ABSTRACT
In ancient India, knowledge and religious belief were united: the highest states of consciousness required much knowledge about nature and the world. One can confirm this in the Vedas, Books of Knowledge, forming the original scriptures of Hindu beliefs. These are an extraordinary collection of teachings, first compiled and written down about 1500 B.C., with further recording down to 500-300 B.C. They include many thousands of poetic verses hymns, chants, prayers that speak about the nature and powers of the gods, the methods by which they must be worshiped and the universe they created, including its composition, movements, and the dimensions by which the gods measured it out and set it in motion. The influence of Indian mathematics on later times one knows for certain by the translations of Indian works into Arabic, then into Latin. In ancient Indian writings, Veda also refers to a field of study, like ayurveda, meaning knowledge of life or medical science.
