THE COSMIC WOMB

It can be said that the tomb of the individual ego also serves as a womb for the universal ego. The unbounded state of silent darkness serves not only as the death place for the individual ego, but also as the birthplace for the universal ego.

In the Vedic literature, this unbounded cosmic womb was personified as Aditi, the mother of all the gods and seers. The Sanskrit term aditi (a + diti) means “unbounded,” but it can also be derived from ad + iti, which means “thus eating.”

The unbounded state of pure ignorance was viewed as all-consuming, with the potential to consume the entire universe and everything in it, and reduce it to a mere nothingness, a mere emptiness. Yet from this emptiness is born the fullness of spiritual enlightenment. For this reason, the cosmic womb was viewed as the mother of all enlightened beings throughout the universe, whether they are conceived as universal gods or individual seers. It represents not only the end of all forms of individual life, but also the beginning of all forms of universal life—the type of life possessed by an enlightened soul. All such souls are deemed immortal. They may possess mortal bodies, which continue to operate in this world as before, but they also possess an immortal body of Logos.