Editing Religious cosmology (section)

===Hindu===
{{Main|Hindu cosmology}}
The Hindu cosmology, like the Buddhist and Jain cosmology, considers all existence as cyclic.<ref name="MichellDavies1989p37">{{cite book|author1=George Michell|author2=Philip H. Davies|title=The Penguin Guide to the Monuments of India: Buddhist, Jain, Hindu|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eqtNAAAAYAAJ |year=1989|publisher=Penguin |isbn=978-0-14-008144-2|page=37}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Sushil Mittal |author2=Gene Thursby | page = 284 | title = Hindu World | publisher = Routledge | date = 2012 | isbn=978-1-134-60875-1 }}</ref> With its ancient roots, Hindu texts propose and discuss numerous cosmological theories. Hindu culture accepts this diversity in cosmological ideas and has lacked a single mandatory view point even in its oldest known Vedic scriptures, the ''[[Rigveda]]''.<ref name="Lochtefeld2002p156">{{cite book|author=James G. Lochtefeld|title=The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Hinduism: A-M|url=https://archive.org/details/illustratedencyc0000loch|url-access=registration|year=2002|publisher=The Rosen Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-8239-3179-8|pages=156–157}}</ref> Alternate theories include a universe cyclically created and destroyed by god, or goddess, or no creator at all, or a golden egg or womb ([[Hiranyagarbha]]), or self-created multitude of universes with enormous lengths and time scales.<ref name="Lochtefeld2002p156"/><ref>{{cite book|author=Randall L. Nadeau|title=Asian Religions: A Cultural Perspective|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T0WcAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT137|year=2014|publisher=Wiley|isbn=978-1-118-47195-1|pages=133–137}}</ref><ref>Charles Lanman, [https://archive.org/stream/sacredbooksearly09hornuoft#page/48/mode/2up To the unknown god], Book X, Hymn 121, Rigveda, The Sacred Books of the East Volume IX: India and Brahmanism, Editor: [[Max Muller]], Oxford, pages 46–50</ref> The Vedic literature includes a number of cosmology speculations, one of which questions the origin of the cosmos and is called the [[Nasadiya sukta]]:
{{quote|
<poem>
Neither being (sat) nor non-being was as yet. What was concealed?
And where? And in whose protection? ... Who really knows?
Who can declare it? Whence was it born, and whence came this creation?
The devas (gods) were born later than this world's creation,
so who knows from where it came into existence? None can know from where
creation has arisen, and whether he has or has not produced it.
He who surveys it in the highest heavens,
He alone knows or perhaps He does not know.
</poem>
|''Rig Veda 10. 129''<ref>{{cite book|author=Kenneth Kramer|title=World Scriptures: An Introduction to Comparative Religions|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RzUAu-43W5oC&pg=PA34|date=January 1986|publisher=Paulist Press|isbn=978-0-8091-2781-8|pages=34–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=David Christian|title=Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7RdVmDjwTtQC&pg=PA18|date=1 September 2011|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-95067-2|pages=18–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Robert N. Bellah |title=Religion in Human Evolution |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qTDKxrLRzp8C |year=2011|publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-06309-9 |pages=510–511 }}</ref>}}

Time is conceptualized as a cyclic [[Yuga]] with trillions of years.<ref name="Chapman2002p8">{{cite book|author1=Graham Chapman|author2=Thackwray Driver|title=Timescales and Environmental Change|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=__2EAgAAQBAJ|year=2002|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-134-78754-8|pages=7–8}}</ref> In some models, [[Mount Meru]] plays a central role.<ref name="Rocher1986p124">{{cite book|author=Ludo Rocher|title=The Purāṇas|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n0-4RJh5FgoC|year=1986|publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag|isbn=978-3-447-02522-5|pages=123–125, 130–132}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=John E. Mitchiner|title=Traditions Of The Seven Rsis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=phGzVwTTp_gC |year=2000|publisher=Motilal Banarsidass |isbn=978-81-208-1324-3|pages=141–144}}</ref>

Beyond its creation, Hindu cosmology posits divergent theories on the structure of the universe, from being 3 lokas to 12 lokas (worlds) which play a part in its theories about rebirth, [[samsara]] and [[karma]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Deborah A. Soifer|title=The Myths of Narasimha and Vamana: Two Avatars in Cosmological Perspective|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OoFDK_sDGHwC&pg=PA51|year=1991|publisher=SUNY Press|isbn=978-0-7914-0799-8|page=51}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Roshen Dalal|title=Hinduism: An Alphabetical Guide |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DH0vmD8ghdMC&pg=PA83 |year=2010|publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=978-0-14-341421-6|page=83}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=John A. Grimes|title=A Concise Dictionary of Indian Philosophy: Sanskrit Terms Defined in English|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qcoUFYOX0bEC&pg=PA95 |year=1996|publisher=State University of New York Press|isbn=978-0-7914-3067-5|page=95}}</ref>

The complex cosmological speculations found in Hinduism and other [[Indian religions]], states Bolton, is not unique and are also found in Greek, Roman, Irish and Babylonian mythologies, where each age becomes more sinful and of suffering.<ref>{{cite book|author=Robert Bolton|title=The Order of the Ages: World History in the Light of a Universal Cosmogony |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=72ksMogzRvMC&pg=PA64 |year=2001|publisher=Sophia Perennis|isbn=978-0-900588-31-0|pages=64–78}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Donald Alexander Mackenzie|title=Mythology of the Babylonian People|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HTrXAAAAMAAJ |year=1915|publisher=Bracken Books|isbn=978-0-09-185145-3|pages=310–314}}</ref>