Once upon a time, so the tale begins...
Picture the situation, the beginning of it all: no thing there, not even time and space. Got the picture? Well then, the picture you have is wrong, forget it: not even nothing existed - it can't be pictured, there was no canvas. Until there arose Brahman, who appeared and thought 'what the?'. Just try to suspend your disbelief for a moment. You can call it Brahman, or God, or, in the religion of science, a Singularity. (In the theory of the Big Bang, I understand, major leaps of faith surrounding the singularity - what it was, what preceded it, etc. - are necessary. In a fairy tale we need a proper name for such a thing...). And it was aware of absolutely nothing but awareness itself. And after some infinite spans of not-time elapsed, it became aware of boredom. That's right, this Brahman dude was bored, all alone with less than nothing to do.
So it turns into a thought - how, out of what, you might wonder? Out of no-nothingness, that's what (remember the disbelief suspension thing) - and the thought becomes time, and it becomes space. And this Brahman character is, like, woah dude, this is cool - time and space - he feels vast. After several more infinite eons pass, he gets bored again. Yes, time and space - we're talking infinite time and space no less (though these infinities kind of wrap in on themselves) - these are pretty cool to get lost in. I mean, heads to this very day can't quite wrap their minds around these - time and space - no matter how many hallucinogenic substances they ingest.
Eons pass again when bored Brahman suddenly has another incredible insight, and BAM, he turns into matter and energy. Within seconds he grows to galactic proportions, with infinite energy shooting around in all its spectra of radiation. Pushing pushing into the darkness it goes. In fact, creating the very concept of darkness as it expands. More eons pass, and Brahman has experienced about enough of being gamma rays, photons, x-rays, electrons, quarks, gluons, stars, comets, asteroids, galaxies, quasars, black holes, supernovas, etc. He starts to, like, fall asleep in the back of a physics lecture. (Perhaps you can relate to such a sleepy state of mind right now...)
Luckily, he has a really cool daydream: planets. He wakes up and finds himself becoming a vast array of the humongous spheres. These are really cool - they'd come spinning out of stars (another great idea), and collide with other cosmic flotsam. Occasionally they'd split apart, maybe merge back together. Brahman is having the time of his life, doing the mashed planet, it goes like this. But alas, after some billions of years, even this grows tedious.
So Brahman brings his attention to one of these planet spheres he is now comprised of. There are probably other special ones, but let's imagine he focuses on one in particular. Like if you have a pimple, you are 15, are going to the dance tonight, and all you can think about is how to make it go away. Or your favorite book you keep coming back to read, say, The Count of Monte Cristo. Sure, you know how it ends, but still, each time there is something new. (And why do the good guy and bad guy's names both begin with Dan? What's with Dan?)
Well, he doesn't know how this particular planet will turn out. He doesn't know about any of them. And imagine, being all these different planets and stuff is really hard to keep track of, he kind of zones out or drifts off from time to time, and almost forgets what is happening. Like maybe his 'planet x' (aka Alison - hey you in back there, wake up!), forgets that her biggest moon had just settled into orbit maybe a billion years earlier. And that it is actually composed of the same cosmic stardust; Brahman kind of forgets some of the details. In fact, the further he gets from his first big idea - remember the BAM - the less he can easily remember.
So he brings his concentration to one particular planet in a galaxy he notices one day. It's as if he's admiring himself in a mirror, kind of looking along the galaxy edge - like it was a big pizza crust - all the stars lining up like a dense white cloud. It made him think of something he hadn't ever seen - a premonition of sorts - it looked a little like milk. Way like milk. (Ba dump bump.) Some day he might become a she-goat, and feed some kids, and spill some milk. (But we are getting ahead of things here.)
He feels the draw of this particular planet in the milky galaxy, like I said, and brings his full attention to it. Was it something I ate? he might think. Or, what is that bump on my back, could you tell me what it is, hon', I can't quite see it in the mirror? Well, the more he probes and prods, the more fascinated he becomes, imagining all the things he could turn into on this planet. There are all kinds of different atoms and elements he'd managed to become and gather together in this one place. He discovers that if he turns into two little hydrogens they would want to stick to one big oxygen atom. And man, this is a blast - he does it a gazillion times, then a gazillion more. Sometimes this combo gets cold and hard, sometimes cold and soft and fluffy, and sometimes all hot and steamy; but when his temperature is just right - a very narrow band of temperatures would do this - he gets all swishy and flows all over his planet self. Way cool. He does that a bunch. Till he is blue in the face.
But of course it gets old. What next he asks? This is pretty excellent, but I'm getting kind of tired having to think up new stuff to do all the time. His next idea is a real breakthrough, a game changer: in fact, it actually is a game - hide and seek! He thinks, what would happen if I let go and pretend I'm not really all this one big pulsing mass of energy and matter? What if I just hide? And little by little he does just that. But deep deep down, if he ever really wants to, he can remember what he is: everywhere and everything.
And gradually, the nitrogen, carbon, phosphorous, and some other elements start to mix around - as if by themselves, as if they are independent of Brahman. An amino acid - guanine - says "look at me!" Cytosine and adenine lock arms and counter, "big deal, look at us!" (Just a reminder from Biology 101, these are the building blocks of DNA). Things are really cooking now, and it isn't long - maybe a billion years or so - before single celled organisms are swimming around, multiplying, and eating each other up. These are Brahman's primordial soup and salad days. Warm and cozy, plenty to eat. And man, the free love! (Oops, this is supposed to be g-rated). But also plenty to get eaten by. Getting lost ever deeper in the game of hide and seek. Now picture the first flora, and fauna; the first swimmer, and walker, etc.
***
Fast forward some billions of years, and you can see how far we have gotten into this game. Right now, for example, you are sitting and reading some words on this computer screen (having made it well past the average reader who probably gave up after three paragraphs...the blogosphere is so unedited, it's embarrassing!); your fingers seem to be your one point of contact via the mouse to these words. You kind of ignore the floor beneath supporting your chair, and the desk; or the air flowing in and out of your lungs, occasionally steaming up the screen - oops, fell asleep again!; or the power from the sun pulsing through you, beating your heart, and powering the computer. And these are just a few examples of macroscopic overlap. The warp and woof of microscopic and subatomic interconnections are utterly mind expanding. There truly is no empirical point, or line, of separation - anywhere. Everywhere you can think, there is connection. But we can pretend to sever these connections as we tinker, organize, manipulate, create, and destroy: in our frenetic game of hide and seek. But wait, you might say, look at all the cool stuff 'we' can make! What power, 'our' science! True, yes, some amazing fun and games.
But also look how far we've gotten lost: some of us even believe very fervently - zealously, fanatically even - that god is 'up there,' or 'out there,' or inside of 'us.' That is, some entity other than what we see/feel/taste/think/sing/digest/etc. And some few extremists are so deeply mired in this game of hide and seek, they are willing to kill and die in the name of these external gods, created in their own images! Oh what a fix we can get in, the further we get lost in this game. A game at times buoyant and effervescent, at others miasmic, poisonous.
As with all religious doctrines, one could get lost in this Hindu one - and many do - spinning all sorts of anthropomorphic tales. And even weave in some sort of morality, or karma: e.g., Brahman doesn't enjoy the act of killing life so much as creating it. But the game continues to play itself out regardless. And all of our self- and group-justifications for the 'good' and 'evil' roles we play are like so much papier-mâché. But onward we pursue these roles, and onward we must: it was coded into the fabric of our being from the moment we - that is, the universe, or Brahman, took its first breath.
But this 'impartial' observer (hah, as if! Brahman chortles...), sees a world in which war and strife find their fiercest advocates in faith traditions which divide the concept of god from the self. In other words, dualism: god above, flock below. Witness the crusades - Christian v. Muslim v. Jew - and their legacy which continues to this very day.
Another 'impartial' observer (hah! again, good one!), might see little difference between this concept of god - or Brahman, or the universe, or everything - that it's one unified pulsing mass of seemingly differentiated entities: that this concept of unity, or everything is God, is at the end of the day no different from atheism; that perhaps there is no god. All god, no god - what's the difference? On one level maybe precious little difference; but with an ounce of belief suspension, I think they are quite a bit different. When I'm asked if I believe in god, my answer (in question form): does a fish believe in water? I think to leave god entirely out of the equation, even more than just removing it from the self (as in dualism), kind of leaves the world a bit stark. I think it's fun to put god in completely, make it the very essence of everything. I-god, you-god, we all-god: for god's sake!
And in my humble opinion, looking up at the stars on a clear night, or at a particularly beautiful sunset, or a violent lightning storm, or any moment that feels very big: I have a choice, that is, we all do, we can feel very small compared to the vast and capricious universe, or we have the option to feel it is all us, right here and now and forever.
I can't know for sure, so I'll go with agnosticism for now. And meanwhile jump back in, keep playing the game - hoping my 'good' roles outnumber my 'evil' ones - till I hear the roar: alle alle oxen free! And hearing this, return to the source - the thing that has been seeking and finding and losing me again all these 49 years of homo sapienism - Brahman.
Aaaaaaaahmeeeeeen!
