Only 15 of the 20 Mayan Calendars Have Been Made Public

I'm reading a book titled "Apocalypse 2012 - A Scientific Investigation into Civilizations End”, authored by Lawrence E. Joseph. In the book, the author mentions, very briefly, that only 15 of the Mayan Calendars have been released to the public, the remaining five (for a total of twenty) are being kept secret by the Mayan Elders.

After some internet searching, I have not been able to find anything else making such a claim (or even anything similar). I am only about halfway through the book, but my curiosity has been piqued. Anyone else heard that there are five unreleased Mayan calendars out there.

If this is true, everyone’s perception on the whole “2012 end of the world” thing could be based on incomplete information. Maybe nothing will happen, but then again, maybe the calendars are being withheld because they prove absolutely that something will happen.

EDIT: Correct BBCode tag

[edit on 8/17/2007 by DCFusion]

A calendar is a calendar - not sure how you can have 15 (or 20) Mayan calendars?

In any case I'm 100% convinced that the date 2012 will prove as significant as 1999, 2000, 2003 and all those other years in which the world ended.

i haven't been completely convinced that anything will happen in 2012. just because these calendars are being kept from the public doesn't necessarily mean they predict something. it could be any number of reasons. maybe they're deteriorated to the point that they are of no use? maybe they were made by a 4 year old and they're ashamed of the illegible script? =)

to some people, it's exciting to think that everything we have could be turned upside down in the near future. to some of us even an apocalyptic event is better than living in police states and working only to feed debt every day of our lives.

Originally posted by Essan
A calendar is a calendar - not sure how you can have 15 (or 20) Mayan calendars?

i concur, the long count is the long count, 13 Baktuns long.

i think what the other 'calendars' are the shamans & day-keeper priests
'prophetic' calendar Katuns...which forecasted the trends of each Katun (about 19 yrs long)...sorta like a Horoscope overview.

each Maya region or metropolitan center had their own day-keepers/
calendar priests/ seers & shamans to lead the masses,
i reckon that their are perhaps 5 other 'prophetic' calendars out there

the Quiche? Maya i think are about the only currently practicing Katun
calendar keepers of all the ancestral Maya who thrived in Mexico, Honduras, well most of northern central america, all those years ago.

related:

books of Chilam Balam
sundin.web.surftown.se...
members.shaw.ca...

You may find this link helpful:

www.kachina.net...

Thanks for the link, ModernDystopia! One of the things the book has not yet mentioned (and may not) was the names of the calendars. At least now I have some names to assist in my research.

St. Udio and ModernDystopia had excellent answers. The calendars may only represent a local tradition (they're certainly not widely known) and appear to have been corrupted with more modern traditions. For one thing, the people who lived in that area 22,000 years ago had no such traditions.

The Aztec/Mayan calendars are fairly new things, and the system of katuns and baktuns arose only a few thousand years ago (1200 years.) Here's a really interesting page on the variances in the calendars:
members.shaw.ca...

I think that what you have here is (at least from the link MD gave) something like the "Blue Star Kachina" legend that was created by a blending of old traditions with newer information that came from "spiritual travelers" -- Americans who journey to sacred places to gain their own spiritual insights. For instance, we do have records of their medicines and medical practices and in spite of the very interesting treatise on the number, 13, it really doesn't match the old beliefs.

Barbara Tedlock, a professor who was initiated as a shaman among these people, certainly doesn't record any similar beliefs.
ublib.buffalo.edu...

Here is a very good site that discusses how some of the writers have appropriated the real teachings, given them a spin that doesn't match reality, and have basically stolen the history and culture of the people. It's a critique of the "dreamspell calendar", but what's said applies to a lot of the things you will be researching. :
members.shaw.ca...

The same site has a good page on the real prophecies (note that they completely missed prophecies about the destruction of their culture and other important dates) :
members.shaw.ca...

Tedlock's husband has done a commentary and translation of the Popul Vuh which includes notes on how much cultural interference there is in the book. You might find it interesting:
phobos.ramapo.edu...



[edit on 18-8-2007 by Byrd]