Charlotte Krause her Life and Literature

SR No.: 001785
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Shreeprakash Pandey
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith
Publication Year: 1999
Total Pages: 674
Language: English, Hindi, Gujarati
Classification: Book_English, Biography, & Articles
File Size: 11 MB

Page 51

Dr. Charlotte Krause : Her Life & Literature
of Leipzig has shown in his late epoch-making researches – the chief principle of the speculation of the earlier Upanişads, which connected all the various shapes of Agni to one entity, and derived them from a great cosmic fire which was thought to surround the world and to shine down on earth through the openings in the stonevault of the sky known as sun, moon and stars. The individual Agnis which were thought to form the chief principle of life, in the shape of the 'Jatharāgni' or stomach-fire, and of bodily warmth, were imagined to form part of that cosmic fire, i.e., to have sprung from it, and to return to it after death, to return to Heaven, beyond the stonevault, where, in an atmosphere of fire and light, the Devas were believed to live, with bodies consisting all of light and fire likewise. According to Prof. Hertel's imposing assumption, the cremation of the dead, as well as the burning of the sacrificial gifts would be nothing but attempts to make the things destined to go to Heaven, fit for an existence in that fiery atmosphere, by transmuting them into sire before hand.
Originally, the name of the cosmic fire was 'Brahma' or ‘Brih', and if the earlier Upanişads say that Brahmā and Ātmā are identical, then it means, according to Hertel, that the principle of life is one and the same in Microcosm and Macrocosm, and that it is nothing but that all-pervading combination of light and heat.
This grand old natural philosophy of the earlier parts of the Upanişads was afterwards forgotten, and all the passages referring to it, became, by and by, enigmata to following generations. People no longer knew the original meaning of 'Brahma', but began to speculate in order to find out and to deepen the sense of the sacred books of their ancestors. Thus, we find, in later parts of the Upanişads, the word 'Brahma' used with quite a different significance, viz., that of an attributeless, indefinite, indistinct principle of life which forms a strong contrast with the clearly defined concrete ‘Brahman' of old. With the attributeless Brahma, various new ideas and speculations found their way into the ancient scrip