The Cycle of Birth,Growth,Harvest and Rest

What do you mean, specifically, when you say that the universe undergoes a cycle of change?

The universe, or heaven and earth, undergoes change during the cycle of four seasons. Just as time observes the cycle of spring, summer, autumn, and winter on earth, cosmic time observes the cycle of cosmic spring, cosmic summer, cosmic autumn, and cosmic winter. One complete cycle of the cosmic seasons constitutes a cosmic year.

By the way, time is not the only thing governed by a periodic cycle. All lives in heaven and earth also repeat a certain pattern of actions. Sangjenim named these actions using four words: birth, growth, harvest, and rest. He proclaimed, “I wield the fourfold principle of birth, growth, harvest, and rest.” (2:49:1) His proclamation declares that heaven and earth—and all the lives residing therein—evolve in accordance with the principle of birth, growth, harvest, and rest.

His proclamation declares that heaven and earth—and all life residing therein—evolve in accordance with the principle of birth,growth,harvest and rest.

What, then, is the dynamic of birth, growth, harvest, and rest? It is a series of processes through which the universe gives birth to all lives, cultivates these lives, harvests them, and finally brings them to rest, marking the end of the cycle. The assertion that the universe evolves means that it repeats the cycle of birth, growth, harvest, and rest. The arrow of time flies from spring, to summer, to autumn, to winter, and then it cycles back to spring again. The days and nights of humanity are also cyclic: people work during daytime, rest at home at night, and then work again when another day begins. The principle of birth, growth, harvest, and rest governs all: in terms of time, this cycle presides over the cycles of day and night and the four seasons; in terms of space, it governs everything within the solar system, the Milky Way, and in fact the whole universe. The principle of birth, growth, harvest, and rest is a universal principle under which all things—from the greatest to the smallest, from the tangible to the intangible, from a human to the universe itself—progress and repeat themselves.

To summarize, time observes the cycle of spring, summer, autumn, and winter; and just as time circulates in this manner, the universe and humanity repeat the process of birth, growth, harvest, and rest endlessly.

How long is the cosmic year?

In fact, a person discovered the length of the cosmic year using Eastern cosmology. Discoursing upon this very subject, Sangjenim said that there was one person who revealed the cosmic timeframe with which He rules the universe: that person was Shao Yong (1011-1077), a scholar during China’s Song dynasty. Hado and Nakseo are ancient Eastern numerology, and Shao Yong was a scholar who immersed himself in their study and learned of the cosmic cycle. According to him, a cosmic year, in which the universe completes a cycle of spring, summer, autumn, and winter—completes the process of birth, growth, harvest, and rest—spans 129,600 calendar years.

Surprisingly, the figure 129,600 is the number associated with many cycles of change found in a variety of contexts ranging from the small universe of the individual human to the limitlessly huge universe. Sum the number of a living person’s average daily breaths and their pulse beats and you arrive at the figure 129,600. The same number is found in the cycle of a calendar year: the earth rotates 360 degrees daily on its axis and revolves round the sun 360 degrees yearly, and 360 degrees times 360 degrees equals 129,600 degrees—the total degrees of the earth’s annual rotation is hence 129,600. The principle upon which heaven and earth proceed is no different. Extrapolating from Shao Yong’s scholarship, three hundred and sixty calendar years amount to one cosmic day. Repeating a cosmic day 360 times yields a cosmic year, which is 129,600 calendar years. Western scientists examined the glaciers and discovered that an ice age occurred every 100,000 years on average. Is their conclusion not close to the span of a cosmic year?