- Hinduism humbly points to the Unknown
There was no air, nor sky that is beyond it.
What was concealed? Wherein? In whose protection?
And was there deep unfathomable water?
Death then existed not nor life immortal;
Of neither night nor day was any token.
By its inherent force the One breathed windless:
No other thing than that beyond existed.
Darkness there was at first by darkness hidden;
Without distinctive marks, this all was water.
That which, becoming, by the void was covered,
That One by force of heat came into being.
Desire entered the One in the beginning:
It was the earliest seed, of thought the product.
The sages searching in their hearts with wisdom,
Found out the bond of being in non-being.
Their ray extended light across the darkness:
But was the One above or was it under?
Creative force was there, and fertile power:
Below was energy, above was impulse.
Who knows for certain? Who shall here declare it?
Whence was it born, and whence came this creation?
The gods were born after this world's creation:
Then who can know from whence it has arisen?
None knoweth whence creation has arisen;
And whether he has or has not produced it:
He who surveys it in the highest heaven,
He only knows, or haply he may know not.
~ The Rig Veda (Book 10, Hymn 129)
Man, was I surprised to come across this. Whoever came up with this sure does require a lot of respect. It's amazing to see how Hinduism turned out to be an outright creationism based one even after bluntly real insights like this from it's forerunners. May be there were multiple authors with contradicting views during different times when the vedas were compiled. But I sure like this guy :).. or maybe girl :P
Actually this can also be interpreted as may he might mean 'devtha' (devargal) when he says 'gods' and 'Indra' when he says 'he who surveys in highest heaven'.. but still what is important is all those question marks.. and the fact that he is leaving the ultimate question unanswered and open (clearly pointing to the 'unknown') than claiming to know the answer or filling that unknown pit with 'God'. I don't see this any different from one of my favorite Einsteinian quotes.
What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of "humility."
Humility is the keyword. May be itz just me, but i see the same "humility" ringing in the words of our ancient vedic buddy :)
P.S.
BTW, did you see how strikingly similar the depiction is to the Big Bang theory? And the theory that DNA came from some kind of primeval soup which was just another kind of protein with no life-like aspects.
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