About the book (Download e-copy)
BEFORE THE BEGINNING AND AFTER THE END is a product of dedicated and prolonged research by the author into the ancient insights of India's seer-scientists. It attempts to bring to light their wisdom as encapsulated in the Vedas. As the title suggests, its contents discuss forces and factors that are beyond the universe of modern physics.
Collectively known as the Veda Shastra, this treasure-house of knowledge consists of four principal and six auxiliary texts. These comprise an effective tool for exploring the fundamental mysteries of our universe. Using rigorous methods of examination and evaluation, the Vedas provide us with answers to such questions as: how did the cosmos originate and what is its future? Of what is it made? Who is the individual self, and what is its place in the universe?
Over several centuries, Western (and, to a lesser extent, Indian) scholars have perverted the true meaning and message of the Vedas. Mistranslation and distortion of these texts occurred for a variety of reasons, from inadequate scholarship to political expediency, with the inevitable and tragic result that the lessons learned some three thousand years before Christ was born have largely been obscured.
The Vedas are no mere exertion in metaphysics, philosophy or spirituality. They were composed by a number of 'seer-scientists' or scientific philosophers, who placed every theory and hypothesis in the uncompromising spotlight of their impeccable powers of logic and reason. They recorded their discoveries in the precise and highly evolved Sanskrit language and pioneered various scientific disciplines, such as medicine, architecture, astronomy, linguistics, statecraft and economy, social engineering, jurisprudence, psychology and the arts.
To investigate the Vedas fully is a lifetime's work for someone possessed of a superior intelligence.
This book of necessity is a brief exploration of Vedic knowledge, written in the hope that the essence of this fount of wisdom may be conveyed to the reader in an unadulterated form.
CONTENTS
Author's note on Transliteration and pronunciation
Pronunciation Guide for Sanskrit words used in the text
Section One
Introduction
Section Two
INTRODUCING VEDA AND THE VEDAS
Chapter One: The Vedas: A Prologue
Section Three
BEYOND THE UNIVERSE OF PHYSICS
Chapter Two: Beginning the journey
Chapter Three: Prajapati: The first individual
Chapter Four: Jeeva, Ishwara and Parmeshwara
Chapter Five: Yajnya: Meaning and significance
Chapter Six: Who is the `I`?
Chapter Seven: The Universe: Inside and outside
Chaper Eight: Inside the Supraphysical Universe
Chapter Nine: The Space-Time continuum
Section Four
Chapter Ten: God, Gods and Goddesses
Chapter Eleven: Pure intelligence and Absolute Consciousness
Chapter Twelve: Vishnu and His one thousand names
Chapter Thirteen: Inra and Vishnu: Two warring `Gods`.
Section Five
VEDIC INSIGHTS AND THEIR PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
Chaper Fourteen: Harnessing our untapped potential: Retraining Body, Mind and Intellect
Chapter Fifteen: Ayurveda: The science of health and longevity
Section Six
TOOLS OF LEARNING
Chapter Sixteen: Definitions, concepts and metaphors
Chapter Seventeen: Word and meaning: The importance of grammar in the study of the Vedas
Chapter Eighteen: Language and the Seer-scientists of the Vedas
Chapter Nineteen: Method of Analysis
Section Seven
DISTORTION OF MEANING
Chapter Twenty: The Vedas: Distortion and misrepresentation
Section Eight
BEFORE THE BEGINNING AND AFTER THE END
Reflections
Section Nine
APPENDICES
Appendix One
Excerpts from Vedic Aryans and the origin of civilisation: A literary and scientific perspective by Navaratna S Rajaram and David Frawley
Appendix Two
Isaac Asimov's short story, The Feeling of Power (courtesy: www.archive.org)
Glossary
Bibliography
About the author
Index
----------
Publisher: Rupa & Co (2000)
(Download the book)
