History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c99.463

v7.c99.463

Cosmology · 1483-1529 (vide under 'Atomic theory'; 'Creation', 'God', 'Heaven and Earth', 'pralaya') : all Dharmaśāstra writers are agreed on the existence of God and rarely adduce arguments for that purpose, 1483; argument from design was present to the mind of the propounders of Vedānta 1485; Christian theologians have put forward various arguments for the existence of God, summarised by William James, which are mainly four 1483 and n, comparison of ancient Egyptian, Babylonian, Hebrew, Greek and Indian ideas on C. in 'Apes and Men' by H. Peak, 1502n; Grousset's observation on Indian scheme of creation and dissolution of the universe compared to Ionian ideas 1503-4; Gerald Heard's remarks about the helpfulness of Sanskrit cosmology as compared with Hebrew and Christian dogmas 1504; originally there was no atomic theory in C., but from 4th B. C. in Greece and from Kaṇāda, the founder of the Vaiśeṣika system in India, it began to prevail 1486; principal questions in C. are two and the whole conception of C. has been revolutionized by developments in Geology, Biology, Physics and Astronomy during about one hundred years, 1502n. whether in the Upaniṣads or later works C. is based on geocentric theory 1515; works on Vedic C. 1485-86n.