The mysterious Universe of the Vedas (Vedic Cosmology, new series #1)

#vedas #cosmology #universe #celestial

The first part of a new series on the Vedic Universe.

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The Vedas explain many topics, including the soul, metaphysics, God, and superior beings living in higher planetary systems. Most of these topics can't be proven or disproven by modern science since they are outside the realm of experimentation. One can make experiments only with things or beings that are lower than himself. One can freely experiment with inanimate matter or even with animals, but one can't experiment with beings that are more powerful than him. A researcher may experiment with rats and rabbits, but he can't make experiments with the president of the United States, for example. Unless he would agree to come and be experimented upon, the researcher would be baffled. Similarly, one can't make experiments with God: or he accepts the conditions set up by Him, or he will not get anything.

Science is based on experimentation and therefore is by design not an effective tool for getting knowledge about God, the soul, or higher beings, as well as subtler entities or higher levels of reality that are beyond our sense perception. These are topics that will always remain out of the reach of modern researchers. One may accept or not the Vedas, but the fact is that there is no other source that gives detailed knowledge about these topics. That's an area where the Vedas have a monopoly we can say.

There is however a part of Vedic knowledge that overlaps with modern science: cosmology. The Vedas give knowledge about the structure of the universe, as well as important historical events that can be proven or disproven by experimentation.

This is quite an interesting point because if it's proved that the cosmological knowledge of the Vedas is correct, this makes a very strong case that everything else in the Vedas is correct, including all the spiritual knowledge. However, if the cosmological knowledge from the Vedas can be disproved by modern science, this makes an equally strong case that everything else in the Vedas may be incorrect, and everything may be actually just a big fantasy.

The British in India did a very good job of discrediting the Puranas with their spurious translations and false propaganda, to the extent that even most Indians believe that the Puranas are just myths. As a result, other parts of the Vedas are also not taken seriously and people are deprived of the spiritual knowledge they contain. Once the Puranas are discredited, people automatically become skeptical about the knowledge from the Bhagavad-Gita and other books of spiritual knowledge.

The problem with the cosmology of the Puranas is that it offers a description of the world that is different from our sense perception. It's not easy to understand and even harder to harmonize with recent cosmological discoveries. Many read the 5th canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam and get under serious doubts.

I have been studying the Vedas, and especially the books of Srila Prabhupada since 1992, and the enigmatic descriptions of the Universe offered in the 5th canto of the Srimad Bhagavatam are a topic that always intrigued me. However, over the years I started to better understand it, helped by the research of Sadhaputra Prabhu, Drutakarma Prabhu, and many others.

This video is the first part of a new series where I will try to share what I learned about this topic over the years and try to offer simple and inclusive explanations of how to make sense of the cosmological knowledge of the Puranas. As a bonus we will study how modern science is actually corroborating the knowledge from the Srimad Bhagavatam, which is quite amazing, considering that the Puranas were written more than 5000 years ago.

How the sages of ancient times were able to give dates for the creation of the solar system, as well as the creation of the universe itself, also identifying precise dates to extinction events whose dates were discovered only recently by modern researchers is a question that modern scientists still have to answer.