Creation (Creator, translation, evolution, scriptures, point of view)

[The Great Architect]

How was The Universe created, according to the Hindu faith? Who was the creator?

[Pariah]

For whatever reason, creation has to be the least talked about and least important part of Hinduism. I never learned it. Instead, Hindus tend to focus on the epics - the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, and the Puranas (the stories of the Gods), and philosophy. How to live seems a bit more important to them than where we came from. Most of them are content with "God created the world", as most do not see disparaging views between science and religion. I, myself, had to research creation from the Hindu perspective, despite having grown up in the religion.

http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism...s/creation.asp

This has most of the hymns dedicated to creation from Rig Veda in an English translation.

By the way - love the Matrix quote.

[celina]

Originally Posted by The Great Architect

How was The Universe created, according to the Hindu faith? Who was the creator?

The Srimad Bhagavatam is the scripture that talks about creation.

http://srimadbhagavatam.com/sb/en

[Aupmanyav]

Pariah, my congratulations for your excellent post and the excellent link. IMHO, the link gives full information about a subject which hindu scriptures nearly dismiss as unimportant. You have missed out on various rishis procreating the human race. Was it Atri, or Kardam, or Swayambhu Manu, or any other, as you find in SrimadBhagawatam. "Dharma", Social rules and interaction, how to live, is certainly most important for hindus, more important that personal belief and belief about creation. The puranas have been written with this view in mind.

The Great Architect, hindus are not bound to any one theory if they can support their theory with enough reason (fully accounted for theory is available neither in religion nor in science). Personally, I believe in an ever-changing universal substrate, which I equate with Brahman (derived from the root 'brh', to expand. This is of the nature of quantum fields or cosmic rays. Change is inherent in the substrate (positrons changing to neutrons to electrons to bosons, giving out or absorbing various particles, just as an example, you can find the various sequences in books about particle physics).

Brahman (neuter gender) means "growth", "development", "swelling", from the Sanskrit root "bṛh", "swell", cognate to English "bulge". It could be from PIE *bherg'h-" "to rise, high, eminent", cognate to Old Norse "Bragi".

The rest is because of the scale of our perception. We are of a particular size (neither microcosmic nor macrocosmic). Our sense of vision is limited to a particular range of electro-magnetic disturbances (we see from violet to red, missing out x-Rays, ultra-violet, or infra-red). Other senses, sound, taste, touch, also, have various limitations. This causes our mind to percieve the reality in our particular way. A bumble-bee has a different perception of the universe.

So what we percieve is not the reality, it is an illusion. We are born, grow-up, live, and die in a world of make-believe. This is known in hinduism as "Ma-ya" (literally, 'not-this'). Hope this helps you.

"Nasadiya Sukta" of the RigVeda, 10th Book (probably written around 2000 BC), quoted in the link, is beautiful poetry. It is as revolutionary today as it must have been at the time it was written:

"6 Who verily knows and who can here declare it, whence it was born and whence comes this creation? The Gods are later than this world's creation. Who knows then whence it first came into being?
7 He, the first origin of this creation, whether he formed it all or did not form it, Whose eye controls this world in highest heaven, he verily knows it, or perhaps he knows not."

[Pariah]

Aupmanyav -
Would you agree with the statement that Brahman has always existed and that what comes from it, changes from time to time (yuga to yuga, creation to creation) aka the Devas can be destroyed and created?

[Aupmanyav]

I do not enough about Brahman (though I am none other, but I am under an illusion, Maya) to answer your questions. Science, as you know, has two theories, big-crunch, and expanding universe. We neither know what was before the big-bang nor what will exist after big-crunch. The problem does not disappear even if we go by the theory of expanding universe; from what did it start expanding, and when it has finally expanded will Brahman come to a rest? May be, the answers would come in our life-time, may be they would not. I am not in favour of jumping to unsubstantiated conclusions. I do not know whether there have been many creations or this is the only one. But in this creation, Brahman, the substrate, does change every attosecond (that is the smallest interval of time mentioned in the encyclopedias) or less till now, and perhaps till quite a long time in future. Devas, what devas? I do not remember to have been the cause of their creation directly. As the 'Nasadeeya Sukta' says, perhaps humans created them.

[Hema]

This is something I came across from another website and I actually posted it in response to an older thread. Here goes:

Taken from:
http://www.swami-krishnananda.org/co...s/consc_2.html

"In the Rig Veda, there is a sukta or a great hymn called Nasadiya Sukta. There was a potential, which looked like a universal darkness. This ubiquitous all-pervading dark potential is supposed to be the concentrated will of God, proposing to outline in His own mind the details of the creation yet to be.

This great declaration in theNasadiya Sukta of the Rig Veda may be compared with the big bang theory of the modern physicists. There was one indescribable point, the nucleus of the would-be expanding universe. That nucleus was not in space and not in time, because space and time had not been created yet. It was a bindu, as Tantra Sastra will tell us. It is a point, but it is not a geometrical point which requires a space in order to locate itself. This is a point, neither conceivable logically, nor describable geometrically; that is why in an enigmatic manner philosophers tell us it is a centre which is everywhere, with circumference nowhere. It is as if this centre of a circle has become the circumference itself, and the whole circle is centre only. Geometrically, from the Euclidian point of view, we cannot imagine such a kind of circle. How could the periphery, the circumference, also become the centre? Therefore, this centre which is the pre-big bang condition is as indescribable and enigmatic as the dark potential of the would-be creative process presented before us by the Nasadiya Sukta of the Rig Veda in the tenth book.
Surprising indeed is what comes out of this proposition. There was no space and time before the big bang took place; therefore, there was no distance of one thing from another. So, we have come from a distanceless point, which means to say even now, at this moment, when we appear to be far, far away at a distance of inconceivable light years of distance from that point, we are still sitting in that point only. We will be flabbergasted to think like this. Even at this moment, we are sitting at the very same point where we were before the big bang took place. If we go deep into this mystery, we will realise that creation is an illusion. Otherwise, how after millions of years of the developmental process of spatial expansion and incredible distance can we still be at the same point where we started? That means creation has not taken place. Even modern physics can confirm this, to its own chagrin, though creation is not its field of enquiry.
The first verse of Manusmritti says that there was a darkness prevailing everywhere. The pre-big bang condition was darkness, we may say, because there was no sunlight at that time. Solar light manifested itself as a concentration of energy subsequent to the occurrence of the big bang, whereas prior to the occurrence of this big bang, there was an all-pervading, equally distributed energy, without any excess of concentration anywhere. When energy is equally distributed, it will all be darkness only. There will be no light. If all the stars in all the solar systems everywhere get distributed in their heat and light throughout the cosmos, there will be no light.
So, there is a point in saying that before creation, it was darkness, but it was darkness due to the excess of light. It was not really darkness. The light potential was so much that it could manifest itself as millions of shining suns and galaxies afterwards. We are accustomed to perceivable light which can be visible to the eyes. If the eyes cannot catch a particular vibration, which we call light waves, we say there is no light. Even if there is light, the eyes cannot catch that frequency, if it is too high.
Vishvarupa was shown. Bhagavan Sri Krishna showed it several times. The splash of light was such that hundreds and thousands of suns were rising, as it were, blinding the eyes of all people, and they saw darkness everywhere. Why go so far? Gaze at the sun with open eyes for a second. This we should not do, of course, always. I am just mentioning this as an illustration. If we look at the sun, that brilliance impinges on the retina of the eyes; then afterwards, when we look anywhere, we will see only pitch dark. Dark spots of sun we will see. We will not see the light of the sun; we will see darkness. Even if we gaze at the sun for some time, the force of the energy waves impinging on the eyes will be so intense that the sun also may look like a darkness. So, our idea of darkness and light is sensorially oriented. Even if we behold the light of God, we will consider it as pitch darkness.
This is a little bit of comparison between the modern physical theory of the big bang and the indescribable, incredible consequences that follow from this wonderful discovery where the subsequent spatial expansion has not in any way contradicted the abolition of this distance, which was prior to the big bang, making out thereby that we have never been born at all. We are still there in the same place where we were before the big bang took place. Thus, it means that we are immortal. Neither were we born, nor can we die, because that centre cannot be born. The expanded universe is an illusory, indescribable, enigmatic phenomena which no human being can conceive. No human being can conceive it, because human beings are involved in the very process of this incredible manifestation."

[Aupmanyav]

No God for me, Hema, 'Nasadeeya' also says the same. Bindu suits better on the forehead of hindu women or men. Do not make physics mystical. Manusmriti is not very correct. If there was no darkness, there was no brightness either. There was no up or down. There was no existence or non-existence. All dualities were non-existent. Where would energy pervade, there was no space or time. Rest of what you quote is interesting and probably true. The answers are not available at the moment, may be in some future. Let us not jump to conclusions.

[Hema]

Originally Posted by Aupmanyav

Do not make physics mystical.

Please tell it to the Swamiji who wrote it.

Where would energy pervade, there was no space or time.

Since creation was being formed, obviously space and time would have come into existance.