Connected thread
Indian Thought
Follow one idea across essays, questions and time.
01 in this thread
When machines become oracles
I built an astrology engine and refused to call its outputs predictions. Modern AI raises the same question about what a model can actually see.
02 in this thread
The Layered Birth of Gods
One temple accepts only flowers; another remembers blood. Read those differences as fossils rather than local flavour, and the gods start to look assembled.
03 in this thread
The Lord of the Hills and the Clay of the Desert
A terracotta goddess excavated at Ur around 1800 BCE looks unmistakably like Venkateshwara. Coincidence, or a shared grammar for picturing the divine?
04 in this thread
Age of the Shiva Tandava Stotra
The hymn is credited to Ravana, but its metre, vocabulary and imagery point somewhere else entirely: eighth-century Rashtrakuta India.
05 in this thread
Why India created so many spiritual systems, and kept them all
Ritual, self-knowledge, mantra, yoga, devotion: India kept adding paths without discarding the old ones. Why the contradictions were allowed to stand.
06 in this thread
Tracing the origins of Srāddha
The gods are offered svāhā; the ancestors, svadhā. Following one difference in wording back through the Brāhmaṇas to the root of a rite for the dead.
07 in this thread
The Many Faces of Indian Gods: A Historical Story
In the Rigveda the gods have no faces, only fire, storm and wind. How Indian divinity travelled from poetic metaphor into carved, worshipable stone.
08 in this thread
The Timeless Evolution of Shiva
Ascetic, dancer, destroyer. Shiva was not born whole: he accumulated, absorbing a wild forest power, a storm god and a yogi across four thousand years.
09 in this thread
The Journey of Indian Spirituality, Part 2
By 500 CE the Vedic sacrifice had argued itself into abstraction. Part two follows what rose in its place: Buddhism, bhakti, and a god you could love.
10 in this thread
The Rise of Vishnu and Fall of Indra
Religion and nature were deeply intertwined in ancient India, with gods representing powerful forces influencing daily life.
11 in this thread
The Journey of Indian Spirituality, Part 1
In the ancient world, early humans looked up at the vast sky, gazed at the mighty rivers, and stood in awe of the towering mountains.
12 in this thread
Evolution of Faith - From Rituals to Religion
As human societies evolved, so did their understanding of the world around them. What began assimple rituals to appease the forces of naturegradually transformed into more structured belief systems.
13 in this thread
From Primal Fear to Divine Symphony
Thousands of years ago, when humanity was still confined to the dense, untamed forests, the Earth endured a brutal summer. The relentless heat from the sun scorched the land, leaving it parched and lifeless.
14 in this thread
Material Minds: Charvaka to Naturalism
Exploring the mysteries of life and the world around us has always intrigued humans. From ancient times to the present day, different ideas have blossomed to explain what we see and experience.
15 in this thread
Deities to Divas: Tracing India’s Continuous Thread of Fandom
The fervour of the Bhakti era and the fervour around a film star may be the same impulse wearing different clothes. India has never stopped making devotees.
16 in this thread
The Tale of Two Transcendent Realities
In an ancient land where sages roamed and seekers of truth meditated under banyan trees, two profound philosophical ideas sprouted from the soil of contemplation: Purusha from Sām̊khya and Brahman from Advaita Vedanta.
17 in this thread
Madhava’s Quest: The Journey of Self-Realization
Long, long ago, there lived a young student named Madhava in a small village. He was brimming with curiosity and a thirst to understand the ultimate reality.