INTERVIEW OF BRAHMÁ AND THE SUN.
Argument.—Brahmá intending to create the world, sees the orbs of light,
and invokes the luminous Sun.
Vasishtha continued:—I will relate to you Ráma, agreeably to your
request, the story that was narrated to me of old by Brahmá himself
(the personified mind of God and the lord of creatures). The _manas_ or
mind produced _Manu_—the progeny of the mind; who begat the _Manujas_
otherwise called _mánavas or manushyas_, or men—the offspring of the
mind.
2. I had asked the lotus-born god once before, to tell me how these
hosts of creation had come to being. (Vasishtha the offspring of Brahmá,
had his communion with his father—the first great patriarch of mankind).
3. Then Brahmá the great progenitor of men, granted my request,
and related to me the apologue of Aindava in his sonorous
voice. (The oracles of God were delivered in the loud noise of
thunders—_brihad-vachas_).
4. Brahmá said:—All this visible world is the manifestation of the
divine mind, like the circling whirl-pools and rippling curls of water
on the surface of the sea. (Referring to the revolutions of heavenly
bodies in the air).
5. Hear me tell you, said he, how I (the personified mind), awoke at
first on the day of creation in a former kalpa, with my volition to
create (expand) myself. (The volitive mind rose out of the sleeping
intelligence on the dawning day of creation).
6. Erewhile I remained alone, and quietly intent upon the One at the end
of the prior day (or Kalpa), by having compressed the whole creation in
the focus of my mind, and hid it under the gloom of the primeval night.
(Old chaos or darkness that reigned over the surface of the deep before
the dawn of light. _Tama ásit, tamaságúdhamagra._ There was darkness
enveloping all things. Sruti).
7. At the end of the chaotic night I awoke as from a deep sleep; and
performed my matins as it is the general law (of all living beings). I
oped my eyes with a view to create, and fixed my look on the vacuum all
about me.
(When that spirit sleeps it is night, and when it awakes, it is a day of
recreation (resurrection). Manu).
8. As far as I viewed, it was empty space and covered by darkness, and
there was no light of heaven. It was unlimitedly extensive, all void and
without any boundary. (Infinite space existed ere creation came into
existence. Sruti. All was _teom_ and _beom_ or _tama_ and _vyoma_).
9. Being then determined to bring forth the creation, I began to discern
the world in its simple (ideal) form within me, with the acuteness of my
understanding. (_i.e._ I looked into the prototypes or models of things
contained in the Mind).
10. I then beheld in my mind the great cosmos of creation, set
unobstructed and apart from me in the wide extended field of vacuity.
(The archetypes of our ideas, are the things existing out of us. Locke.
Our ideas though seen within us, form no part of ourselves or our
being).
11. Then the rays of my reflexion stretched out over them, from amidst
the lotus-cell of my abode, and sat in the form of ten lotus-born
Brahmás over the ten orbs (planets) of this world; like so many swans
brooding upon their eggs. (The spirit of God that dove-like sat,
brooding over the deep. Milton).
12. Then these separate orbs (mundane eggs), brought forth, to light
multitudes of beings, amidst their transparent aqueous atmospheres. (All
worlds girt by their covereles of watery ether or nebulous clouds,
teemed with productions of every kind).
13. Thence sprang the great rivers and the roaring seas and oceans; and
thence again rose the burning lights and blowing winds of the firmament.
(The atmospheric water is the source of all things).
14. The gods began to sport in the etherial air, and men moved about on
the earth, and demons and serpents were confined in their abodes
underneath the ground. (The gods are called _devas_ from their sporting
in the regions of light—_divideváh divyanti_. Men are _párthivas_ from
_prithví_ the earth, and demons are called infernal from their abode in
the _infrapátála_ or antipodes).
15. The wheel of time turns with the revolution of seasons and their
produce, and it adorns the earth with her various productions by change
of the seasons.
16. Laws were fixed for all things on all sides, and human actions were
regulated in the _smritis_ as right or wrong, and producing as their
fruits, the reward of heaven or the torments of hell. (And Brahmá
appointed to all beings their several laws. Manu. And there is no single
atom that goes beyond its appointed law—nature or _dharma_, which is an
attribute of the Great God).
17. All beings are in pursuit of their enjoyments and liberty, and the
more they strive for their desired objects, the better they thrive in
them. (The gloss makes the pursuit of earthly enjoyments to be the cause
of pain and hell, and that of liberation from them to be productive of
heavenly bliss).
18. In this way were the sevenfold worlds and continents, the septuple
oceans and the seven boundary mountains, brought to existence, and they
continue to exist until their final dissolution at the end of a _Kalpa_
period (which is determined by the _Kalpa_ or will of God).
19. The primeval darkness fled before light from the face of open lands,
and took its refuge in mountain caverns and hollow caves; it abides in
some places allied with light, as in the shady and sunny forest lands
and lawns.
20. The azure sky like a lake of blue lotuses, is haunted by fragments
of dark clouds, resembling swarms of black-bees on high; and the stars
twinkling in it, liken the yellow filaments of flowers shaken by the
winds.
21. The huge heaps of snow setting in the valleys of high hills,
resemble the lofty _simula_ trees beset by their pods of cotton.
22. The earth is encircled by the polar mountains serving as her
girdles, and the circles of the polar seas serving as her sounding
anklets and trinkets. She is girt by the polar darkness as by a blue
garment, and studded all about with gems, growing and glowing in the
bosoms of her rich and ample mines and seas.
(The lokáloka or polar mountain, is so called from its having eternal
light and night on either side, turned towards or beyond the solar
light).
23. The earth covered over by the garniture of her verdure, resembles a
lady sitting begirt by her robes; and having the produce of paddy for
her victuals; and the busy buzz of the world for her music.
24. The sky appears as a bride veiled under the sable mantle of night,
with the glittering chains of stars for her jewels. The season fruits
and flowers hanging in the air, resemble wreaths of lotuses about her
person.
25. The orbs of worlds appear as the beautiful fruits of pomegranates,
containing all their peoples in them, like the shining grains of
granites in the cells of those fruits.
26. The bright moon-beams stretching both above and below and all around
the three sides, appear as the white sacred thread, girding the world
above and below and all about; or as the stream of Gangá running in
three directions in the upper, lower and nether worlds.
27. The clouds dispersing on all sides with their glittering lightnings,
appear as the leaves and flowers of aerial forests, blown away by the
breezes on all sides.
28. But all these worlds with their lands and seas, their skies and all
their contents, are in reality as unreal as the visionary dreams; and as
delusive as the enchanted city of the Fairy land.
29. The gods and demons, men and serpents, that are seen in multitudes
in all worlds, are as bodies of buzzing gnats, fluttering about the
_dumbura_—fig trees. (Udumbara is the ficus religiosus—yajnadumbura or
sacred fig tree. It is by the orthographical figure aphaeresis or
elision of the initial, that _udumbara_ is made _dumbura, vulgo_).
30. Here time is moving on with his train of moments and minutes, his
ages, _yugas_ and _kalpas_, in expectation of the unforeseen destruction
of all things. (Time devours and destroys all things).
31. Having seen all these things in my pure and enlightened
understanding, I was quite confounded to think, whence could all these
have come into being. (The first inquiry into the cause and origin of
beings).
32. Why is it that I do not see with my visual organs, all that I
perceive, as a magic scene spread out in the sphere of my Mind?
33. Having looked into these for a long time with my steadfast
attention, I called to me the brightest sun of these luminous spheres
and addressed him saying:—(The first address of Brahmá to the sun,
corresponds with Adam’s address to that luminary. “Thou glorious sun
nature’s first born and the light and life &c.” Milton).
34. Approach to me, O god of gods, luminous sun! I welcome thee to me!
Having accosted him thus, I said:—
35. Tell me what thou art and how this world with all its bright orbs
came to being; if thou knowest aught of these, then please reveal it to
me.
36. Being thus addressed, he looked upon me, and then having recognized
me, he made his salutation, and uttered in graceful words and speech.
37. The sun replied:—Thou lord! art the eternal cause of these false
phenomena, how is it then that thou knowest it not, but askest me about
the cause thereof?
38. But shouldst thou, all knowing as thou art, take a delight in
hearing my speech, I will tell thee of my unasked and unthought of
production, which I beg thee to attend to.
39. O great Spirit! this world being composed of reality and unreality
in its twofold view, beguiles the understanding to take it sometimes for
a real and at others for an unreal thing. It is the great mind of the
Divine Soul, that is thus employed in these incessant and unceasingly
endless creations for its diversion. (The soul is the animating power,
and the mind is the principle of action. Metaphysically, the soul is an
individual name; the mind is a generic term or genus. The soul is
opposed to body, the mind to matter. The soul is the principle of
animation, the mind of volition. The soul is the mind of a certain
being, the mind is the soul without its personality).