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User:Visarga/Heraclitus and Kashmir Shaivism

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His philosophy mirrors the Kashmir Shaivism

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Heraclitus was a forerunner of Kashmir Shaivism (a monistic idealistic philosophy that had its maximum during 700-1100 A.D.). In different cultures, epochs and countries, both systems converged on the same ideas:

  • adherence to non-duality from the ultimate perspective
    • "to God all things are fair and good and just"
    • "the A is both A and not-A"
  • the consistence of the world is mental
    • he refers to "the thought by which all things are steered through all things"
  • God is both material cause (like "pots are made of clay") of efficient cause (like "pots are made by the potter")
  • he describes the objective(exterior) reality in a constant state of flux; similarly, K.S. describes the world as a product of continuous acts of creation and dissolution
    • "everything is in a state of flux"
    • "simultaneously it forms and dissolves"
  • the pratibimba (reflection) and bheda-abheda (duality-cum-nonduality) concepts
    • "one is made up of all things and all things issue from the one"
  • the world is made of a series of ever more subtle cattegories (tattvas) born one of the previous one
    • "the death of fire is the birth of air, and the death of air is the birth of water"
  • the K.S. theory of abhasa universe is seen as a series of instantaneous flashes
    • "each object must dissolve and be generated continually momentarily"
  • he perceived the nature in a mystical way, different from the common norm
    • quoted "nature likes to hide"
  • focus on "the word" (logos) as substrate is identical to the Kashmir Shaivism focus on paravak
  • Heraclitus seems to have been a mystic
    • he wandered the mountains ... making his diet of grass and herbs
  • he wrote philosophical texts just like the tantrics, encoding them so as not to be easy to read
    • Heraclitus wrote his book "rather unclearly" (asaphesteron) so that only the "capable" should attempt it
  • both philosohies are panentheistic