Wednesday 29 October 2014

creation






'...'Creation' in this Hindu view of things is designated by the word shrishti, literally, 'pouring forth' of the universe from its source. As a complex plant or tree grows, bursting forth and developing from a simple unitary seed... so is this whole and diverse universe poured forth... There is no god who stands apart from it and creates it... Everything is a manifestation that has poured forth from the living body of the whole.'

Diana Eck, India










'Everything is a manifestation that has poured forth from the living body of the whole.' 

The idea of the world as a living body, and of everything in the world as an emergence from a de-centred whole, is in line with contemporary theories in science of complexity and emergence. It's an ecological view, which sees everything in the world as connected, and perhaps even in some ways alive. The ecological cycle which creates rain has no components which we would say were literally alive, in the way that humans or cats or fungi or amoebas are alive, but the ecological processes that produce rain are dynamic and completely dependent upon each other.





There is a very ancient tradition in Hindu creation myths about 'the man'; the cosmic man who was sacrificed by the gods, to the gods, at the beginning of time. In Jain cosmology the giant man is holding the world in his hands, at the level of his belly:





The cosmic man is also inherent in the foundation plan of the Hindu temple:






The human is the world, the human contains the world... 

Rather than, the world is here for human dominion, to be plundered in whatever way humans feel inclined...






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