January 29, 2011 (Part 2) [Did the Maya Predict the World Would End in 2012?]

With the apocryphal date of December 21, 2012 fast approaching, the intricate Maya calendar system has become a popular topic for thousands of curious citizens of the world to ponder. Publishers and filmmakers alike are helping their fans gear up and count down to this special date that ancient Mayan societies were anticipating thousands of years ago. In 2007, three books on the subject arrived in mainstream bookstores. A fourth was due later that year. Each book arrived in the wake of the 2006 success of 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl, which sold thousands of copies every month since its release in May, 2006. These books built on the popular interest in the Maya fueled in part by Mel Gibson's December 2006 film about Mayan civilization, Apocalypto.

The authors of these books disagree about what humankind should expect on December 21, 2012, when the Maya's "Long Count" calendar marks the end of a 5,126-year era. This historic day marks the day the long count calendar will complete a “great cycle” of thirteen b’ak’tuns—each b’ak’tun consisting of a period of 144,000 days—since the mythical creation date of the calendar’s current era (supposedly August 11, 3114 BC). Journalist Lawrence Joseph forecast widespread catastrophe in Apocalypse 2012: A Scientific Investigation Into Civilization's End. Spiritual healer Andrew Smith predicted a restoration of a "true balance between Divine Feminine and Masculine" in The Revolution of 2012: Vol. 1, The Preparation. In 2012, Daniel Pinchbeck anticipated a "change in the nature of consciousness," assisted by indigenous insights and psychedelic drug use.

The buildup to 2012 echoes excitement and fear expressed on the eve of the new millennium-- popularly known as Y2K-- though on a smaller scale, says Lynn Garrett, senior religion editor at Publishers Weekly. She says publishers seem to be courting readers who believe humanity is creating its own ecological disasters and desperately needs ancient indigenous wisdom. "The convergence I see here is the apocalyptic expectations, if you will, along with the fact that the environment is in the front of many people's minds these days," Garrett says. "Part of the appeal of these earth religions is that notion that we need to reconnect with the Earth in order to save ourselves." But many scholars are bristling at attempts to link the ancient Maya with trends in contemporary spirituality. Maya civilization, known for advanced writing, mathematics and astronomy, flourished for centuries in Mesoamerica, especially between A.D. 300 and 900. Its Long Count calendar, which was discontinued under Spanish colonization, tracks more than 5,000 years, then resets at year zero.

"For the ancient Maya, it was a huge celebration to make it to the end of a whole cycle," says Sandra Noble, executive director of the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies in Crystal River, Fla. To render Dec. 21, 2012, as a doomsday or moment of cosmic shifting, she says, is "a complete fabrication and a chance for a lot of people to cash in." Part of the 2012 mystique stems from the stars. On the winter solstice in 2012, the sun will be aligned with the center of the Milky Way for the first time in about 26,000 years. This means that "whatever energy typically streams to Earth from the center of the Milky Way will indeed be disrupted on 12/21/12 at 11:11 PM Universal Time," according to Lawrence Joseph.
But most scholars doubt the ancient Maya extrapolated great meaning from anticipating the alignment — if they were even aware of what the configuration would be. Astronomers generally agree that "it would be impossible the Maya themselves would have known" about the alignment," says Susan Milbrath, a Maya archaeoastronomer and a curator at the Florida Museum of Natural History. What's more, she says, "we have no record or knowledge that they would think the world would come to an end at that point." University of Florida anthropologist Susan Gillespie says the 2012 phenomenon comes "from media and from other people making use of the Maya past to fulfill agendas that are really their own."