Free Will in the Ancient Sanskrit Texts

[Locutus]

The question of Free Will has challenged the best minds throughout human history. In the ancient Sanskrit texts Free Will is an enigma, a veiled mystery bewildering to most westerners. The Bhagavad Gita is the brilliant essence of the earlier texts, and even directly quotes various Upanishads. The final Chapter XVIII in the Bhagavad Gita is a summation of the others and verse 61 contains the Sanskrit term yantrarudhana, which is often translated as ‘mounted on a machine’.

The Lord of all beings abides in the Heart,
Causing all beings to wander, to move (to revolve),
[As if] fixed, attached to, mounted on a machine,
By the power of Illusion (maya).
​

The graphic, apparently holographic image of the yantrarudhana has always fascinated me. Over the years again and again I find myself reflecting on this metaphysical construct, the invisible cosmic machine-mechanism, which enfolds us in this temporal illusory holographic universe. In my mind I have often connected the yantrarudhana with the famous elusive Sri Yantra, that one can meditate on and never quite grasp.


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Free Will in the Ancient Sanskrit Texts - Waking Times

 

[darkbeaver]

Interesting read, I agree with the theme, our free will is limited to begin with and frantic flipping through pages on the web is debilitating.

 

[L Gilbert]

Mythology is fascinating sometimes, yes.

 

[darkbeaver]

Mythology is science.

 

[L Gilbert]

Mythology is science.

Quite right. It's included in the science of cultural anthropology.

 

[petros]

And climate scientists.

 

[darkbeaver]

And climate scientists.

zoology I think

 

[L Gilbert]

And climate scientists.

Anything to sidetrack a topic.

 

[darkbeaver]

Quite right. It's included in the science of cultural anthropology.

Lester the ancients attempted to explain their world with natural science all of based on observation and reason. Science is an ancient art even though you insist it is a modern development. These same people invented the wheel, the lever the screw paper medicine geometry, so you can belittle the ancestral scientists all you want but you do it standing on their shoulders and no other way.

 

[L Gilbert]

Lester the ancients attempted to explain their world with natural science all of based on observation and reason.

I have no problem with that. It's the idiotic interpretations of the observations that are ridiculous by modern standards.

Science is an ancient art even though you insist it is a modern development.

I have never insisted such a thing. "Ancient" and "modern" are relative terms anyways.

These same people invented the wheel, the lever the screw paper medicine geometry, so you can belittle the ancestral scientists all you want but you do it standing on their shoulders and no other way.

Any such behavior by me is only in your head. I'd never belittle any real scientist, whatever period of time in which they existed. So please, quit fabricating things about me.