The traditional music of India, the raga, is melodic in relation to a fundamental tone. Western music is harmonic, that is, simultaneous and complex. In the West, much thinking takes place in terms of structures; for a time, there was much talk of structuralist and poststructuralist thought. Complex systems are found everywhere: in philosophy, in canonical texts and systems of images, in technology and models that explain the world. One essential underlying idea is atomistic thinking. The idea is that…
Yesterday I followed something in my mind that I find difficult to describe. In everyday language, I might say I followed my intuition. But it is a little more complex. I drove to Tiruvannamalai again. It was the last day of the Karthigai Deepam Brahmotsavam Festival. So on December 6, 2022, a fire was created on this mountain, as it has been for 2500 years. Of course there is a story from prehistoric times about this. Brahman, the universal Self,…
I remember that ever since childhood I have always stared into the fire in the fireplace. Many do this, I think. There is something fascinating about fire. In the Vedas, Agni is the god of fire, one of the 5 elements alongside water, air, earth and ether. These elements exist among the Greeks too. For a very long time I did not understand this and found it ‘unscientific’. I thought of the elements from the perspective of physics and chemistry,…
In 2017 we were in Varanasi. Varanasi is the spiritual center of Hinduism. Whoever is cremated here in the fires that Shiva lit 2,500 years ago and that have been burning ever since is freed from the cycle of suffering.
