− | {{ToBeEdited}}{{NeedCitation}} | + | {{ToBeEdited}}{{NeedCitation}}[[Brahma]] is distinct from Brahman.<ref name="BondKunin2003p231">{{cite book|author1=Helen K. Bond |author2=Seth D. Kunin|author3=Francesca Murphy |title=Religious Studies and Theology: An Introduction |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=HokZ5UW5fZsC&pg=PA231 |year=2003|publisher=New York University Press |isbn=978-0-8147-9914-7 |pages=231 }}</ref> Brahma is a male deity, in the post-Vedic Puranic literature,<ref name="pandeyp40">{{cite book|author=R. M. Matthijs Cornelissen|title=Foundations of Bharat's Psychology Volume 2: Practical Applications|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=BkkgeKXyiOIC |year=2011|publisher=Pearson |isbn=978-81-317-3085-0 |pages=40 }}</ref> who creates but neither preserves nor destroys anything. He is envisioned in some Hindu texts to have emerged from the metaphysical Brahman along with Vishnu (preserver), Shiva (destroyer), all other gods, goddesses, matter and other beings.<ref name="Doniger1999p437">{{cite book|author=Wendy Denier|title=Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of World Religions|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=ZP_f9icf2roC |year=1999|publisher=Merriam-Webster |isbn=978-0-87779-044-0 |pages=437 }}</ref> In theistic schools of Hinduism where deity Brahma is described as part of its cosmology, he is a mortal like all gods and goddesses, and dissolves into the abstract immortal Brahman when the universe ends, thereafter a new cosmic cycle (kalpa) restarts again.<ref name="pandeyp40" /><ref name="Fowler2002p330">{{cite book|author=Jeaneane D. Fowler|title=Perspectives of Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Hinduism|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=8dRZ4E-qgz8C |year=2002|publisher=Sussex Academic Press|isbn=978-1-898723-93-6 |pages=330 }}</ref> |
| In the Hindu tradition, the whole creation is the dynamic game of three fundamental forces symbolized by the three gods: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. This triad is made up of the creator (Brahma), the sustainer (Vishnu) and the destroyer or transcendent (Shiva). The correspondence of these three principles (creation, sustenance and destruction) in our daily existence is to be found in birth, life, and death. These correspondences occur not only at a physical level, but at psychic level as well. They represent the very basis of the universe, in its continuous becoming. | | In the Hindu tradition, the whole creation is the dynamic game of three fundamental forces symbolized by the three gods: Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. This triad is made up of the creator (Brahma), the sustainer (Vishnu) and the destroyer or transcendent (Shiva). The correspondence of these three principles (creation, sustenance and destruction) in our daily existence is to be found in birth, life, and death. These correspondences occur not only at a physical level, but at psychic level as well. They represent the very basis of the universe, in its continuous becoming. |