Journeys into Vedic Thought
Long-form, researched essays on the deities, language, ritual and history of the Rig Veda. All free to read.
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The Rigveda Has No Word for West
Sanskrit's ordinary word for west, paścimā, never appears in the Rigveda. Its poets located themselves with a different set of words: in front, behind, above, below, and the right hand. The result is a map of the world drawn from a standing body facing the sunrise.
The Sky That Does Not Fall: Astronomy and Cosmology in the Rigveda
Three thousand years before Newton, a Rigvedic poet looked up and asked why the sun, unbound and unsupported, does not fall out of the sky. This is what the oldest layer of Indian thought actually knew about measuring time, mapping the heavens, and where it all came from.
The Riddle at the Heart of the Veda: Dirghatamas and the Cosmic Enigmas of RV 1.164
A blind seer composed the longest hymn in the oldest book of the Rigveda: 52 verses of numerical riddles, cosmological metaphors, and unanswerable questions. What happens when you read them carefully?