Thought 25: Were ancient Indians aware of BIG BANG theory?

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Big bang theory is the most widely accepted scientific theory about how our universe emerged 13.7 billion years ago. Though there is not much of empirical evidence about this theory yet, except for mathematical derivations, it is most likely to be true. This theory was propounded in the late 1940s and refined in the past few decades.

But what is amazing is that there are seemingly similar descriptions of the origins of the universe, in the more than 5000-year-old Vedas. – the most ancient scriptures of India. In this talk, I will briefly touch upon one such description.

Thought 24: Is Kundalini meditation a myth?

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Almost all the meditation practices that are propagated today are based on the idea of Kundalini and associated Chakras. The concept of Kundalini is so popular that one has to think twice before calling it as a myth 😉 It can be viewed as blasphemous!

I had discussed earlier how one of the well-known Gurus of our times, namely Swami Dayananda Saraswati, brushes aside Kundalini based meditation as “not meditation”.

Let me look at this practice a bit more in depth before sharing the views of some of the well-known Yogis of our times, on this idea.

Thought 23: What does Patanjali say about Meditation?

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Patanjali is normally credited with laying out a formal base for Yoga or meditation. The meditation talked about by Patanjali seems to be a reframing of early Buddhist meditative practices in the light of Upanishadic meditation, and under the strong logical framework of Samkhya. What does Patanjali say about meditation?

Thought 22: Upanishadic Meditation

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Once, one of my readers surprised me by saying that Upanishads never talk about meditation! Probably he was watching a bit too many of the videos by the Advaiti Swami that I talked about, a few episodes ago 😉 That Swami sometimes says that meditation is only an aid to move on the path of enquiry or Jnyana Marg; and as such, meditation cannot lead to ultimate realization. We have already discussed about this earlier, when I talked about that swami.

Is it then true that Upanishads don’t talk about meditation?