Was one man created in the beginning of Creation or more than one?
Q- Was one man created in the beginning of Creation or more than one?
A.~ More than one; because souls, that on account of their previous good actions deserve to be born in the Aishwari – not the result of sexual intercourse – Creation, are born in the beginning of the world. It is said in the Yajur Veda, “(In the beginning) there were born many men as well as rishis, i.e.., learned seers of nature. They were progenitors of the human race.” On the authority of this Vedic text it is certain then that in the beginning of Creation hundreds and thousands of men were born. By observing nature with the aid of reason we come to the same conclusion, viz., that men are descended from many fathers and mothers (i.e., not from one father and one mother).
Q- In the beginning of Creation were men created as children, adults or old people or in all conditions?
A.~ They were adults, because had God created them as children they would have required adults to bring them up, and had created them as old men, they would not have been able to propagate the race, therefore He created them adults.
Q- Does creation ever had a beginning?
A.~ No; just as the night follows the day and the day follows the night, the night precedes the day and day precedes the night, so does Creation follows Dissolution and Dissolution follows Creation, Dissolution precede Creation, and Creation precede Dissolution. This alternate process has been eternally going on. It has neither a beginning, nor an end, but just as the beginning and end of a day or of a night are seen, so do Creations and Dissolutions have beginnings as well as ends. God, the soul and prakriti – the primordial elementary matter – are eternal by nature, whilst Creation, and Dissolution are eternal by pravah -i.e., they follow each other in alternate succession – like the flow of a river which is not continuous throughout the whole year. It dries up and disappears in summer, and reappears in the rainy season. Jus as the nature, attributes, and character of God are eternal, so are His works – the Creation, Sustenance, and Dissolution (of the world).
Does not the belief of souls in lower beings impute partiality?
Q- God put some souls in human bodies, while others he clothed with bodies of ferocious animals such as tigers, others with those of cattle, such as cows, others with those of birds and insects, other still with those of plants. Does not this belief impute partiality to God?
A.~ No, it does not impute any partiality, because He put souls into the bodies they deserved according to deeds done in the previous birth. Had He done so without any consideration as to the nature of their deeds, He would have been unjust indeed.