Relativity in Hinduism

It has been claimed by many that the bases of the Einstein’s theory of relativity is present in the ancient eastern mysticism. Even it has been pointed out that Albers Einstein was very proficient in the ancient language of the Hindus, the divine language ‘Sanskrit’ and Einstein had read many Hindu scriptures and he used to converse in ‘Sanskrit’ language with the Hindu scholars when they happen to meet him.

The ‘relativity’ concept of the Einstein, in fact is present in many Hindu scriptures. In this article I am going to present one among them and the rest will be discussed later on. This discussion is limited only to the relativity of time, the core concept in the special relativity of Einstein.

According to the Hinduism, the ‘Saivism’ in particular, the Universe is represented as the lord ‘Shiva’. The worship of lord ‘Shiva’ takes TWO forms, one is the formless ‘Shiva-ling’ and the other one is the ‘Nataraj’, the dancing idol of Shiva. The ‘Nataraj’ idol is the representation of the dancing [changing] universe and the other form represents the more advanced, the changeless form, the deeper form, the invisible.

Now, the ‘Nataraj’ idol, is the snap shot of the dance of the God, lord Shiva. This ‘god’ has many snakes [sarpa] or the king cobras, as ornaments on his body, specifically after or at the body joints.

Another point is that, in the Hindu mythology the snake represents many things, ‘time’ being one such representation of it.

So, the lord Shiva having snakes all over his body is nothing but, there are different time frames in the Universe, as claimed by Albert Einstein in his modern theory of relativity. At different places [called as frames of reference – in the modern relativity theory] of the Universe, the ‘time’ moves at different speeds. For example on the Sun the time moves slower compared to on the Earth, due to the higher mass of the Sun, but on still bigger massive stars the time movers still slower. So, the snakes on the body of lord Shiva in fact represent the different time frames present in the universe.

The snakes on the lord are always in motion, this represents that the time is always moving. If there is no motion, then there is no concept of time at all. Only due to motion of something, the concept of time comes into being.

[According to Hinduism the motion of the mind, the manas creates – time and space (Universe). If the mind is not moving there is no space and time, in other words there is no universe at all]

Another point is that, at or after each body joint there is a snake on lord Shiva. This implies that – each body part or each part of the Universe has its own time frame, in other words the time is relative, as claimed by Albert Einstein.

This is the main reason for adoring the idol of Shiva with snakes otherwise the devotees could deck their god with golden ornaments.