Indra's net - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Indra's net is a metaphor

Metaphor

A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...

used to illustrate the concepts of emptiness

Shunyata

Śūnyatā, शून्यता , Suññatā , stong-pa nyid , Kòng/Kū, 空 , Gong-seong, 공성 , qoγusun is frequently translated into English as emptiness...

, dependent origination

Pratitya-samutpada

Dependent origination or dependent arising is a cardinal doctrine of Buddhism, and arguably the only thing that holds every Buddhist teaching together from Theravada to Dzogchen to the extinct schools. As a concept and a doctrine it has a general and a specific application, both being integral to...

, and interpenetration in Buddhist philosophy

Buddhist philosophy

Buddhist philosophy deals extensively with problems in metaphysics, phenomenology, ethics, and epistemology.Some scholars assert that early Buddhist philosophy did not engage in ontological or metaphysical speculation, but was based instead on empirical evidence gained by the sense organs...

. The metaphor of Indra's net was developed by the Mahayana

Mahayana

Mahāyāna is one of the two main existing branches of Buddhism and a term for classification of Buddhist philosophies and practice...

Buddhist school in the 3rd century scriptures of the Avatamsaka Sutra

Avatamsaka Sutra

The is one of the most influential Mahayana sutras of East Asian Buddhism. The title is rendered in English as Flower Garland Sutra, Flower Adornment Sutra, or Flower Ornament Scripture....

, and later by the Chinese Huayan school between the 6th and 8th century.

Buddhist concepts of interpenetration hold that all phenomena are intimately connected; for the Huayan school, Indra's net symbolizes a universe where infinitely repeated mutual relations exist between all members of the universe. This idea is communicated in the image of the interconnectedness of the universe as seen in the net of the Vedic god Indra

Indra

' or is the King of the demi-gods or Devas and Lord of Heaven or Svargaloka in Hindu mythology. He is also the God of War, Storms, and Rainfall.Indra is one of the chief deities in the Rigveda...

, whose net hangs over his palace on Mount Meru

Mount Meru (Mythology)

Mount Meru is a sacred mountain in Hindu and Buddhist cosmology as well as in Jain cosmology, and is considered to be the center of all the physical, metaphysical and spiritual universes...

, the axis mundi

Axis mundi

The axis mundi , in religion or mythology, is the world center and/or the connection between heaven and Earth. As the celestial pole and geographic pole, it expresses a point of connection between sky and earth where the four compass directions meet...

of Vedic cosmology and Vedic mythology

Vedic mythology

Vedic mythology refers to the mythological aspects of the historical Vedic religion and Vedic literature, most notably alluded to in the hymns of the Rigveda...

. Indra's net has a multifaceted jewel at each vertex, and each jewel is reflected in all of the other jewels.

Huayan school

Francis Harold Cook describes the metaphor of Indra's net from the perspective of the Huayan school in the book Hua-Yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra:

Gödel, Escher, Bach

Douglas Hofstadter uses Indra's net as a metaphor for the complex interconnected networks formed by relationships between objects in a system—including social networks, the interactions of particles, and the "symbols

Symbolic interactionism

Symbolic Interaction, also known as interactionism, is a sociological theory that places emphasis on micro-scale social interaction to provide subjective meaning in human behavior, the social process and pragmatism.-History:...

" that stand for idea

Idea

In the most narrow sense, an idea is just whatever is before the mind when one thinks. Very often, ideas are construed as representational images; i.e. images of some object. In other contexts, ideas are taken to be concepts, although abstract concepts do not necessarily appear as images...

s in a brain

Brain

The brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals—only a few primitive invertebrates such as sponges, jellyfish, sea squirts and starfishes do not have one. It is located in the head, usually close to primary sensory apparatus such as vision, hearing,...

or intelligent computer.

Vermeer's Hat reference

In Vermeer's Hat, a history book written by Timothy Brook, the author uses the metaphor.
Writing in The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...

, Sarah Burton explains that Brook uses the metaphor, and its interconnectedness, "to help understand the multiplicity of causes and effects producing the way we are and the way we were." She adds: "In the same way, the journeys through Brook's picture-portals intersect with each other, at the same time shedding light on each other.

Huayan school

Gödel, Escher, Bach

Vermeer's Hat reference

See also