Religious Studies 1023E Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Upanishads, Vedic Period

• School: Western University
• Department: Religious Studies
• Course: Religious Studies 1023E
• Professor: Jonathan Geen

Document Summary

Look out for how religions change over time: any religion that has a history has changed. Named after the scriptures from that time the vedas and the vedic canon . People migrated further east during the 3 stages of the vedic period. Go to owl to get a summary chart of the vedic period. Vedic texts were hymn collections rig veda: way of communicating with deities, only about 1000 hymns, designed to praise the gods, not to be a historical account or anything. Performed fire sacrifices to a variety of deities (deva: quid pro quo the people would ask for something in exchange for the sacrifice o. Less formal &unstandardized: most important sacrifice was the sacrifice of soma (hallucinogenic drink many historians think) Many of the deities were personifications of natural forces. Think freud"s theory: agni (fire), indra (king of the gods) &soma were the 3 most important gods o o.