Philosophy

Although Greek knowledge of India (initially mediated through Persia) dates back to the 6th-5th c. BCE, it was only with Alexander the Great’s Indian campaign (ca 330 BCE) that the Greeks came into direct contact with the Indian world, founding colonies and settling in Indian regions (especially in Bactria) as soldiers, settlers, diplomats, traders, and even rulers of kingdoms. The conspicuous presence of Greeks in India is attested by some of the edicts of Aśoka (3rd c. BCE). The main Greek sources on India include: historical and medical works, Attic tragedy, reports of Alexander’s officers and companions, and sources depicting the Indian philosophers called Gymnosophists. As an effect of language contact between Greeks and Indians, Ancient Greek incorporates a variety of Indian loanwords. Among them are words referring to “exotic” products ( péperi  ‘pepper’,  oríndēs  /  óruza  ‘rice’,  sákkhari(s)  /  sákkharon  /  sákkhar  ‘su...

I. Religious Studies Meditation  is a general term for different, variously contextualized methods of training consciousness that are found in various religions. The term itself originated in the Platonic/Neoplatonic Christian tradition (Platonism, Neoplatonism), where it means “intensively focused thought.” The works of Hugh and Richard of St. Victor as well as Bonaventura and J. de Gerson treat meditation as a stage in the progress of the spiritual life:  lectio  –  meditatio – ( oratio ) –  contemplatio  (see also II below). Another medieval analysis (explicit in Bonaventura) is the tripartite division into  purgatio  –  illluminatio  –  unio , which goes back to Dionysius Areopagita and the Neoplatonism on which he built. The meaning of the purification, spiritual enlightenment, or unification experienced in the various traditions differs diachronically and diatopically (con...

Philosophy as the Greek termed it the love for wisdom(sophia),a much talked about term but mostly considered as abstract and not concrete or useful for some Philosophy is about the experience of your own life the subjective truth as one evolves every day and transformed by the cold ,brutal harshness of phenomena which is transitory and impermanence Quest of this life would no doubt be about happiness for almost all, we aspire to be truly happy in whatever actions we do, be it love,making money, or carrying out any activity,the aspiration to success as defined by the world around us makes us feel as if our life is worthy and that judgement would denote as for most as sort of happiness But what if what one has build in life the source for one happines crashes like sand castles washed apart, swept apart by the tides of adversity, everything you once thought was a given, a thing which will never go away, now suddenly has vanished as if it was a mirage or illusion of sorts ,the happiness wh...

In ancient India, the elemental fire was mostly indissociable from the deified fire  Agni . Agni is likened to various animals in vedic metaphors (see below). These animals can be domesticated or wild, stressing the ambivalent nature of fire: fire is only temporarily tamed and threatens to run wild again, a trait that is prominently reflected in the myth of Agni’s hiding (see below). Agni’s trifunctional nature is revealed in his descriptions and in the prayers addressed to him. The hymns underscore in turn his (1) priestly, (2) warlike, and (3) domestic functions. By far, fire’s most striking symbolism is as the “spark of life.” The waters (sg.  ap ; pl.  āpas ) are Agni’s mothers from the  Ṛgveda   onward, and the  Mahābhārata  often depicts the generation of offspring by a pairing of the fiery seed with the female waters. Lastly, the motif of fire as a multiform of  gems , gold, seed, and  soma    is examined in various myth...