View Single Post
Old 09-21-2011, 08:43 PM   #35
eduptultyt

Join Date
Oct 2005
Posts
548
Senior Member
Default
Rigveda does not show the monistic (Ekadeiva - only one Godhead behind everything) concept. That seems to me to be a later adoption, most probably when knowledge about the abrahamic religions reached our brahmins in the ancient days through traders etc., from the present day Gulf countries, Turkey, etc., as also from the zoroastrians through the North-West land route across the Hindu kush. Once the idea reached us, the early Upanishads - specially Brihadaaranyaka, discussions on Brahman, the later Upanishads, etc., started and culminated in what is now vedanta. In order to suit our convenience some riks like "Ekam sad vipraah bahudhaa vadanti" etc., were extracted out of context and tomtomed to make an impression that the much later one-Reality concept was already in the earliest of the vedas, imo.

But I will like to be corrected if my impression is wrong, based on scriptural internal evidence.
I cant believe you are serious about the high-lighted portion of the message. For a person who had started/contributed to the thread "let us famililarise ourselves with rig veda", for a person who translated some portion of brihad-aranyaka upanishad (BU) and for a person who drew attention to Apasthamba sutras (AS), I feel you surely know the antiquity of BU vis-a-viz. abrahmic religions. AS is dated by historians to 200-600 BC and as per Mr. Michael Witzel, BU is one of the oldest upanishads. The general opinion of historians is that sutra period succeeded Brahmanam/upaniSad period (the major 10/11 upaniSads commented by vedantins and not the ever-mushrooming newer upaniSads).

As regards influence of zoroastrians through NW land route, I feel, you know more than anyone else in this forum, that the fall of "varuNa worship" indicates complete branching out of Indian and Iranian tribe/people and the waning influence of "Zend Avesta".

I suppose you mean Islam and Christianity by abrahamic religions, and if you mean some other religion, my reply is not relevant.
eduptultyt is offline


 

All times are GMT +1. The time now is 03:48 AM.
Copyright ©2000 - 2012, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Design & Developed by Amodity.com
Copyright© Amodity