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Wellsprings
hindu-cosmosfeatured in 1 work

Tattva 36 — Earth (Pṛthivī)

Solid earth: the densest element and the very bottom of the map — consciousness at its most contracted.

Pṛthivī is the gross element of earth — the densest and most solid of the five great elements, the principle of firmness, weight, and stability, carrying the quality of smell. It is the very bottom of the thirty-six-fold map: the most contracted, most 'externalized' point of the whole descent from pure consciousness. From the heights of undivided Śiva down to solid earth, the entire universe is, for Kashmir Shaivism, one consciousness appearing as all these levels.

How it traveled

  1. Vaiśeṣika-sūtra
    Kāśī (Varanasi) · -150
    explains

Key passages(12)

Vaiśeṣika-sūtra · Kaṇāda

Very high

Tantrasāra · Abhinavagupta

High

Paramārthasāra · Abhinavagupta

High

Tarka-saṃgraha · Annaṃbhaṭṭa

High

Chāndogya Upaniṣad · Vedic Revelation (śruti)

High

That Gâyatrî is also the earth, for everything that here exists rests on the earth, and does not go beyond.

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Praśna Upaniṣad · Vedic Revelation (śruti)

High

He replied: "The ether is that god, the wind, fire, water, earth, speech, mind, eye, and ear. These, when they have manifested (their power), contend and say: We (each of us) support this body and kee

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Tarka-saṃgraha · Annaṃbhaṭṭa

High

Vaiśeṣika-sūtra · Kaṇāda

High

Upadeśasāhasrī · Ādi Śaṅkara

Moderate

Bhagavad-gītā · Vyāsa (Yoga-bhāṣya commentator)

Moderate

Bhumi (earth), Ap (water), Anala (fire), Vâyu (air), Kha (ether), mind, intellect, and egoism: thus is My Prakriti divided eight-fold.

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Paramārthasāra · Abhinavagupta

Moderate

Praśna Upaniṣad · Vedic Revelation (śruti)

Moderate

The earth and its subtile elements, the water and its subtile elements, the light and its subtile elements, the air and its subtile elements, the ether and its subtile elements; the eye and what can b

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