- Title Pages
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on contributors
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The common origin approach to comparing Indian and Greek philosophy
- 2 The concept of <i>ṛtá</i> in the <i>Ṛgveda</i>
- 3 <i>Harmonia</i> and <i>ṛtá</i>
- 4 <i>Ātman</i> and its transition to worldly existence
- 5 Cosmology, <i>psyche</i> and <i>ātman</i> in the <i>Timaeus</i>, the <i>Ṛgveda</i> and the <i>Upaniṣads</i>
- 6 Plato and yoga
- 7 Technologies of self-immortalisation in ancient Greece and early India
- 8 Does the concept of <i>theōria</i> fit the beginning of Indian thought?
- 9 Self or <i>being</i> without boundaries: on Śaṅkara and Parmenides
- 10 Soul chariots in Indian and Greek thought: polygenesis or diffusion?
- 11 ‘Master the chariot, master your Self’: comparing chariot metaphors as hermeneutics for mind, self and liberation in ancient Greek and Indian sources
- 12 New riders, old chariots: poetics and comparative philosophy
- 13 The interiorisation of ritual in India and Greece
- 14 Rebirth and ‘ethicisation’ in Greek and South Asian thought
- 15 On affirmation, rejection and accommodation of the world in Greek and Indian religion
- 16 The justice of the Indians
- 17 Nietzsche on Greek and Indian philosophy
- Bibliography
- Index
Cosmology, psyche and ātman in the Timaeus, the Ṛgveda and the Upaniṣads
Cosmology, psyche and ātman in the Timaeus, the Ṛgveda and the Upaniṣads
- Chapter:
- (p.71) 5 Cosmology, psyche and ātman in the Timaeus, the Ṛgveda and the Upaniṣads
- Source:
- Universe and Inner Self in Early Indian and Early Greek Thought
- Author(s):
Hyun Höchsmann
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
This chapter compares the Rgveda, the early Upanishads, and Plato's Timaeus for their conception of the universe, the inner self, and the relation between them. All three texts envisage the universe as a hierarchically organised system in which order (rta in the Rgveda) prevails. But only in the Timaeus is there the motivation to create a cosmos endowed with beauty and goodness. Only in the Timaeus and the Upanishads is cosmology a prerequisite for self-knowledge and ethics, and both texts lay the foundations for moral realism, the belief in the objective validity of moral values.
Keywords: Rgveda, Plato Timaeus, Upanishads, Universe, Atman, Psyche, Moral realism
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- Title Pages
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on contributors
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The common origin approach to comparing Indian and Greek philosophy
- 2 The concept of <i>ṛtá</i> in the <i>Ṛgveda</i>
- 3 <i>Harmonia</i> and <i>ṛtá</i>
- 4 <i>Ātman</i> and its transition to worldly existence
- 5 Cosmology, <i>psyche</i> and <i>ātman</i> in the <i>Timaeus</i>, the <i>Ṛgveda</i> and the <i>Upaniṣads</i>
- 6 Plato and yoga
- 7 Technologies of self-immortalisation in ancient Greece and early India
- 8 Does the concept of <i>theōria</i> fit the beginning of Indian thought?
- 9 Self or <i>being</i> without boundaries: on Śaṅkara and Parmenides
- 10 Soul chariots in Indian and Greek thought: polygenesis or diffusion?
- 11 ‘Master the chariot, master your Self’: comparing chariot metaphors as hermeneutics for mind, self and liberation in ancient Greek and Indian sources
- 12 New riders, old chariots: poetics and comparative philosophy
- 13 The interiorisation of ritual in India and Greece
- 14 Rebirth and ‘ethicisation’ in Greek and South Asian thought
- 15 On affirmation, rejection and accommodation of the world in Greek and Indian religion
- 16 The justice of the Indians
- 17 Nietzsche on Greek and Indian philosophy
- Bibliography
- Index
