The Geography of the Puranas c13.s1: General Character of Purāṇic Cosmology
The Geography of the Purāṇas c13.s1
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General Character of Purāṇic Cosmology
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In the Purāṇas the discussions on the difficult questions of cosmogony, cosmology and cosmography show keen and vivid thinking because they lie on the border between philosophy and theology. It appears at first that the Purāṇics were more interested in attempting to solve the insoluble mysteries of the Supreme Being and the Universe than they were in the world of Nature immediately surrounding them. The first sections of all the Purāṇas give an account of creation discussing all its aspects in full detail. During the period between the 5th and 13th centuries A.D., immense and weighty volumes were written as commentaries on the earlier account of Creation in the Sacred Books, in which complicated arguments were elaborated with the finesse of scholastic logic. In an age of faith, as the period under review was, the religious enthusiasm of the artisan-architect was transmuted into lofty and majestic temples while that of the theologian turned to the elucidation of the words of the Vedas. To analyse these words, to comment upon their minutest details, to reveal the meaning that presumably lay behind them, was not only a work of piety and devotion but an absorbing pastime for keen-witted thinkers. In the more concrete realism of natural science, this period is characterised by keen observation and creative thought but in matters of cosmogony and cosmography which were highly controversial and classical, opinions were either enthusiastically defended as casting light on the Vedas or else bitterly attacked as subversive of all truth. The Purāṇic concepts excel all previous and subsequent literature on these subjects.
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The Purāṇas deal with many problems, pertaining to cosmology, cosmography and cosmogony. Some of these are abstruse and metaphysical—questions of the nature of the Supreme Being and the nature of time and space. With these we are not concerned. Others are more concrete—questions of the materials out of which the Universe was made and the manner in which it was made.
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For the sake of clarity let us state some of these questions as follows:
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(a) The question of whether matter existed prior to the creation of the world, that is to say, whether the Universe was fashioned out of a pre-existing substance or if it was made out of nothing.
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(b) The question of the manner in which the Universe was fashioned after it had been created.
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(c) The problem of whether the Brahmā Day is an actual division of time or merely a hypothetical division of the process of Creation.
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The answers to these problems as given in the Purāṇas are elucidations or elaborations of the Vedic ideas. In fact, the Vedic ideas permeated through the ages the cosmology and cosmogony of the Persian, Greek, Jewish, Buddhist, Christian and Islamic Sacred literature. The cosmogony of the Vedas, which has a strong bearing on the Purāṇic views may be summarised as follows:
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(a) Artistic origin of the Universe;
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(b) Mechanical origin;
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(c) Instrumental origin; and
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(d) Philosophical origin.