancient text contains specific indications of the reason for the displacement of the Earth’s rotation axis: “Erkallum trembled” and “the shell” of the earth became thinner. "Erkallum" is translated as "the underworld" or "the lands below the earth", that is, the inner core of our planet. The myth also indicates the approximate date when this cataclysm occurred - during the transition of the zodiacal house of the Bull (Taurus) to the zodiacal house of the Ram (Aries), that is, around 2300 BC, according to the modern dating of the change of zodiacal constellations.

The sacred books of the Zoroastrian priests speak of a time of great catastrophe caused by the “king of darkness,” who lives underground and periodically rises to the surface to destroy all life. Azhi-Dahaka is a dragon chained and suspended in the volcanic crater of the sacred Mount Damavand. Before the end of the world, he will break free and reign on Earth for a short time.

Among the goddesses of Ugaritic mythology, the cruel and bloodthirsty ruler of the underworld, Anatu, is known. Rising to the heavenly gods from her abode, she literally breaks through the bowels of the earth:
I will go... to the far-living god... I will pass through the thickness of the earth from the ground waters, I will rise up through the layers of the earth.
Enraged, the goddess causes earthquakes in palaces and destroys peoples on the surface of the Earth:
She threw chairs at brave men, threw tables at warriors, benches at mighty heroes... She crushed Anatu in the valley of her enemies and exterminated the people. She struck the townspeople and people who came from the sea, and destroyed those who came from the East.
Under the mythological guise of the goddess Anatu, the very real earth's inner core and its displacement from the center of the planet are clearly visible.

The Old Norse Description of the Earth III mentions similar catastrophic events:
When Peaceful Frodi ruled the state, there were such good harvests that the arable lands were sown on their own, and there was no need to prepare them for the winter... One day, when Frodi was (already) old, great thunder and lightning broke out. Then the sun disappeared from the sky, and the earth shook so that the mountains fell from their place. Then a mountain rose from the ground, and all the predictions were violated...

The myths of the Nenets and Selkups tell about the support of the Earth, located in the underground world. In ancient times, a shaman descended underground and, after seven days of travel, ended up in the iron dwelling of the Master of the Earth, where he remained forever - he holds a certain stone in his hands and maintains the inviolability of the world. If a shaman drops a stone, great misfortunes will befall people - flood, cold, hunger and disease.

The beliefs of the African Ganda tribe feature the earthquake god Musisi, who lives in the center of the Earth. When it moves, the earth's surface begins to shake and crack.
According to the legends and myths of most peoples of the world, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis occur as a result of the movement inside the Earth of various animals - whales, snakes, etc. For example, the Hurons believe that Onniont lives inside our planet - a giant snake with a horn on its head, which periodically shakes the surface of the Earth. The Aztecs believed that the cause of earthquakes and other disasters was the giant Coyote.

The tales of the Edda warn of the dangers threatening the ash tree Yggdrasil (World Tree), thanks to which our Universe and Earth exist.
People don't know
What adversity
At the ash tree Yggdrasil;
Nidhogg eats the roots,
Top of the head - deer
The trunk is dying from rot...
A fool can't understand
How many snakes crawl
Under the ash tree Yggdrasil;
Goin and Moin -
Gravvitnira children, -
Grabak and Gravvöllud,
Ofnir and Svafnir, -
They constantly gnaw on ash trees.

The famous Russian historian and folklorist A. N. Afanasyev in “Poetic Views of the Slavs on Nature” mentions the “Pigeon Book,” which, according to the beliefs of the ancient Russians, fell from the sky. It also contains data on the movement of the nucleus in the bowels of our planet:
Wherever the beast wants, he goes through the dungeon,
Like the sun in the sky,
It happens all the white stone mountains,
Clears streams and grooves,
Passes through rivers and icy deposits:
Wherever the beast goes, the spring is boiling.
When this beast takes over,
Like clouds in the sky,
The entire universe (Mother Earth below him) will shake.
When this beast (horn) turns,
All underground springs will boil.

There are references to a catastrophe associated with increased seismic activity of the earth's interior in Scandinavian and German mythology:
The mountains began to tilt. The earth began to lose its appearance. The stars began to float from the sky... The universe has turned into a huge furnace. Flames burst from cracks in the rocks, steam hissed everywhere. All living creatures, all vegetation were destroyed. Only bare earth remained, but it, like the sky, was all covered with cracks and crevices.

The astronomical tables compiled by the Indian Brahmins show the general deviation of the stars from their present positions. According to some sources, the Earth moved away from its normal position at a distance of up to 900 km.

The Indian myth "Strengthening the Earth" says:
...in those days the earth shook, as if under the blow of the wind, like a lotus leaf, from side to side... and the gods had to strengthen it.

In Egypt (Fajam) A sundial was discovered that is suitable only for a country located at latitude 150. At the same time, Egypt is located at latitude 25 0 - 30 0. The error in incorrect division of the scale reaches a whole hour. Thus, the clock is suitable for measuring time in a country located about 1000 km south of where it was found.

Ancient astronomical tables indicate that Babylon must have been located much further north than the modern ruins. The Arab scientist Arzakhel drew attention to this discrepancy back in the Middle Ages. Johannes Kepler also knew about this amazing fact. Research by the American geophysicist A. O. Kelly showed that before the last shift of the earth's axis, the North Pole was located at 60 0 s. sh., that is, as much as 30 0 south of its current position.

In the Rig Veda it speaks of the Big Dipper standing directly overhead and the Sun rising once a year.

Zend-Avesta explains, which forced the Aryans to move to India - as a result of the displacement of the axis, their ancestral home found itself beyond the Arctic Circle and cold weather set in:
Summer lasted two months, and winter lasted ten... The sun, moon and stars rose above us only once a year, and the year seemed like one day and one night.

Plato described the movement of the earth's axis of our planet this way:
Forward and backward, and again to the right and to the left, up and down, wandering in all six directions... [The Earth's axis] turned over once, then tilted and returned to its original position again... When this devastation happened, things were going like this for the people: all around was a vast, terrible desert, a huge mass of land, all the animals died, only here and there a herd of cattle and a tribe of goats accidentally survived. These herds initially provided the shepherds with meager means of subsistence...

You can also read about the disruption of the planet’s rotation and the displacement of its rotation axis from Plutarch:
The dense air hid the sky from view, and the stars went astray from random flashes of fire and smoke and frantic gusts of wind. The sun did not follow an unchanging and constant path so as to distinguish between east and west, and did not return the seasons in the right order... The pole acquired a rotation or tilt.

Diogenes Laertius wrote:
The earth... tilted towards the south because the northern regions became hard... due to the snowy and cold weather that prevailed there.
Anaxagoras believed that the pole had completed a revolution and the world began to tilt south. Ovid argued that the earth sank a little lower than it should.

Jesuit missionary Martinius, who lived for many years in China and studied ancient Chinese chronicles, wrote the book “History of China”, which talks about the displacement of the Earth’s axis and the flood as a consequence of this cataclysm:
The support of the sky collapsed. The earth was shaken to its very foundation. The sky began to fall to the north. The sun, moon and stars changed their path. The entire system of the Universe has fallen into disarray. The sun was eclipsed and the planets changed their paths.

The Karelian-Finnish epic “Kalevala” tells:
... terrible shadows ... covered the Earth, ... and the sun sometimes left its usual path.
The Icelandic Voluspa contains the following lines:
She (Earth) did not know where her home should be,
The moon didn't know what her home was
The stars didn't know where to stand.
Then the gods restore order among the celestial bodies.

Displacement of the Earth's core is confirmed by numerous myths and legends of various peoples, and in all sources the same characteristic feature appears - this cataclysm was accompanied by an underground rumble and the rapid disappearance of the Sun beyond the horizon.

A myth recorded on the islands of Micronesia says that the catastrophe was preceded by a sudden darkness (when the planet's axis shifted, the Sun went below the horizon). Then the flood began.
The natives of Tierra del Fuego (the extreme south of South America) tell a legend that the Sun sank into the sea, and the waters rose noisily over the highest hills. The entire land was flooded except for one of the highest mountains, where a few people were saved.

The South American tribes of Paumari, Abederi and Cataushi, living near the Purus River in the Amazon basin, also have a description of the flood:
One day people heard an underground rumble and dull rumbles of thunder. The sun and moon began to take on red, blue, and yellow colors, and wild animals began to fearlessly approach people. A month later, thunder rumbled again, thick darkness rose from the ground to the sky, a thunderstorm broke out, and it began to rain. It was as if daylight and land had never existed. Some people found themselves unknown where, others died unknown how, for unimaginable chaos reigned everywhere. The water rose so high that the entire earth was under it, only the tops of the tallest trees still rose above the water. In some places people fled, not knowing where to hide, in others, having climbed into trees, they died from cold and hunger, for the darkness and rain did not stop all the time.

The Araucans (Chile) preserved the legend of a great flood caused by a strong earthquake, which was accompanied by volcanic eruptions. The few survivors escaped on the high mountain Tegteg (“thundering”, “sparkling”) with three peaks and capable of floating on water.

The Dakota Indians, who once lived along the banks of the Missouri, have the following laconic legend:
A mountain spitting fire, then a flood, and finally, after the flood, the first people.

The Chinese book Mencius reports about the great flood during the reign of Emperor Yao: During the time of Yao, the waters turned back and flooded all of China. Snakes and dragons settled everywhere, and people had nowhere to live. Those who lived in the lowlands built nests, those who lived in the mountains settled in caves.

The Eskimos, living along the coast of the Arctic Ocean from Cape Barrow in the west to Cape Bathers in the east, as well as in Greenland, tell of several floods that periodically destroyed almost the entire population. One of the floods was the result of a hurricane wind, which drove sea waters onto the land and turned it into a desert. The few survivors then escaped on rafts and boats. Another flood was caused by a terrible earthquake. Another flood was caused by a huge tidal wave:
A long time ago, the ocean suddenly began to rise higher and higher until it flooded the entire earth. Even the mountain peaks disappeared under water, and the ice floes beneath them rushed downstream. When the flood stopped, the blocks of ice gathered together and formed the ice caps that still cover the mountain peaks. Fish, shellfish, seals and whales were left lying on the dry ground, where their shells and bones can still be seen.

The Popol Vuh, a book by the K'iche Indians who lived in central modern Guatemala, states that one of the floods was caused by the "Heart of the World", that is, the core of the Earth.
From the ancient Indian epic it is known that in the past the Sun rose in the west and set in the east, that is, the direction of rotation of the Earth was reversed. People could have received this information from previous civilizations that died as a result of various disasters. From these same sources it follows that modern humanity is already the fifth generation of intelligent beings living on Earth.

The sacred books of the ancient Indians say that the cataclysm on our planet was caused by the god Hayagriva, who lived in the abyss. They describe the contact of the inner core with the mantle of the planet:
At the first sound, heaven and earth moved, seas and rivers turned back, mountains and hills shook on their foundations... Heaven and earth thundered, mountains and hills moved.
The Psalter speaks about this catastrophe:
The voice of the Lord is over the waters;
The God of glory has thundered...
The voice of the Lord is strong, the voice of the Lord is majestic.
The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars;
The Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon
And makes Lebanon and Sirion gallop like a calf -
Like a young unicorn.
The voice of the Lord cuts out the flames of fire.
The voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness;
The Lord shakes the desert of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord releases the deer from the burden and strips the forests bare...
The Lord sat over the flood, and will sit...

Many historical sources mention terrible sounds and roars. For example, Chinese legends tell about a terrible cannibal:
In the center of the Earth, a red man-eating bull, Yayu, with a human face and horse legs, is rampaging, making sounds that resemble the cry of a child. The mere appearance or sound of his voice makes people run away without looking back.

Pliny wrote that an earthquake is preceded (or accompanied) by a certain terrible sound.
Ovid also mentions the sounds of trumpets in Metamorphoses:
Nevertheless, undoubted signs of future sorrows are revealed:
The black clouds began to thunder, they say, like weapons;
A roar was heard in the heavens and terrible sounds of trumpets, -
They proclaimed sin...

The Book of Moses says:
On the third day, when morning came, there were thunder and lightning,
And a thick cloud over the mountain, and the sound of a trumpet was very strong...
Mount Sinai was all smoking because the Lord
came upon her in fire;
And smoke rose from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain
I hesitated a lot.

Homer describes the same phenomenon:
The endless expanses of the earth and the heavens above them sounded like the voice of a trumpet.
In Voluspa there are these words:
The whole world is burning in the sounds of the horn...

The ancient Egyptian Ipuwer Papyrus states that a tectonic cataclysm, accompanied by the rumbling of the Earth, continued for several years. This time is called “The Year of Noise”: And there is no end to the noise…. Oh, if only this earth would stop rumbling and make no more noise.

Among different peoples, the “groan of the Earth” is described almost identically - Yau, Yao, Yahwe, Io, Zhao, Yayu. According to the Bible, the Apocalypse will also begin with the “voice of God” that we will all hear.

The Great Sphinx is called by the Egyptians the “Father of Terror and Fear”; There is a belief that when the Sphinx laughs, the world will shake. And then, most likely, there will be a shift in the Earth’s rotation axis.

The first sign of an approaching catastrophe, according to various sources, will be the appearance of bright auroras in southern latitudes, caused by changes in the strength of the magnetic field of our planet, and an anomalous glow of the atmosphere.

The ancient Roman poet Virgil Publius Maro wrote in the Aeneid:
A flickering light flashed high above the ground, and suddenly
There was a roar all around, as if the vaults of the ether had collapsed,
The roar of the Tyrrhenian trumpet filled the sky,
Again and again a deafening roar sounded above them.
They looked up: where the sky was not covered with clouds,
In the scarlet glare, swords and spears clashed noisily.

According to the Lapland cosmogonic legend, the displacement of the core occurred relatively recently:
When human anger intensified, the center of the Earth trembled with horror, so that the upper layers of the earth collapsed, and many people fell into these caves to die there.
These disasters were accompanied by bright aurora:
His terrible anger flared up like red, blue and green fiery snakes, and people hid their faces, and children screamed in fear….
The heavenly god Yumbel said:
I will change this world. I will make the rivers flow back; I will force the sea to gather into a huge wall, like a tower, which I will bring down on your evil earthly children and thus destroy them and all life.
And he kept his promise:
Yumbel caused a gale to blow
And angry air spirits...
Foaming, fast, rising to the sky
The sea wall came, crushing everything.
Yumbel with one strong blow
Made the Earth turn over;
Then he leveled the world again.
Now the mountains and hills
Cannot be seen by Beike (Sun).
Filled with the groans of dying people.
There was a beautiful land, the home of humanity.
Beike no longer shines in the skies...

Undoubtedly, the displacement of the core of our planet must somehow manifest itself, but due to the huge angular momentum of the Earth (compared to the inner core), these changes will be insignificant. First of all, this should affect the slowdown in the rotation speed of our planet. In 1991, the length of the day increased by 1 second, in July 1992 an amendment was made to the daily time by another 1 second, and in 1993 a full two seconds were added. Due to the displacement of the center of mass of the “Earth-core” system and the change in the position of the rotation axis in the body of our planet, a slow shift of the north geographic pole in the direction of Greenland is currently observed, the amplitude of the movement of the instantaneous pole increases, the daily nutation of the rotation axis increases, and significant fluctuations occur geographic polar latitude.
Magnetic pole shift registered since 1885. Over the past 100 years, the magnetic pole in the Southern Hemisphere has moved almost 900 km and is already in the Indian Ocean. The Arctic magnetic pole is moving towards the East Siberian world magnetic anomaly through the Arctic Ocean; from 1973 to 1984 its movement amounted to 120 km, from 1984 to 1994 – more 150 km. The drift speed of the north magnetic pole increased from 10 km/year (1970s) to 40 km/year (2001).
In the direction of the displacement of the inner core between Australia and Antarctica, the magnetic field strength increases, today it already reaches 0.7 oersted (almost like at the pole). On the opposite side of the Earth, in the South Atlantic Ocean, the magnetic field strength, on the contrary, decreased by 10%. In the future, changes will occur more and more intensely.
As the core approaches the Earth's mantle, the number of earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis will increase, especially in the area of ​​the Indian and Pacific faults of the earth's crust (Indonesia, Philippines, Japan, Kamchatka), in southeast Asia (Pakistan, India, China), as well as in west coast of South America.
Seismic stations constantly monitor the “trembling” of the Earth, recording even minor vibrations of the subsoil. Statistics show that earthquakes on our planet are occurring more and more often. In the period from 1900 to 1930, only 2000 earthquakes were recorded; from 1940 to 1982, about 1000 vibrations of the earth’s crust were recorded annually (!). In 1983, 300,000 tremors were recorded (that is, more than 800 per day), and since 1984, the number of recorded earthquakes has been 1,000 per day. At the same time, since 1994, the number of long-focus earthquakes, that is, coming from the depths of the Earth, has doubled. The number of tectonic disasters is also increasing. In the first half of the 20th century, there were only 33 of them, and in the second half there were already 95. Some of them claimed hundreds of thousands of human lives.
The threat of a tectonic cataclysm caused by the displacement of the Earth's inner core is quite real. The consequences of this disaster could be the most terrible. As the “sleeping” prophet E. Cayce stated, if it seems to you that something is moving and rumbling in the bowels of the Earth, then the displacement of the Earth’s inner core has begun. According to him, the earth’s axis began to “slip” out of its gravitational grip already in 1936.

The causes of future catastrophes are called very different: global warming, the fall of an asteroid, the approach of the hypothetical planet Nibiru, increased activity of the Sun, a parade of planets, a quantum transition, a change in the level of consciousness, etc. What are the true causes of the (possible) cataclysm? And will it actually happen? Let's try to understand this confusing and pressing problem.
In order to predict future events, it is necessary to establish what cataclysms and disasters occurred in the distant past of our planet and determine the likelihood of their recurrence. Information about strong earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and floods is contained in myths, legends and traditions of many peoples of the world. Information about alternating catastrophes that periodically occur on Earth is available in the sacred book of the Hindus “Bhagavata Purana”, the Buddhist book “Vizuddhi Magga” (chapter “World Cycles”), “Avesta”, “Edda”, and the codes of the Indians of South America. According to most historical sources, we live in the era of the fifth, seventh or ninth Sun. Each change of eras is accompanied by global destruction: floods, earthquakes, hurricanes and fires, which kill almost the entire population of the Earth.
Plato in the text of the dialogue “Timaeus” mentions information received from the Egyptian priests of the goddess Neith in Sais, who claimed that terrible cataclysms that occurred in ancient times destroyed almost all the inhabitants of the planet. He received this information from the great-grandson of Dropidas, Critias the Younger. Dropidas was a relative and friend of the “wisest of the seven sages” Solon, who told him this amazing story. Solon, in turn, heard it during his journey for 10 years in Egypt from the Egyptian priests, who conveyed this information to him: “You are all young in mind,” he (the priest) answered, “for your minds do not retain no tradition, passed from time immemorial from generation to generation, and no teaching that has grown gray with time. The reason for this is this. There have already been and will continue to be multiple and various cases of death of people, and moreover, the most terrible ones - due to fire and water, and others less significant - due to thousands of other disasters... in fact, bodies rotating in the vault of heaven around The lands deviate from their paths and therefore, at certain intervals, everything on Earth dies from a great fire..., flooding it with waters."... No matter what glorious or great deed or generally remarkable event occurs, be it in our region or in any other country about which we receive news, all this is recorded from ancient times in the records that we keep in our temples; Meanwhile, among you and other peoples, whenever writing has time to develop and again at the appointed time, torrents fall from heaven like a pestilence, leaving all of you only illiterate and unlearned. And you start all over again, as if you were just born, knowing nothing about what happened in ancient times in our country or in your own country...”
Aristotle, the ancient Greek philosopher and scientist, wrote: “The same places do not always remain land or always sea. The sea comes where there was land before; the land will return to where we now see the sea. Moreover, one must think that these changes follow one after another in a certain order and represent a certain periodicity.”
Philo of Alexandria (1st century AD) mentioned in his writings: “Because of the repeated destruction caused by water and fire, later generations did not receive from previous generations the memory of the order and sequence of events.” In his book “On the Eternity of the World” he writes: “I attribute the destruction of things on earth, not all at once, but in large quantities, to two most important reasons, the sudden onslaught of fire and water. These two calamities are said to befall us after a long succession of years. When the time comes for a fire, the fire sent from the sky falls from above, spreads in streams over many places, and covers vast expanses of inhabited lands.”

Xenophanes of Colophon(c. 570 - c. 470 BC) - ancient Greek philosopher and poet, argued that “the land is mixed with the sea, and over time it is freed from moisture<...>All people perish whenever, plunging into the sea, the earth becomes mud, then again it initiates birth, and such an alternation happens in all worlds.”
In the book by E.P. Blavatsky’s “Isis Unveiled” mentions periods of catastrophes on our planet: “At the end of each “Great Year,” called by Aristotle - according to Censorinus - the greatest, which consists of six saros (Saros), a great physical revolution occurs on our planet.

The polar and equatorial climates gradually exchange places, the first slowly moving towards the equator, and the tropical zone with its luxurious vegetation and teeming animal life is replaced by the harsh deserts of the icy poles. This climate change is necessarily accompanied by cataclysms, earthquakes and other cosmic convulsions. As the ocean reservoirs shift, at the end of every ten thousand years and one Neros there will be a semi-universal flood similar to the legendary Noah's flood. And this year is called Heliacal in Greek; but no one outside the walls of the sanctuaries knew anything definite about its duration or other details.

The winter of this year was called the Cataclysm or Flood, and the summer was called Ekpyrosis. Popular tradition teaches that during these alternating seasons the world will alternately be burned and flooded. This is what we, at least, learn from the Astronomical Fragments of Sensorius and Seneca. Regarding the duration of this year, all commentators express themselves very uncertainly - so uncertainly that none of them, with the exception of Herodotus and Linus, who attributed a duration to this year - the first 10,800 years, the last - 13,984 - came close to the truth.
Disasters on our planet occurred with a certain frequency. The Chinese call past eras “kiss.” At the end of each “kitty” “in the general shudder of nature... everyone perishes, and ancient traces are erased.”

Aztecs They counted eras by the names of the Suns, and, accordingly, cataclysms in which almost the entire population of the Earth died. Global disasters recur on our planet with an average period of 4288 years. They were called Sun-Water (with a period of 4008 years), Sun-Earthquake (4010 years), Sun-Hurricane (4081 years) and Sun-Fire (5056 years). The era of the first "Sun" began 17,141 years before this legend was told to the Spaniards.

The first sun is the Tiger Sun (Ocelotonatiuh):“The god of the night sky, Tezcatlipoca, the Smoking Mirror, was the first to become the Sun. Thus began the first era. Other gods created giant people who did not work or cultivate the land, but only ate fruits.
But the Sun did not move in the sky as it should, at noon it was already night, and the tigers devoured the people. Cold and darkness enveloped the earth.

God of the West, Quetzalcoatl (Feathered Serpent) hit Tezcatlipoca with his staff, and he fell from the sky into the water. In the water he turned into a tiger, came out to land and devoured all the giant people. So the earth again became uninhabited, and the universe was left without the Sun, and this continued for 676 years. Thus ended the first era in the history of mankind - the era of the First Sun. This happened in the fourth year of Ocelot, or Tiger (4 Ocelotl).”

The second sun is the Sun of Wind (Ehekatonatiuh):“Then Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, god of the West, became the Sun, and the second era began. The earth was repopulated by people. And there was peace on Earth for some time.
Then Tezcatlipoca turned into a tiger and threw the Sun to the ground with one blow. And again the earth was left without the Sun.

A terrible wind arose and knocked down all the trees. Everything that was on the ground was blown away by the wind. Most of the people died. Those people who survived turned into monkeys. This lasted 676 years. Thus ended the second era - the Sun of the Wind. This happened in the fourth year of the Wind (4 Ehecatl).”

The third sun is the Sun of Fire Rain (Kiahuitonatiu):“Then the gods made Tlaloc, the god of rain and heavenly fire, the Sun. Thus began the era of the Third Sun. This lasted 364 years. And then Quetzalcoatl made fire rain fall from the sky.
Fire fell from the sky in the form of lightning. Volcanoes opened their craters and fire devoured the earth. Sand and hot stones fell from the sky. Most of the people died, and those who survived turned into birds.
Thus ended the third era - the era of the Sun of Fire Rain. This happened in the fourth year of the Rain (4 Quiahuitl).”

The fourth sun is the Sun of Water (Atonatiuh):“Then Quetzalcoatl made Tlaloc’s sister, the water goddess Chalchihuitlicue, She Who Wears the Green Stone Skirt, the Sun. Thus began the era of the Fourth Sun, which lasted 312 years.

Tezcatlipoca made sure that the rain did not stop. It rained for many days and the land was flooded. The water carried away plants, animals and people. Those people who survived turned into fish. Thus ended the era of the Fourth Sun. This happened in the fourth year of Water (4 Atl).
It rained so hard that the sky fell to the ground. The earth could fall apart at any moment. Then the four main gods gathered again to raise the sky. Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl turned into large trees, and the other gods helped them put the sky in its place.
Four times the gods tried to create humanity, and four times the world was destroyed due to the enmity between Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl. It was cold and dark again, and there was no sun.”

We live in the era of the “fifth sun”, which the Aztecs called the “Sun of Movement” and they believed that there would be some kind of “movement” from which the whole world would perish. The Indians left behind calendars that state that the era of the “fifth Sun” should end on December 21, 2012.

What is this “movement” that repeats itself with an average period of 4288 years? According to numerous prophecies, before the End of the World there will be a tectonic catastrophe caused by the displacement of the Earth's inner core. The harbingers of this destructive earthquake are already reminding us of themselves. At the end of November 2004, earthquakes continued in Japan for almost a month. In the Indonesian region, thunderous sounds were heard, which were initially mistaken for explosions caused by terrorists, and were also explained by the fall of large meteorites, but all these assumptions were not confirmed. A week later (December 26), a powerful earthquake with an amplitude of 8.9 occurred west of the island of Sumatra, which caused a movement of the earth’s crust and a powerful tsunami up to 10 meters high, killing about 220 thousand people and causing significant destruction on the island of Sri Lanka, Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, the islands of Oceania, the east coast of Africa. As a result of this cataclysm, according to media reports, the Earth's rotation axis shifted - so far only slightly by 2.5 centimeters and the Earth's rotation speed increased. The island of Sumatra has shifted almost 30 meters from its original location. The seismic wave circled the globe several times.

Seismologists warn that the 2004 tsunami began another period of tectonic activity that will last several decades. Scientists have found that tectonic shifts lead to changes in the direction of coral growth. This data allowed them to delve into the distant past for many centuries and, by analyzing the structure of coral reefs, to gain insight into previous earthquakes in the eastern Indian Ocean. It turned out that in the last 700 years, every two centuries this region has been shaken by a series of strong earthquakes, which are repeated with a certain periodicity. The last increase in tectonic activity occurred in this area in the first quarter of the 19th century.

The true cause of such a destructive earthquake has never been clarified. And this is only a harbinger of the approaching tectonic cataclysm. Let's consider this issue in more detail.
At the end of the 19th century, based on temporary variations in latitude changes, astronomers discovered a global phenomenon - the movement of the axis of rotation in the Earth's body. This phenomenon was studied by the President of the Royal Society of Great Britain J.G. Darwin (son of Charles Darwin) and the Japanese astronomer Kimura.
J.G. Darwin writes: “The Japanese astronomer Kimura drew attention to the following strange conclusion that he received from observations: ... the latitudes of all six observatories of the Geodetic Association change simultaneously by the same amount, and they simultaneously decrease or increase, and this change has an annual period. Now it turns out that we must add a small movement of all observation sites immediately to the north or immediately to the south, having a period of a year. Such a movement could be caused by an alternating movement of the Earth's center of gravity north and south along the polar axis...

It is so difficult to comprehend the idea of ​​​​moving the Earth's center of gravity that many tried to explain Kimura's result solely as a fictitious consequence of various inaccuracies in astronomical observations. But if these were only fictitious results, then the observatories of the southern hemisphere could not give completely opposite changes. Both hemispheres, of course, must be diametrically opposed in this respect. Observations were specially organized at the southern observatories for two years and the result was that the southern observatories gave exactly the same readings as the northern ones. The reality of this strange kind of oscillation of latitude, therefore, seems to be well established... and hitherto we must accept this fact as an as yet unsolved mystery.”

Perhaps the cause of tectonic cataclysms that periodically repeat on our planet is our night star. Under the influence of the Moon's gravity, the Earth's core is displaced from its axis of rotation and, as a result of the influence of centrifugal force on it, gradually moves away from the center of the Earth, overcoming the resistance of the viscous outer liquid core. There are no forces that would return the inner core to its original state. There is only one possibility to return to a state of stable equilibrium - to shift the Earth's axis of rotation.

According to ancient legends, the Moon appeared in the sky relatively recently. From numerous historical sources we can conclude that our solar system is visited by a massive celestial body, presumably a neutron star (Typhon), with a period of 12 thousand years. In our Galaxy, according to astronomers, there are about a billion neutron stars, which, with small sizes - 5-10 km and a mass of 0.01 - 2 solar masses, have a strong magnetic field (about 1011-1012 Gauss) and a huge rotation speed around its axis.

The mass of this celestial body is greater than that of Jupiter, but less than the solar one. According to numerous information contained in ancient legends and traditions, this massive body is accompanied by 11 satellites and an extensive gas and dust plume. Object color is black. During accretion (fall of matter onto its surface) and release of kinetic energy, its color changes to red or dazzling white.
Our ancestors called this object Typhon (Set), Tiamat, Serpent Apep, Red-Haired Dragon, Rahab, Hurakan, Matu, Garuda, Humbaba, etc. This massive object, when passing through the solar system, with its gravity caused catastrophic destruction to celestial bodies, disturbing the orbits of the planets and their satellites. Based on the information contained in the myths and legends of ancient peoples, a neutron star has already visited our solar system four times.

During one of these visits, Typhon borrowed from Jupiter one of its satellites, that is, the future Moon. Indirect evidence of this event is available in one of the myths of the Akkadians and Babylonians, which is called “When Above” and describes this cosmic cataclysm as follows: “At the sight of Marduk (Jupiter), fear took possession of Kingu - (the dragon). The army of dragons created by Tiamat (neutron star) fled. But she herself withstood Marduk’s gaze and stood firm. Then Marduk threw his net over Tiamat, which was stretched by the winds. Tiamat opened her mouth to swallow the daredevil, but Marduk deftly pulled back. Violent winds were sent straight into Tiamat's mouth (capturing part of Jupiter's atmosphere). They filled her womb and swollen her so much that she could not move. And then Marduk placed an arrow (lightning) on ​​the arc of his huge bow, pulled the string, and the arrow, escaping with a whistle, pierced her heart.... Then he defeated the other gods and all the evil spirits that Tiamat had created against him.... Then he created the Moon, entrusting it with the night. He gave the moon a crown so that he could measure time with its horns and teeth.” The myth “When at the Top” mentions that after this battle Marduk could not find his home (orbit) for a long time. Interestingly, the tablet recording the myth ends with the admonition: “The teachings that the ancients spoke in times past are written down and intended for teaching in the future.”

A more ancient version of the Sumerian myth about the origin of our planet’s satellite says that the Moon “got to the Earth” from Tiamat. According to Sumerian cosmogony, this celestial body had 11 satellites - “dragons”. The largest of them was Kingu:
Crowded together, they marched next to Tiamat.
Enraged, they plotted intrigues day and night,
Ready for conflict, seething with anger and raging.

As a result of the “Celestial Battle” between Marduk (Jupiter) and Tiamat, gravitational capture and a change in the orbits of one or more neutron star satellites occurred. Having lost their “leader,” they left the solar system forever or were captured by other massive planets. It is possible that in such an unusual way, the Earth “acquired” the Moon.

Ancient Sumerian cylinder seals contain images of the celestial battle between Marduk and Tiamat, where Jupiter is shown throwing lightning at a winged dragon. Twelve stars around the planet are perhaps the largest satellites of Jupiter. Between these celestial bodies there is an image of the Moon in the form of a crescent, which confirms the myth about the appearance of a satellite in Earth’s orbit as a result of a grandiose cosmic catastrophe that occurred in ancient times in the solar system.

In Greek mythology (“Typhonia”, Nonna) there is information about the influence of Typhon on the Moon during its last appearance in the area of ​​the earth’s orbit. At the same time, the Earth’s satellite recorded incredible evolutions in the sky:
Several times with his boastful hand he struck down the detached
To them from Selene's yoke of bulls that staggered and lowed,
And stopped these similar animals
Or he directed all the harnessed oxen in reverse,
Their white collars are a sign of the deity - tearing
And spilling the destructive whistle of a poisonous echidna.
But Titanide Luna did not yield to her attacker:
Resisted the Giant with the same exact horns,
The bull's horns were sharpened by luminous curves...
Moving with a roar, a chorus of motionless and unshakable
It overtook the stars, opposite the wandering ones (planets); echoed
Through the heavens in the void, piercing to the middle, straight
Firmament axis; looking at the beast, Orion, like a hunter,
He took his sword out of its scabbard, and when he armed himself with it,
The light ribs of the Tanagra blade sparkled in the sky.
From its fire-breathing mouth, emitting radiance,
The starry throat of the thirsty Dog was terribly worried,
He galloped with a fiery bark, but his growl was not familiar
I met hares, and steam from the teeth of Typhoean monsters.

In the mythology of the peoples of Asia and South America, a neutron star was depicted as a dragon with a long wriggling tail - a gas and dust plume of a star. The Aztecs associated the appearance of the Moon in the sky with the dragon. The Aztec Codex contains a depiction of this event. The Moon Goddess Tlazolteotl, to emphasize this fact, specifically points her finger at this terrible monster.
The Slavic “Kolyadov Tales” also indicate that the satellite of our planet, after a long “battle,” was caught by Perun’s seine and has since been rotating along its star path: “And then Perun and Devan (Moon) came together in an open field. They fought with spears and clubs, cut themselves with swords. But their spears, swords, and clubs broke. She turned around, Devan as a Lioness, and Perun as a Leo. And Leo overcame the powerful Lioness.
Then Devan turned into a Magur bird, and Perun - an Eagle. And again the Eagle fought the Magur bird. Then Devana turned into Whitefish. Perun called upon the goddess of fate Makosh for help, and she, together with Dolya and Nedolya, tied a frequent net. And Perun caught Devan with this net.
Here Devan submitted to fate and bowed to Perun.”
"And since then the Moon has been in the blue sky
walks along the starry path.
Grows again, but a mighty god (Semargl)
again he cuts it with a sword (phases of the Moon).”
“The Book of Kolyada”, X b.
According to Slavic legends, Devana (Moon) “gave birth” to two children from the god Semargl - Van and Lyuta: “From the blow of Ognebogov, the powerful son of Semargl Svarozhich, Van, was conceived in the womb of Devanushka, together with his sister Lyuta...”
Perhaps our planet in those ancient times had several satellites. An astronomical map discovered in a cave on the island of Youth (Cuba) shows three satellites of the Earth. On the hieroglyph of the Mayan Indians in a stylized form denoting the Moon, you can also see three circles, which can symbolize the former satellites of our night star. On a vase of the Peruvian Mochica tribe, who lived in Peru long before the Incas, there is an image of the Moon with three satellites drawn in the form of dots with diverging rays that end in balls. The stars in this picture look like circles with regular straight rays. The dragon against the background of the Moon is a symbolic image of a neutron star, which was very often depicted, especially in Southeast Asia, in exactly this form.

This event, when the Moon first appeared in its orbit, occurred approximately 25-26 thousand years ago. When approaching the Earth, Typhon caused significant changes on the surface of the planet, which were accompanied by powerful volcanic activity and earthquakes. At this time, huge expanses of land in the area of ​​the Sea of ​​Japan and the South China Sea sank under water. The land bridges that previously connected Asia with the Japanese islands and Indonesia have disappeared. Around the same time, the Indochinese ridges and mountains of Central Asia became 2000 meters higher, and in South America Lake Titicaca, in the vicinity of which seashells, silt and algae remains were found, rose 4 km from sea level!
Despite the fact that these events happened a long time ago, legends about those times have been preserved among some peoples. The Indonesian Nias tribe had two supreme deities, Lowalangi and Lature Danyo, who opposed each other. Lawalangi (Sun) is associated with the upper world; it embodies goodness and life, its color is yellow or gold, its symbols and cult signs are a rooster, an eagle, light. Lature Dane (Typhon) belongs to the lower world; he is the embodiment of evil and death, his color is black or red, his emblem is snakes, and his symbols are the moon and darkness. From the myth we can understand that the appearance of the Moon in the earth’s sky is associated with the deity Lature Dana.
In the folklore of the Indians of South America, there is such information about our night luminary, allegorically describing the appearance of the Moon: “He had three names - Bochika, Nemketeba and Zuhe.... He brought his wife with him, and she also had three names - Chia, Yubekayguaia and Hawtaka (satellites). But only the beautiful Chia was a very evil woman - she always and in everything went against her husband, and he wished only good for people. Chia bewitched the Fansa River, and it overflowed its banks, flooding the entire Bogotá valley. Many residents died during this flood. Only a few managed to escape; they climbed to the tops of the surrounding mountains. The angry old man drove Chia away from the earth, and she became the Moon. Since then, Chia has illuminated the earth at night.”
The Chibcha-Muisca tribe from Brazil has a legend: “In ancient times, even before the moon began to accompany the earth, the people who inhabited the Bogotá plateau lived like real savages: they walked naked, did not know how to cultivate the land, and they did not have no laws, no rituals." A white man with a black beard, Bochika, “sent by God,” came to their land and taught them how to dress and build cities. This was in “those ancient times when the moon had not yet accompanied the earth.”

In the ancient book of the Mayan Indians, known today as the Codex de Paris (translated by R. Keyser), it is repeatedly mentioned that in time immemorial there was no moon in the night sky: “The Lord created this day. It was a very, very long time ago - during the second Age of Creation, when the gods made a prediction. It was long, long before August 12, 3114 BC, when the gods foretold that they would discover the secret of how to create beings who could call them by name. These are the people they will create from the dust. Wooden people were cracking.

The gods sent giant streams to wash away their mistakes. But the wooden people swam and lived as Monkeys to this day. It was so long ago when this happened that there were still no Baktuns (centuries), Katuns (decades), Tuns (years), Vinals (months) or Kinov (days) that could be counted. There wasn’t even a moon”; “... when the First Father sailed in his alligator canoe across the void to fan the First Fire in the Hearth of Heaven. The moon had not yet been created"; “... when the First Fire was fanned, and the Great Orion Nebula was illuminated for the first time.

From this ashes and smoke the God of Maize himself arose. He rose up from the back of the amphibian. Itzamna, the Sky Lizard, watched over his revival. The moon was not yet born when this happened”; "... when the First Father set the Zodiac in motion... when the stars began to move, the Horned Deer appeared from the East.... The high and full Moon followed on his heels."
G. Wilkins in his book “Lost Cities of South America” writes: “The Indians of the high plains of Colombia claim that before the catastrophe (flood) struck the Earth, the vault of heaven was not illuminated by the Moon!”
In the oral traditions of the African Bushmen, there is information that after a terrible cataclysm that occurred in time immemorial, when darkness and smoke on Earth dissipated, two Moons appeared in the sky, where there had been no night luminary before!

The ancient Indian epic "Mahabharata" says that at the beginning of time the gods tried to extract the liquid of immortality - amrita - from the ocean. They churned the ocean (churning), lowering there from the sky the giant serpent Vasuki, who held Mount Mandara in his mouth. And from the raging waters of the ocean for the first time “the Moon appeared, clear, like your closest friend. It emitted rays and shone with a cool light.”

Long before the Greeks, the Palazgian tribes lived on the land of Hellas, and in the south of the country there was the legendary country of Arcadia. The Greeks called their predecessors the Palazgians and Arcadians “below the moon.” It was a long time ago, when the moon had not yet shone in the sky. A flood struck their ancient land as the Moon appeared in the sky.

Apollonius of Rhodes (3rd century BC)- the keeper of the Library of Alexandria, half a million of whose manuscripts were burned and lost to us irretrievably, having access to such a huge amount of information, argued that the Moon did not always shine in the earth’s sky. In his work “Argonautics”, he refers to the “Constitutions of the Phygeans” - Aristotle, who has not survived to our time: “... when not all celestial bodies were circling in the sky, the race of the Danaans was still unknown, and the sons of Deucalion did not yet rule the country of the Palazgi. It was then, as they say, that only the Apian Arcadians lived here in the mountainous part of the country, eating acorns, as in those days when there was no moon in the sky.”

Anaxagoras, a Greek philosopher, astronomer and mathematician (5th century BC), based on more ancient sources, mentioned in his works that the Moon appeared in the sky later than the Earth itself was formed.
The Indians of British Guiana told the famous scientist A. Humboldt, when he traveled to this region of the world in 1820, that their ancestors lived here before the appearance of the Moon.

The Moon, approaching the Earth, caused huge tidal waves in the seas and oceans with its gravity, creating another flood. Among the legends of the Yagans living on the Tierra del Fuego archipelago, there is a legend about our night companion, which says that many centuries ago the Moon fell into the sea and a large (tidal) wave arose, flooding everything: “Many centuries ago the Moon fell into the sea. The sea waves rose like water in a bucket when you throw a large stone into it. This caused a flood, from which only the lucky inhabitants of this island, which broke away from the seabed and floated on the sea, escaped. Even the mountains on the mainland were flooded with water. ...When the Moon finally emerged from the depths of the sea, and the water began to subside, the island returned to its place.” From this saved island people populated the entire Earth.”

The flood, during the appearance of the red Moon surrounded by a “veil of clouds,” is spoken of in the legends of the Irish, which are borrowed from more ancient Celtic legends. The heroes of the myth are Bit and Birren and their daughter Caesar. During the flood, the whole family boarded the ship, and thanks to this they were saved. But “soon after the flood a new catastrophe occurred. The red Moon rose, surrounded by a veil of clouds that scattered and fell to the Earth, causing destruction. As a result of another disaster, “Bit’s family died, and the country was left without people.”

An African tribe living in the lower reaches of the Congo River has a myth when, “the sun and the moon met one day, the sun covered the moon with dirt and obscured its light; for this reason, part of the moon remains in shadow from time to time (moon phases). During this meeting there was a flood."
The Caribs, Indians living in the Orinoco River basin, claim that there was no moon in the sky before. Its appearance is associated with the outbreak of a catastrophe that killed many people and burned forests to ashes.

Taiwan, Philippines. Tsou people. Previously, the sky was close to the earth and two suns were shining. People were dying from the heat at that time. The hero of Oadzyma struck one sun with an arrow; his blood became like a sea, the sky rose, both suns disappeared; the second sun began to emerge, first for a short time, and then - as it does now. The wounded sun became the moon; the blackness in its center is where the arrow hit.

Bashkirs. In ancient times, two suns shone in the sky; when one set, the other rose. People suffered from their blinding light. Bai promised a daughter to the one who struck one of the suns. Ural Batyr split one sun with an arrow; The moon was formed from one part, the other fell and turned into the Ural-Tau mountains rich in treasures. When the arrow hit the target, the people shouted: “Ay.” That's what Luna is called now.
Udege people. In the distant past, there were two suns and it was very hot. The man Gangt had a son, Namik. When he grew up, he killed the second sun, hitting him with the thirty-third arrow. The Moon appeared in the place of the dead star. The sky rose and people multiplied on the earth. At this time, the flood began and only Namika and her sister escaped on a high mountain.
Many more similar legends can be cited, and almost all legends say that one of the heavenly bodies, probably one of the satellites of a neutron star, became the Moon.

In the past, the Moon was in an orbit closer to Earth. In the ruined city of Tiaguanaco, on the famous “Gate of the Sun” there are symbols of solar eclipses, which occurred 19 times a year, i.e. The moon blocked our star 19 times, and at this time a solar eclipse occurred. Researchers of this ancient calendar, A. Poznansky and E. Kiss, calculated that the disk of the ancient Moon was 14 times larger than the modern one, and its distance from the Earth was 5.9 Earth radii. In addition, they established that the nearby complex of structures - Kalasasaya ("Standing Columns") is the oldest observatory.

Studying the landmarks of the column sights and the angles formed by the observation lines. Posnanski concluded that they suggested a significantly greater tilt of the Earth's axis in the past than at present - 23.5 degrees.

During excavations, archaeologists find Stone Age calendars on which lunar years are marked in the form of holes or dashes. The finds date back to 15-20 millennium BC. For example, in France, in the town of Abri-Blanchard in the Vézère Valley, a calendar was discovered carved on bone, with clearly defined four alternating lunar phases in the form of holes of various shapes. There are 33 marks on the bone that can indicate how many times during one normal year the Moon orbited the Earth. Our night star, in this case, should be located approximately three times closer to our planet than at present, and the lunar month would consist of 11 days. The same number of days in a month is indicated by a complex spiral-shaped lunar calendar found during excavations of a Stone Age settlement in the vicinity of Achinsk, carved on a mammoth tusk. On its surface, in the form of spirals and holes, the three-year alternating lunar cycle is marked and there are marks with 11 daily or multiple dates, that is, 22 and 33 days. Doctor of Historical Sciences V.E. Larichev, who studied this find, came to the conclusion that the calendar indicated the length of the year - 360 days, the value of the lunar synodic month, year, the number of days from the spring to autumn equinox, the repetition period of lunar eclipses, etc. It is hard to believe that savages living in caves, dressed in animal skins and with a club on their shoulders, could create such a complex and accurate calendar. But these conclusions are confirmed by other artifacts. Based on other information about the chronology of lunar years in ancient calendars, we can clarify that in that distant time, a month consisted of 10.8 days, and in a solar year there were 33.33 lunar years.

In the mythology of different peoples, it is mentioned that, indeed, the Moon was located much closer to our planet, and then it moved to a higher orbit. The Bulgarian legend speaks of the “evil woman” Moran, who “killed many people” and threw a dirty veil over the silver moon, which became covered with dark spots and, frightened, began to walk above the Earth much higher than before.

The unusual movement of the Moon is also mentioned in the ancient beliefs of the Armenians: “Lusin (the Moon) used to walk across the sky during the day, with her brother the Sun. But Lusin fell ill with smallpox and, ashamed of the ugly rowan trees that covered her, she appears only at night, under the cover of darkness.” The night star was much closer to our planet, since the ancient Armenians were able to see lunar craters (pockmarks) even with the naked eye.
On the surface of the glaciers covering Antarctica, meteorites were discovered that are not like the rest. Their study showed that their chemical composition is similar to the rocks of the lunar “seas” and “plains”. Moreover, they came to Earth relatively recently. According to various estimates, the time of the fall of lunar meteorites on our planet ranges from 12 to 25 thousand years ago. Most likely, these fragments of the Moon fell on our planet as a result of its appearance in Earth’s orbit and cataclysms caused by a neutron star, which, with its gravity, tore out part of the surface of the night star.

Based on the foregoing, it can be argued that the Moon appeared in its current orbit relatively recently, that is, during one of the passages of a neutron star through the Solar System. After the Moon began to shine in the sky, periodically recurring catastrophic earthquakes began on Earth.

The next time a neutron star or other massive object appears in the Solar System, a situation may arise in which Typhon, with its attraction, can change the orbit of the Moon. Under unfavorable circumstances, it will approach the Earth, and then, having passed the Roche limit, (at an altitude of 3 Earth radii) will collapse into separate fragments that will collapse on our planet. After this terrible cataclysm, humanity will no longer survive. Still, it’s unpleasant to have such a huge cobblestone over your head, which hangs over us like the sword of Damocles, and may someday collapse to the Earth.
To conclude the chapter, I will cite a Sumerian cuneiform text-prophecy, which is dedicated to the Earth’s satellite:
O Moon, you are the only one who sheds light,
You, who bring light to humanity...
All the great deities lie in the dust before you,
For the fate of the world rests in you

People of the mythological era assumed that space is a beautiful, well-ordered universe and a container of life; it is constantly surrounded by terrifying chaos, like a caterpillar in a cocoon.

The chaos lurking on the borders of the world carries the threat of destruction: at any moment, space can again turn into a shapeless mass, be swallowed up by the abyss, fall into the abyss, be swallowed by a monster, etc.

Sometimes the gods were involved in the forces of chaos, and sometimes they released them in much the same way as an owner unleashes a dog.

The end of the world could take place for various reasons: here is the “wearing out” of the life-giving cosmic principle, which periodically happens, and various cataclysms up to world catastrophes. In a word, sooner or later the world felt cosmic fatigue, which ended in its death.

Cosmic fatigue for centuries

In the biblical Apocalypse, a book about the final destinies of the world, a symbolic picture of the final battle between God and all the forces of evil, embodied by John the Theologian in the images of two animals, is drawn.

One of them rose from the abyss of the sea, and the other from the abyss of the earth. The second beast put spirit into the first, “so that the image of the beast would speak and act in such a way that everyone who would not worship the image of the beast would be killed.”

Before the last great judgment the devil, that ancient serpent and Antichrist, will “he was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.” . The place of this final battle at the end of the time of the kings of the earth is called Armageddon.

Probably this secret or symbolic name arose from a combination of the Hebrew “har” - “mountain” with the name of the area Megiddo. Some important battles of Old Testament times were associated with this place in northern Palestine.

The death of the world is the leitmotif of eschatological (from the Greek “last”) myths, which are found in many mythological traditions. When in Ancient Mesopotamia people created by the gods began to rapidly multiply, the noise from them became unbearable and “the earth roared like a wild bull.”

The irritated god Enlil decided to send a plague to people, but Atrahasis, surpassing everyone in wisdom, managed to prevent the death of humanity by making a sacrifice to the plague god Namtar in time. However, everything happened again after 12 centuries.

This time, humanity, which had become disobedient, decided to kill it with drought, and again Atrahasis, to whom the gods granted eternal life, saved him by appeasing the god of storms Adad. But the people continued to make noise, and Enlil completely lost sleep.

Then the gods decided to impose a ban on all the gifts of nature, and this already threatened a major disaster. It was then that the cunning Enki decided bring down a flood on people.

Flood is the most common scenario for the destruction of the world

In addition to the well-known biblical version, floods brought the end of the world, as myths tell, in Ancient India, and in other Asian countries, and in America, and in Australia, and on the islands of New Guinea, and in Polynesia, and in Micronesia, and in Melanesia.

In a word, myths about floods are known everywhere, except perhaps in Africa, where they came relatively late under the influence of Christian missionaries.

The reasons why mankind, with the exception of a select few, should be destroyed by water are varied. In the Bible - human sins, in Greek mythology - Zeus's dissatisfaction with the insignificance of people, in the Mayan epic "Popol Vuh" - the inability of the first people to honor the gods.

The prototype of the biblical story of the flood was the Sumerian myth. Its text has not reached us in full, but from the available fragments it is clear that the gods decided to send a flood to the earth and destroy the human race.

A flood floods the earth in Chinese mythology, but in a slightly different situation. The spirit of water, Gun-Gong, who is in charge of the floods, having been defeated by the spirit of fire, decided to commit suicide and began to beat his head against Mount Buzhou, which served as a support for the sky. The spirit remained alive, but caused a catastrophe: the pillars of heaven were broken, the earth's threads were torn, as a result the sky tilted, and the nine parts of the inhabited world split.

The sky did not cover the earth, the earth did not support the sky, the fire raged, the water overflowed, fierce animals devoured people, birds of prey tormented the old and weak with their claws.

The situation was saved by the goddess Nuiva, associated with the earth and fertility: she fused stones of five colors and strengthened the sky with them, cut off the legs of a turtle and strengthened the sky with them, collected reed ash to dam the waters, and stabbed a black dragon to save the earth.

An Australian legend tells how one day a huge frog swallowed all the water. All the seas and rivers dried up, and the fish jumped on the hot sand, as if on hot coals. The animals decided to save the situation and found that the surest way out of it was to make the frog laugh. But all their attempts were unsuccessful.

The frog, like our fairy-tale Princess Nesmeyana, never wanted to laugh, she only puffed out her cheeks and puffed up her eyes.

Oddly enough, the eel succeeded: his antics seemed so hilarious to the frog that he burst out laughing, tears flowed from her eyes, and water gushed from her mouth. This turned out to be the cause of the flood.

Indian mythology has preserved different versions of doomsday scenarios. It paints a picture of all the raging elements, when the flood sounds the final chord. Myths say that after many years of drought, seven or twelve burning suns will light up in the sky, which will dry up all the water and burn the earth to the ground.

Then a fiery wind will rush across the earth, sweeping away everything in its path. A cluster of luminous clouds in a wreath of blazing lightning will appear in the sky.

Then the heavens will open and the rain will pour continuously for 12 years until it covers the entire world, and other elements will also take an active part in the grandiose picture of the end of the world, so that as a result there will be no trace left of weak humanity.

And then everything will disappear altogether, and the self-created god, the root cause of everything, will absorb all the winds and fall asleep. The night of Brahma will come, and everything will await his awakening - the beginning of the period of a new creation of the world.

The world will become an endless and terrible mass of water without a single sign of life. And only on the surface of the ocean will the huge serpent Shesha sway, on whose rings the god Vishnu will sleep, and the world will not resume until he wakes up...

The full cycle of world development will be completed by a cosmic catastrophe. The age of destruction will be terrible: the clouds will not fall to the ground in the form of rain for 100 years, people will not be able to find food for themselves and, suffering from hunger, will begin to eat each other and will approach the most terrible death.

Other options for the death of the world are known

The ancient Egyptians said that Ra, the creator god, once repented for creating humanity, which had evil plans against him. Ra has grown old "his bones were made of silver, his flesh was of gold, his hair was of pure lapis lazuli" , and people stopped revere him properly.

It was then that he decided to destroy people and sent against them his beloved daughter, his eye in the form of the lioness goddess Sekhmet, the powerful goddess of war and the scorching sun.

She staged an unprecedented bloodbath, destroyed people, wandered in their blood and reveled in it. Either this picture of unbridledness made Ra shudder, or he came to his senses, but, one way or another, he decided to put an end to the extermination of humanity.

He poured several thousand jugs of red beer on Sekhmet’s path, and the goddess began to drink it with lust, mistaking it for human blood. Having quickly become intoxicated, she stopped her bloody deed. And Ra climbed onto the back of a heavenly cow and continued to rule the world from there.

In Karelian-Finnish mythology, Louhi, the mistress of the eternally gloomy Pohjela, stole the moon, which sat comfortably on a birch tree, and the Sun, which shone with pleasure, and dragged it all with her to Pohjela, and also grabbed fire from the hearths so that people’s homes would not there was light.

An impenetrable night fell on earth and in the sky, animals and people became sad, birds fell silent, but divine order was quickly restored.

The so-called Dresden Codex, one of the Mayan manuscript books that has survived to this day, depicts the end of the world, as the ancient Mayans imagined it: a huge rain snake stretched across the sky, spewing streams of water.

No less terrible streams pour out from the Sun and Moon; The vessel of heavenly waters is also overturned by the evil old goddess, the patroness of floods and downpours with a terrifying face and tiger claws.

On her outfit, as a symbol of inevitable death, crossed bones are depicted, and her head is crowned with a wriggling snake. Below her is a black god with a raging owl on his head and with a spear pointing downwards and bringing universal destruction.

But the end of the world is not perceived tragically: the old creation is destroyed to make way for the new.

⚓ Fantasize, choosing your reality

Experts in Scandinavian mythology have come to the conclusion that the end of the world, according to the mythology of the Celts, as well as the Vikings and other Germanic peoples, may occur on February 22, 2014. On this day, according to ancient legends, the main god of the Celts, Odin, will be killed by the giant dire wolf Fenrir...

The day of the end of the world, the death of everything and, possibly, the beginning of some new life, i.e. apocalypse, the Vikings called “Ragnarok” - the death of the gods. In German-Scandinavian mythology, this is the day of the last battle between gods and monsters. According to the ideas of the ancient Scandinavians, the existing world would perish during a terrible battle.

Wolf Day

The prophecy about Ragnarok belongs to the dead seer Velva, who was temporarily summoned from the grave by the god of gods Odin especially for this purpose. According to prophecy, on the day of Ragnarok, the monstrous mythological wolf Fenrir, the son of the god Loki and the giantess Angrboda, will swallow the sun, plunging the world into darkness. By the way, this god Loki is a demon of trickery and ridicule. The characteristic features of his nature are duplicity, envy, resourcefulness, cunning and deceit. Loki is often called deceitful, but this is not so. It’s just that the concepts of “lie” and “truth” do not exist for Loki.

Odin and Fenrir, drawing from 1905.

Fenrir grew up and was raised among the highest gods, the Aesir. Only Tyr, the god of military courage, the son of Odin, the same father of the gods, the founder of poetry and magic, dared to feed him.

Realizing who Fenrir was and to protect themselves, the aces decided to chain the wolf, but he easily broke the strongest chains. Finally, the Aesir, by cunning, managed to bind Fenrir with a chain. However, in order for the wolf to allow this chain to be put on him, Tyr had to put his hand into the mouth of the terrible beast as a sign of the absence of evil intentions. When Fenrir could not free himself, he simply bit off Tyr’s hand. Finally, the Aesir chained Fenrir to a rock deep underground and placed a sword between his jaws.

And the battle will break out

According to Norse myths, the day will come when Fenrir will swallow the sun, plunging the world into darkness. And then no less terrible events will occur: the seas will overflow their shores, and from their depths the world serpent Jormungand will appear, encircling the entire Earth inhabited by people. The wolf and snake will be joined by the fiery giant Surt with a flaming sword that will scorch the earth. Then the mistress of the afterlife kingdom Hel will appear in this terrible company, followed by our friend, the insidious god Loki.

All the aces, the supreme gods, led by Odin, and all the einherjars - the valiant warriors who fell in battle, living in the heavenly palace - will oppose them.

The last scene of Ragnarok: the giant Surtr burns the whole world

One, according to the prophecy, will fight Fenrir in battle and be killed by the insatiable wolf. But Odin’s son, Vidar, the god of vengeance, will immediately tear the jaws of the terrible wolf... Thor will fight Jormungandr and kill him, but he himself will die from the snake’s poison. The giant Surt, seeing that good and evil cannot defeat each other, will burn the whole world. The battle of Darkness and Light will end. But the world will be reborn again. According to legend, only two people on the entire Earth will survive, Liv and Livtrasir. It is they who will lay the foundation for a new race of people, a new civilization.

Interestingly, the Scandinavian myth about the end of the world has direct parallels in Celtic, Iranian, and Indian legends. There are similar stories in Caucasian tales about chained giants and heroes.

Daredevils go to Yolablot

Scientists at Norway's Viking Heritage Center say several recent events lead to belief that the end of the world is near. After all, they are talked about in the legends of Ragnarok. For example, legends mention the disappearance of borders. Indeed, the idea that existing boundaries will collapse has actually become a reality in the Internet age, when you can communicate with so many people around the world. This legend can also be interpreted literally: more and more countries are abolishing the visa regime, more and more people can freely travel around the world.

Ragnarok is also a harbinger of violation of moral standards, bloody feuds between relatives, moral chaos... Isn’t this what we are seeing today?
Experts also remind us of the forecasts of climatologists: now, apparently, a short-term (in the historical sense) ice age is coming, which is quite consistent with the prophecies about “several winters” - Fimbulwinter - before the apocalypse.

New world after Ragnarok

What about the legend about the serpent Jormungand, who must rise from the ocean? And there are signs of the end of the world: two huge ribbon fish found dead on a California beach recently fit that description. And in other places on the planet they find strange snake-like sea monsters that unexpectedly rose from the depths...

Traditionally, the Viking festival Yolablot marked the end of winter. In 2014, the festival will take place from February 14 to 22. And in British York they already blow the horn every evening, reminding that Ragnarok is very close.

According to tradition, the Viking festival signifies the end of winter and the beginning of a new cycle of life. But if winter does not end, then the holiday may end with Ragnarok.
Thus, the end of the world may not have long to wait. Coming soon, as they say...

Initially, a person needs food - and he begins to come up with legends about what he eats (myths about animals and plants). Then he begins to think about why day gives way to night, and night gives way to day and make his own assumptions about this (myths about celestial bodies). Then a person begins to notice a change in climatic conditions in the area in which he lives (myths about the seasons). Since the change of day and night occurs more often than the change of seasons, our ancestors began to construct explanations for the change of day and night earlier than to explain the change of seasons.

Therefore, we place myths about dying and resurrecting gods later than myths about heavenly bodies.

The time of creation myths is coming. Sooner or later, a person comes to mastering fire, inventing tools, and so myths appear about cultural heroes, mythical characters who somehow made the lives of others easier. Although this may not be an individual hero, but an entire people who taught another a certain craft and thus acquired a place in its mythology. When a person determines for himself where it all began, he begins to ask the ensuing question: “How will it all end?” Thus, myths about the end of the world, that is, eschatological myths, are born.

Eschatology (the doctrine of the ultimate destinies of the world and humanity) is an integral part of any religious system.

Eschatological views have a decisive influence on the ideological principles of religion, being their logical conclusion.

The presence of eschatological myths testifies to the high level of development of the people who created them.

The caveman will not be interested in the end of the world; he is busy with more pressing issues (searching for food, for example). Next, my task will be to present 5 myths of different peoples about the end of the world and compare them with each other.

Hindu eschatology. At the head of the Hindu pantheon are three gods: Brahma - the creator of the world. Vishnu protects the world created by Brahma. In some myths, he descends to Earth and incarnates into a mortal being to save the world and restore order (avatar). Shiva destroys the world when it is filled with evil. At the same time, Shiva destroys the world not of his own evil will.

Destroying the world is the purpose of this god.

Hindu eschatology is closely related to the concept of mythological time. The day-and-night (“kalpa”) of Brahma lasts 24,00 divine years. This time is divided into 4 periods, 4 “yugas” (yuga is the designation of the world period): Kritayuga is the golden age, humanity is prospering, all people are righteous and fair. This is the longest yuga.

Tretayuga is the Silver Age, vice appears, but it is still small. People begin to divide into classes and forget about duty.

Religion turns from a spiritual need into a means to achieve personal goals.

Dvaparayuga is the Copper Age, evil and vices prevail. People turn away from debt.

There is less good behavior, and more and more solemn rituals.

Diseases and disasters begin.

The single faith is divided into four parts (four castes in India). Kaliyuga is the Iron Age, the shortest yuga, lawlessness reigns everywhere. According to ancient Indian mythology, Kaliyuga began on February 18, 3102 BC. e. (Accordingly, you can calculate the day of the end of the world). Everyone turns away from sacred duty.

Virtue and good behavior disappear completely. Anger, sadness, hunger and fear reign in the world.

The rulers behave like highway robbers, trying to seize power and wealth by any means.

It is believed that our age - Kaliyuga - will perish from a fire that will burn everything. This era takes its name from the name of the goddess Kali (translated as “black”), the four-armed goddess of death, wife of Shiva. After the end of Kaliyuga, Shiva “dances” destroys the world, the Sun burns all living things, the elements of matter disintegrate, space collapses and Ishvara ( the image of the Absolute as the ruler of the manifest world) turns the Universe into its subtlest world.

The night of Brahma comes, he rests for 12 thousand years, then Brahma wakes up and everything repeats all over again. The myth of the visions of Markandeya can be considered part of Hindu mythology.

Markandeya was a legendary Indian sage. Vishnu showed him the Cow of the Law and showed him how at first she stood on four legs (kritayuga). Then, during the Tretayuga, the Cow of the Law removes one leg and stands on three legs.

Fairness is reduced by one third. Then Dvaparayuga comes.

The Cow of the Law is already standing on two legs.

Justice is halved. When Kaliyuga occurs, the Cow of Law stands on one leg. There is only one quarter of justice and law left in the world. Then, the Cow of the Law will remove her last leg and fall - the world will collapse.

Zoroastrian eschatology (Ancient Iran). Iranian mythology intersects with Indo-European mythology and the mythology of India in particular. This can be explained by the fact that the ancient settlements of both Iranians and Hindus arose during the Great Migration, that is, both mythologies were created by people who had the same ancestors.

Zoroastrianism got its name from the name of the prophet Zoroaster.

The main role in the ritual of Zoroastrianism is played by fire, considered as the embodiment of divine justice. At the head of the forces of good in Zoroastrianism is Ahura Mazda, at the head of the forces of evil is the hostile destructive spirit Angro Mainyu. Ahura-Mazda, knowing that it was impossible to eradicate evil, invited Angro-Mainya to fight for 9,000 years. Thus, the followers of this religion divided the history of the world into 3 periods (eras) of 3000 years each. In the last 3000 years, the era of the Separation of Good and Evil, three saviors will be born.

The first of the saviors will meet with Ahura Mazda and, returning to the physical world to people, will purify the faith. Then the first end of the world will come (in ancient Iranian mythology, the end of the world is called “frashkard”). Then wolves from all over the world will gather in one place and merge into one huge wolf.

Righteous people will gather an army, perform a sacred ritual and fight the monster. They will kill the wolf with whips, daggers, spears and arrows.

Wolfsbane will spread around and all the plants will die. Then it will rain endlessly and snow will fall. By the end of the terrible winter, wild animals will flock to people from everywhere. No one will kill them, but, on the contrary, will take care of the animals as if they were their own children. Then the second Savior will appear and proclaim to people the forgotten law and faith. But again, like wolves once did, snakes of all varieties will crawl and merge into a single body, and this giant snake will move towards people. And the righteous will again go out into battle and destroy the serpent. And a deva (devil) will arise in the form of a black locust and enter the body of a two-legged deva. Then the terrible dragon Azhi Dahak, chained in the crater of the volcano, will break free. He will devour a third of people, cows and sheep. Fire, water and plants will come to Ahura Mazda and pray to him.

The Creator will awaken the mighty warrior Kersaspa herself from sleep and he will destroy Dahaka. After this, Ahura Mazda will begin to destroy the world. The whole world will be engulfed in fire (the personification of divine justice), all the dead will be resurrected and judged. A stream of molten copper will spill onto the ground.

To the righteous it will seem like warm milk, but to the sinners it will burn in torment. Then the stream of molten metal will reach hell and Angro Mainyu, along with his minions, will be destroyed forever.

Each soul will have to cross the horsehair-thin Bridge of Selection (Chinwa Bridge) leading to heaven (the House of Songs). After this, the earth will turn into a flowering plain and people will stop eating meat.

Eternal spring will come.

German-Scandinavian eschatology. In German-Scandinavian mythology, the myth about the end of the world is called Ragnarok.

Ragnarok is the most terrible, the most eerie and yet the most poetic of the Scandinavian myths. The word "Ragnarok" literally means "fate or doom of the gods." This concept includes the complete destruction of everything by the forces of evil, and in history there is, perhaps, no second equally gloomy concept of the fate of humanity and the gods created by it.

It is of great importance that the gods know from the very beginning that the end of the world cannot be prevented. The gods in German-Scandinavian mythology are no less responsible for evil on earth than people. In particular, the gods are responsible for the emergence of greed in people; the god of justice Tyr resorted to deception in order to put the wolf Fenrir on a chain. This chain was indestructible, but with every bad human act the chain became weaker.

The prelude to Ragnarok will be the decline of human morality. Brother will go against brother for the sake of profit, neither father nor son will stir a feeling of pity for each other.

Chained by a dwarven chain, the giant wolf Fenrir will break free and swallow the Sun. Then the fierce winter of Fimbulvetr will come - three winters in a row all year round, and there will be no other seasons, only snow will fall from all sides. Following this, rocks and entire mountain ranges will begin to collapse. These powerful shocks will break the chains and shackles in which all their main enemies were shackled by the gods. Water will begin to flood the land, because the World Serpent Ermungand will turn over in the sea, and in great anger will crawl to the shore, spewing poison onto heaven and earth. Then the ship Naglfar, made from the nails of the dead and equipped in the swamps of Hel (the underworld), will break loose from its anchor and float, caught up by a gigantic shaft. On board is a team of the dead and the villain Loki, who has awakened from paralysis and broken his stone shackles.

This ghost ship is ruled by a giant named Moody.

The terrible dog Garm will also break free. And then the sky, which has become ominous, will split in two, and an army of the sons of Muspell will appear.

Muspell (or Muspellsheim) is a fiery country that existed even before the beginning of creation.

Muspell is the abode of fiery giants, similar to animated volcanoes: fiery rays burst out of their eyes, and lava came out of the cracks in their dark bodies. The warriors held huge granite clubs in their paws. At the head of this army rode the giant Surt. All this army of darkness will gather on the Vigrid field and oppose the gods (Aesir). Ahead of the Aesir army will be the supreme god Odin riding on his horse, followed by the thunderer Thor with his hammer, Odin's son Thor, the god of war Tyr and the rest of the gods and warriors. Thor, seeing Jormungand, will separate from the main army and go to measure his strength with the World Serpent. Thus begins the battle of the gods with the world's evil.

The frantic Fenrir will be the first to rush into battle and swallow Odin, but one of the sons of the supreme god will press the wolf’s lower jaw to the ground with his foot, grab his upper jaw with his hand and tear his mouth apart. Here the dog Garm will rush forward and, flooding the ground with stinking foamy saliva, will enter into battle with Tyr. After a fierce fight, they will strike each other to death. Thor will kill the World Serpent, but will not be able to come to the aid of the other gods, since, having moved only nine steps from the defeated snake, he will fall, poisoned by its poison.

The treacherous Loki will also die in this battle. Surtr, seeing that the advantage over the army of the Aesir was not coming, would spew out an all-consuming flame and burn the world. This will end the battle between good and evil, in which evil will win. After this, the world will be reborn again, younger gods who were not responsible for the mistakes of the previous ones will emerge from the kingdom of the dead and will create a new world.

Christian Eschatology.

Christian eschatology is revealed in the revelation of John the Theologian. This passage of the Bible says that four horsemen will come to earth. Behind them there will be a great earthquake, the Sun will turn pale, and the Moon will become red as blood, stars will begin to fall on the Earth. Because of this, the sky will disappear “rolled up like a scroll” and the continents will begin to move (“and every mountain and island moved from their places”). All people will hide in the caves and gorges of the mountains and begin to beg them to hide from the wrath of God. Then the Angel will mark with the seal of God those who led a righteous life - and they will be saved, ascending to the abode of God. After which seven angels will blow trumpets and disasters will fall on the Earth (earthquakes, hail, fires, volcanic eruptions, etc.). Then a meteorite will fall to the ground, and huge locusts will emerge from the crevice it creates and begin to sting sinners.

These locusts will be the size of horses, with human faces and lion teeth and stings like scorpions. Its bites will not kill, but only torment people, like scorpion stings. Even those sinners who want to die cannot die. This will continue for five months, after which there will be an invasion of four Angels at the head of an army on horses spewing fire, smoke and brimstone. After the seventh Angel blows the trumpet, the Earth will become the “Kingdom of the Lord.” Then a sign will appear in the sky - a woman “clothed with the Sun” and a huge red dragon with seven heads.

The woman will give birth to a child, and a war for him will begin between the dragon and the Angels. At the end of this war, the Angels will cast down the dragon (devil) to Earth and he will rule on earth (the personification of vice). Then God will command his seven Angels to pour 7 bowls of wrath onto the Earth. And people who find themselves in the power of the devil will begin to suffer again: purulent wounds will appear on their bodies, all life in the seas will die, the Sun will begin to burn people with fire, etc. The city of Babylon, which has become a symbol of the sinfulness of people, will be destroyed. After this, the army of the Beast (vice) and the kings of the earth will fight with the army of God and lose, the Beast and his false prophet will be thrown into the lake of fire.

The dragon will be bound and thrown into the abyss for a thousand years, after which he will be released and will again tempt the nations. Then God will burn the nations that have again submitted to the devil, and throw the dragon himself into the lake of fire to the Beast and the false prophet. Then the judgment of the dead will begin and everyone will be rewarded according to their deserts: the sinners will be thrown into the lake of fire, and the righteous will see a new world and a new Jerusalem (paradise), in which there will be no illnesses, sorrows and misfortunes.

Islamic eschatology. Belief in the Day of Judgment is one of the main tenets of faith in Islam.

Muslims believe that on a day known only to God (Allah), when He sees fit, this world will come to an end as a result of a terrifying, unimaginable cosmic cataclysm.

Archangel Israfil will blow into a huge trumpet called “Su"ur” and the End of the World will come.

The terrible sound of the trumpet will kill all living beings and a terrible storm and strong earthquake will occur on the earth.

Not only will people’s buildings collapse, but all the mountains will be destroyed to the ground. The end of the world will affect not only the Earth.

The harmony of the entire universe will be disrupted and as a result of the cataclysm, the entire universe will be reorganized. After a certain time allotted for such a reorganization, Archangel Israfil (peace be upon him) will blow the “Su”ur trumpet a second time. After the second voice of “Su”ur”, all the dead will rise and will be called to the “Mahshar” field, where Allah Almighty will be administer Your Fair Judgment.

Each resurrected person will be given a book with his deeds. Belief in the Day of Judgment is also belief in the existence of Libra Mizan. All good deeds and sins will be weighed on these scales. Nothing can be hidden. Those who have lived a pious life will immediately go to heaven (the Gardens of Adna) and experience happiness, the understanding of which lies far beyond human imagination. And those who did not believe in the One God, Allah, will remain in continuous, terrible fire among a disgusting environment and the same friends in misfortune. The Koran (the holy book of Muslims) says that non-believers will want to have another opportunity to return to the world in order to live their lives differently in the light of their new knowledge of Genesis, but it will be too late.

	Hinduism	Zoroastrianism	Germanic-Scandinavian mythology	Christianity	Islam
Who will prevent the end of the world.	Nobody. The end of the world is in order for Hindus. Everything should take its course.	People. Only after this will the kind supreme being stand up for them.	Gods. They will sacrifice themselves, even knowing that they cannot win.	Sinners and the devil. The world that will exist before the end of the world will satisfy only them.	Nobody. No one can resist the power of God.
Natural catastrophes before the end of the world (earthquakes).	Yes.	Yes. Before the end of the world there will be a plague of locusts and a long winter.	Yes. The Sun and Moon are involved in cataclysms. There will be a long winter before the end of the world.	Before the end of the world there will be a plague of locusts. The Sun and Moon are involved in cataclysms.	Yes.
Date of the end of the world.	Known.	Roughly known.		Unknown. The end of the world will come when evil finally prevails.	Known only to God. The end of the world will come unexpectedly, but there are signs of the end of the world, which in some places have come true.
Who died as a result of the end of the world.	All people.	Sinners.	All people and all gods.	Sinners.	Sinners.
Which means the end of the world.	Death of the world.	Cleansing and renewal.	Cleansing and renewal.		Reward to everyone for what they have accomplished.
Blame for the end of the world	People and gods are not guilty		Both gods and people	Yes, the angels cast down the dragon into our world

1) Who will prevent the end of the world: By comparing all five columns, we can judge the worldviews of all five peoples. The two poles here are the Scandinavians and the Hindus. Hinduism is characterized by subordination to the general flow of events. The Scandinavians resist the end of the world until the very end, at the same time the gods realize that this struggle is useless (you cannot escape fate). However, here another incentive comes into force - the heroes fight in the name of posthumous glory.

Perhaps the reason for such different perceptions of fate was the difference in the living conditions of the peoples (peaceful Indian pastoralists and warlike barbarians of the Scandinavian Peninsula, for whom war is a way of survival). The contradictions between Iranians and Hindus, as two antagonistic peoples (the conflict between pastoralists and farmers is inevitable) are also revealed in their eschatologies.

The supreme deity, the highest power among the Hindus (their own god) destroys the world, while among the Iranians, God saves people by punishing only sinners.

In general, Hindu mythology is interesting because it is the whole world that is filled with evil, and not just individual sinners who force God to destroy the world. As for Christianity and Islam, in both of these religions, opposing the end of the world is completely the lot of sinners.

The only difference is that in Islam the “infidels” simply will not be able to resist God and will automatically come under his control. Thus, the preachers of Allah are once again trying to emphasize the greatness of their God. 2) Natural disasters before the end of the world: In all mythologies, the end of the world occurs due to a natural disaster (in Hinduism, only, the end of the world is personified to a greater extent than anywhere else). This is not a coincidence; for the people creating mythology, at that time the most terrible disasters were earthquakes, hail, etc.

At that time, man had not yet mastered the forces of nature to such an extent as to fear himself (for example, errors in a nuclear reactor). An interesting fact is the detailed description in Ancient Iranian and Christian eschatologies of the threat associated with locusts. This may be a consequence of the adoption of mythological stories between peoples. As is known, the first steps towards monotheism were taken in Zoroastrianism, and Christianity is a striking example of monotheism. In Scandinavian and Christian mythologies, natural disasters are directly associated with the Sun and Moon. This suggests that the ethnic groups who created these myths mastered the principles of astronomy and understood the connection between cosmic objects; in Viking eschatology, a direct connection was also established between the Sun and the temperature on Earth (winter Fimbulvetr after Fenrir swallows the Sun). 3) Date of the end of the world: Islam occupies a special place in this aspect. The Koran describes the moment in which the prophet of Allah Muhammad was asked about the day of the End of the World. In response, he asked how the questioner was sure that the End of the World was not beyond the threshold. For Muslims, the End of the World can come any day; their world is already filled with evil. This attitude towards the Last Day can be considered as another method of forcing those who believe in Allah to lead a righteous life, presenting them with the fact of an imminent end. In Hinduism and Zoroastrianism, as in more ancient religions, there is a certain date for the end of the world. It is not found in Christianity and German-Scandinavian mythology, as in later-formed religions. This indicates the increasing share of philosophy in religion (now the onset or approach of the end of the world depends on everyone). 4) Who will die as a result of the end of the world (which means the end of the world): Also, the increasing share of Gnostics (Gnostics is the totality of religion and philosophy) can be judged by the facts that the eschatology of Hindus does not leave anyone alive (for this mythology the end of the world is indeed its end). At this time, among Zoroastrians, Muslims and Christians, those who led a righteous lifestyle will remain alive (or be reborn in a new, reborn world). So, allegorically, people who preach this or that religion are given life priorities. In German-Scandinavian mythology, gods and people die, but after the destruction of the previous world, unjustly killed gods who were not responsible for the mistakes of the previous ones will emerge from the Kingdom of the Dead and create a new world. To some extent, this is a kind of rebirth. For Muslims and Christians, after the end of the world, a new world is not born; people remain either in hell or in heaven. These two religions position our world as the final and only one - this imposes an additional share of responsibility on believers. 1) Mythology.

Encyclopedia, -M.: Belfax, 2002 S. Fingaret "Myths and Legends of the Ancient East", -M.: Norint, 2002 2) http://persian.km.ru History and mythology of Ancient Iran.