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Plato’s Euthyphro, the Euthyphro Dilemma, and Why They’ll Never Leave You

Socrates in conversation with Euthyphro, with Meletus standing in the shadows.
Socrates questions Euthyphro outside the Stoa Basileios, or Porch of the King Archon, in Athens.

By Dr Neel Burton — Psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine writer; Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford; author of over twenty books.

The Euthyphro is one of Plato’s shortest dialogues—and one of his finest. It is funny, dramatic, and unexpectedly modern. What begins as a chance encounter outside an Athenian courthouse turns into one of the most profound and celebrated conversations in the history of philosophy.

On his way to answer a charge of impiety, Socrates meets the self-professed religious expert Euthyphro, who has decided to prosecute his own father for the manslaghter of a servant. Intrigued by his resolve, Socrates asks him an apparently simple question: What is piety? The answer proves far more elusive than either man expects. The problem has exercised philosophers ever since—not least the ‘last universal genius’ Gottfried Leibniz.

The core of the dialogue is the so-called Euthyphro dilemma: is something pious because the gods love it, or do the gods love it because it is pious? In modern terms, are things like justice, virtue, and beauty merely matters of authority, or are they woven into the very fabric of reality? Does God, or anyone else, decide what is good, or is there an independent standard?

Outline and Summary of Plato’s Euthyphro

Socrates is on his way to answer a charge of impiety for ‘corrupting young men’ and ‘creating new gods and not believing in the old ones’. The charge is being pressed by a certain Meletus, a little-known young man with a beak-like nose, long straight hair, and a sparse beard.

In the agora (market or central square), Socrates runs into the dogmatically religious Euthyphro. Following the death of a servant, Euthyphro has pressed a charge of manslaughter against his own father. Euthyphro tells Socrates that he is prosecuting his father for inadvertently killing a servant who, in a drunken rage, murdered one of the household slaves. After binding the servant and throwing him into a ditch, Euthyphro’s father sent a messenger to a priest to enquire what ought to be done. Unfortunately, the servant died of hunger and cold before the messenger could return.

Socrates flatters Euthyphro, saying that he must be far advanced in wisdom if he is willing to prosecute his own father on so questionable a charge. Euthyphro responds that his relatives are angry at him for prosecuting his father on behalf of a murderer whom he did not deliberately kill. Although they would say that he is behaving impiously, he himself thinks that he is behaving piously—and that he has knowledge of the pious and impious.

Posing as ignorant, Socrates asks Euthyphro to define the pious and impious. Euthyphro replies that the pious is to prosecute a wrongdoer regardless of who he is, and the impious not to prosecute him. He cites the example of Zeus, ‘the best and most just of gods’, who bound his father Cronus for unjustly swallowing his children.

Socrates says that many actions can be pious: but what is it that makes all pious actions pious, and all impious actions impious? What, in short, is the essence of piousness? Euthyphro offers that the pious is that which is dear to the gods. An action or man that is dear to the gods is pious, whereas an action or man that is hated by the gods is impious.

Socrates points out that the gods may be at odds, so that what is pious to one god may not be so to another. Euthyphro replies that none of the gods would be at odds on a matter such as his. Socrates argues that while both gods and men agree that whoever has killed someone unjustly ought to pay a penalty, they might disagree about who the wrongdoer is, what he did, and so on. Can Euthyphro be sure that, in his case, all the gods are in agreement? Even assuming that they are, this merely signifies that the action is hated by the gods. It does not signify that what is hated by the gods is impious, or that what is loved by them is pious. Even assuming that it does, is that which is pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods? If the gods love something because it is pious, it cannot be their love that makes it pious. Whereas if something is pious because the gods love it, we still don’t know for what reason they love it.

Euthyphro complains that Socrates makes his arguments go around in circles. But Socrates points out that all he is doing is asking questions: it is Euthyphro’s answers and Euthyphro’s arguments that are going round in circles.

Socrates next argues that all that is pious is necessarily just. But whereas all that is pious is necessarily just, not all that is just is necessarily pious. Thus, where there is piety there is also justice, but where there is justice there is not necessarily piety, because piety is a part or aspect of justice. So what part of justice is piety? Euthyphro replies that piety is the part of justice that is concerned with the care of the gods, with the rest of justice being concerned with the care of men. Socrates asks Euthyphro what he means by ‘care’. In most instances, ‘to care’ means ‘to aim at the good of that which is cared for’. So does piety, which is concerned with the care of the gods, aim to make them better? Euthyphro suggests that piety, the care of the gods, is the sort of care that slaves have for their masters, and thus that it is a kind of service. If piety is a kind of service to the gods, asks Socrates, what is the goal of this service? The goal of service to doctors is health, and the goal of service to shipbuilders is the building of a ship. So what is the goal of service to the gods? Euthyphro answers that service to the gods is the knowledge of how to say and do what is pleasing to the gods at prayer and sacrifice, for the preservation of private households and public affairs of state.

Socrates says that, if the pious is the knowledge of how to pray and sacrifice, it is the knowledge of how to beg and give to the gods. To beg correctly would be to ask from them the things that we need, whereas to give correctly would be to give to them the things that they need—so that piety would amount to a sort of trading skill between gods and men. Euthyphro says, ‘Trading yes, if you prefer to call it that’—to which Socrates replies, ‘I prefer nothing, unless it is true.’

Socrates wonders what benefit the gods might derive from the gifts that they receive from us. Or do we have such a trading advantage over them that we receive all our blessings from them and they receive nothing in return? Euthyphro now claims that we give gifts to the gods so as to honour and please them. Socrates asks whether the pious is then pleasing, rather than beneficial or dear, to the gods—to which Euthyphro replies, ‘I think it is of all things most dear to them.’ Socrates points out that they have returned to Euthyphro’s original definition of piety, namely, that piety is that which is dear to the gods.

Socrates says that Euthyphro is more skilful than Daedalus, in that Daedalus could only make arguments move whereas Euthyphro can make them go round in a circle. Socrates suggests that they begin their inquiry anew, but Euthyphro says that he is in a hurry and leaves!

Analysis and Themes of Plato’s Euthyphro

The Euthyphro is often treated as an early Platonic dialogue, interesting only insofar as it introduces the Euthyphro dilemma. But that would be to miss much of its richness. It is also a brilliant study of dogmatism, intellectual humility, and the nature of dialectic and philosophical enquiry. And, chronologically, it is the first of the four dialogues that retrace the final days of Socrates—to be followed by the Apology, Crito, and Phaedo. If Plato’s internal chronology is to be relied upon, the conversation in the Euthyphro takes place on the same day as the conversation in the Theatetus, which follows the preliminary hearing (anakrisis) at the porch of the King Archon.

At no point does Euthyphro realise that he may be ignorant, or even that his knowledge of impiety may be less than complete. He confidently prosecutes his own father, without questioning whether this is what the gods would really want. When Socrates challenges the source of his self-esteem—knowledge of the gods—he finds himself unable to refute Socrates—and so simply leaves. It is a masterclass in the psychology of self-deception. The irony, too, is striking. Socrates is on his way to answer a charge of impiety, yet proves far more concerned with piety than the supposed expert on religion.

Whereas Euthyphro mistakes certainty for knowledge, Socrates is content to admit his ignorance and continue the search. It is apparent, especially in the unabridged dialogue, that Euthyphro struggles to understand what Socrates is asking of him—in other words, he struggles to understand what Socrates means by a definition. The same might be said of other so-called experts who engage with Socrates, including Laches in the Laches and Meno in the Meno. The confusion of these experts, some of whom, like Meno, were philosophically trained or at least philosophically aware, suggests that Socrates’ search for rigorous definitions was something original and radical.

For Socrates, it is not sufficient simply to define an ethical concept in terms of itself or related concepts, or by a list of its instances, or according to convention or popular opinion (‘piety is what is dear to the gods’). Instead, a rigorous definition is one which, by picking out the nature or essence of the ethical concept, applies to all its instances and no more. For example, Meno’s definition of virtue as ‘the ability to rule over people’ is both too narrow for excluding children and slaves, and too broad for including those who rule unjustly. Today, we take the search for rigorous definitions so much for granted that it is easy to forget how revolutionary it once was.

If beauty, courage, justice, and piety can have an essence that can be defined, perhaps they can also have an independent reality. In time, Socrates’ search for essences would evolve into Plato’s Theory of the Forms. In the Metaphysics, Aristotle is quite clear that Socrates did not originate the Theory of the Forms: ‘Two things may properly be ascribed to Socrates, inductive reasoning and definition by universals… But Socrates did not assign to the universal or the definitions an independent existence.’ Nonetheless, the seeds of the Theory of the Forms are already present in dialogues such as the Euthyphro.

Leibniz and the Best of All Possible Worlds

In the modern era, Leibniz (1646–1716) followed the direction of Socrates’ argument while going beyond anything that Socrates himself explicitly claimed. God does not make something good simply by willing it; rather, he wills it because it is good. Eternal or necessary truths—including the standards of the beautiful, the good, and the just—depend on God’s understanding, but not on his will.

This is no mere point of theology. It underpins Leibniz’s most famous doctrine, that this is the best of all possible worlds. If goodness depended solely on God’s will, then whatever world God chose to create would de facto have been the best, rendering the claim empty.

The very idea that God chose to create the best of all possible worlds presupposes an objective standard of goodness by which the alternatives can be judged. Notice that, in the Bible, in Genesis, as God created the world, he kept on checking that what he had done was ‘good’—and even, at the end of the sixth day, ‘very good’. Had there not been an independent standard of goodness, he would not have needed to look.

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To delve deeper into Plato, see The Gang of Three: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Plato’s Shadow: A Primer on Plato.

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Hate Noise? You Might Be a Genius

My silent writing retreat
Where I Wrote The German Greeks, surrounded by all the right sounds.

By Dr Neel Burton — Psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine writer; Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford; author of over twenty books.

I am excruciatingly sensitive to noise. I always carry earplugs and sometimes fantasise about living in the middle of the woods or on top of a hill. If I were browsing property listings, the first word I’d search for would be ‘secluded’. Is the problem with me—or with the world?

As a misophone (‘hater of sounds’), I’m in pretty good company. Kant hated noise, as did Proust, Kafka, and Darwin—and even, ironically, Wagner. Kant is said to have moved lodgings on account of a crowing rooster, while Proust lined his bedroom with cork.

Among all the great thinkers, none hated noise more openly or fervently than Arthur Schopenhauer.

Schopenhauer and the Noisy Seamstress

In August 1821, while living in Berlin, the 33-year-old Schopenhauer had an altercation with a neighbour, the 47-year-old seamstress Caroline Louise Marquet. On that day, he was enraged by the noise of three women talking in the private anteroom to his apartment. When he demanded that they leave, two of the women complied but Marquet refused.

Later, Marquet claimed that Schopenhauer kicked and punched her and threw her down the stairs, leaving her paralysed on the right side and unable to work. He countered that he had only pushed her, and that she fell to the ground on purpose so that she could sue him.

Following a six-year legal battle ending in May 1827, he was made to pay her medical expenses along with a maintenance allowance of 60 thalers per annum for the rest of her life. On the day she died in 1842, the great philosopher of compassion recorded in his ledger, in Latin, Obit anus, abit onus (‘The crone dies, the burden is lifted’). Moral of the story: Don’t make noise around philosophers.

Schopenhauer built his pessimistic philosophy on that of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), who lived all his life in Königsberg (present-day Kaliningrad). Although gregarious and fond of laughter, Kant needed absolute quiet to write. In May 1784, he penned a letter to the police superintendent to complain about the ‘stentorian singing of prayers by the hypocritical inmates of the jail’ (in the Iliad, the Greek herald Stentor had a voice as loud ‘as fifty voices of other men’). He was offended not merely by the noise but also by the insincerity of the prayers, which were offered, he thought, simply to appear God-fearing to the jailor.

Schopenhauer on Noise

In his essay On Din and Noise (1851), Schopenhauer rails hardest not against the nattering of women but the cracking of whips in narrow resounding streets (the nineteenth-century equivalent of revving motorbikes, or those fart-can cars with modified exhausts): ‘Hammering, the barking of dogs, and the screaming of children are abominable; but it is only [his emphasis] the cracking of a whip that is the true murderer of thought.’ To him, the cracking of whips was all the more unbearable for being unnecessary and, worse than unnecessary, useless.

He goes on to link noise intolerance (misophonia, ‘the hatred of sound’) with intellect and creativity:

Certainly there are people, nay, very many, who will smile at [my predicament], because they are not sensitive to noise; it is precisely these people, however, who are not sensitive to argument, thought, poetry, or art, in short, to any kind of intellectual impression: a fact to be assigned to the coarse quality and strong texture of their brain tissues.

The Difference Between Sound and Noise

But not every sound is noise. The difference between sound and noise is not merely one of acoustics but also of perception. The sounds of nature, I find, are almost always more tolerable than those of man. Years ago, I toured Copenhagen Zoo—the only thing open on a Monday—and noted that the most disturbing cries came not from the animals but from the human children.

I enjoy birdsong, the burbling of a stream, or waves lapping or breaking on a shore, but not, say, an air conditioner humming (unless it is very hot outside), children crying, or people shouting or talking without saying anything useful, interesting, or amusing. If I believe that something is important, meaningful, or beautiful, the sound that it makes is much less likely to constitute noise. Noise, then, is whatever I don’t think is worth hearing. In the final analysis, it is whatever dissipates rather than concentrates my energies.

For Schopenhauer, genius is precisely this: the ability of the mind to remain focused on a single point and object. But as soon as a focused mind is interrupted or distracted, it is no better than an ordinary mind. It is, says Schopenhauer, as with a large diamond, which, if shattered, loses most of its value; or as with an army, which, if dispersed, loses most of its power.

It is not merely a matter of genius but also of happiness. For anyone who has experienced it, deep concentration is one of life’s greatest pleasures. Aristotle famously conceived of God, the traditional fount of all reason, as a mind that turns blissfully upon itself. In contrast, people who are too frightened to put two and two together, or too dense to do so, use noise to occupy and numb their minds.

The Stoic Answer: Can We Rise Above the Noise?

Unlike Schopenhauer, the Stoic Seneca (d. 65 CE) sought not to eliminate noise but to rise above it. In his Letters to Lucilius, he claims to be living above a bustling Roman bathhouse, and paints a vivid picture of the soundscape: the grunts of the weightlifter, the slaps and pummelling of the masseur, the splashing of the enthusiast who bombs into the pool, the ceaseless chatter of the hair-plucker who makes his victims yell… ‘So picture to yourself the assortment of sounds, which are strong enough to make me hate my very powers of hearing!’

Despite the din, Seneca remains able to read and write, assuring Lucilius that ‘this racket means no more to me than the sound of waves or falling water.’

Still, he recognises that some noises are worse than others. Intermittent noises, he says, are more upsetting than steady ones. Spoken words are more distracting than mere sounds, in that they demand our attention: compared to speech, even the saw-sharpener is easier to bear. 

Yet Seneca is able to force his mind to concentrate and ‘keep it from straying to things outside itself’. More than that, he sees this as a test of his Stoicism, mental fortitude, and even virtue. Ultimately, he reasons, noise only disturbs us insofar as it resonates with our own emotional turmoil. If our mind is still, no amount of noise can unsettle it; but if our mind is angry or fearful, or burning with greed or envy, no amount of silence can still it: ‘For of what benefit is a quiet quarter or neighbourhood if our emotions are in an uproar?’

We tend to associate sleeping with resting. But unless we are able to still our mind by the use of reason, the night merely changes the form of our worries. Real tranquillity, in contrast, ‘is the state reached by a rational mind when it is at rest.’

I think there is a lot of truth in that. When overwhelmed by noise, I find it helpful to ask myself, ‘Is my annoyance more to do with me or my prejudices than with the noise itself?’ But I would contest that even if we are able to concentrate in a din, our concentration is less profound or complete than it would otherwise have been, and more wearing too.

Seneca concedes that, having tested ourselves, it is simpler to avoid the uproar, or block it out, just as Odysseus blocked his ears and had his men row faster to get past the Sirens. According to lore, the Sirens were fated to die if someone ever escaped their singing, and after Odysseus were never again seen or heard.

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I explore Schopenhauer and the German philosophers in The German Greeks, and Seneca and Stoicism in Stoic Stories.

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Why the Odyssey Endures

Photo of Neel Burton and Emily Wilson
Emily Wilson, Neel Burton, and Marty Moss-Coane

By Dr Neel Burton — Psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine writer; Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford; author of over twenty books.

I don’t usually accept media invitations, but this one was irresistible.

I was invited to discuss the Odyssey with Emily Wilson, whose translation has introduced Homer to a new generation of readers.

We even ventured into Indian epic, comparing Argos with the stray dog of the Mahabharata.

And, of course, the conversation ended on food, wine, and giggles.

Click on the button to listen in.

Listen to: Why the Odyssey Endures

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

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Why Odysseus’ Journey Is Also Our Own

Odysseus meets Argos
Home is not merely where we return, but where we are recognised.

By Dr Neel Burton — Psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine writer; Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford; author of over twenty books.

The Odyssey is usually described as the story of a man trying to get home. But this is only half the story. The real journey is not geographical but psychological and moral. Odysseus is trying not merely to return to Ithaca, but to become the kind of man who can return.

This is why, after almost three thousand years, the Odyssey continues to speak to us. We are all trying to find our way home—not simply to a place, but to a life that feels genuinely like our own.

Every encounter presents Odysseus with a different temptation. The Lotus-Eaters invite him to forget who he is. Circe seeks to trap him into surrendering his humanity. The Sirens tempt him with endless fascination. Even after escaping the Cyclops Polyphemus, Odysseus succumbs to the temptation of pride. By revealing his true name, he forgets his true purpose and risks undoing all that he has achieved. Again and again, Homer asks the same question in different forms: what must we refuse if we are to remain true to ourselves?

The greatest temptation of all comes from Calypso. She offers Odysseus what human beings have always desired: immortality, together with eternal youth and freedom from suffering. Yet he refuses. He chooses instead to return to his ageing wife, his uncertain kingdom, and his mortal life. In doing so, Homer suggests that to become fully human is not to escape our condition, but to embrace it. Only by accepting the limits of human existence can Odysseus finally become himself.

From one perspective, it is a baffling decision. Why exchange paradise for hardship? Like the modern philosopher Bernard Williams, Homer intuits that a life derives its meaning not from its length but from being truly our own. We would rather live a finite life that belongs to us than an endless life that does not.

At last, Odysseus reaches Ithaca. But instead of returning as a conquering hero, he enters his own home disguised as a beggar. His wife does not recognise him. His servants do not recognise him. His kingdom does not recognise him. But one creature does.

Outside the palace gates lies Argos, the hunting dog that Odysseus had raised before leaving for Troy. Once magnificent, Argos has been left to grow old on a dung heap. Yet the moment Odysseus approaches, the dog recognises him. Disguised though he is, stripped of every outward sign of rank and identity, his faithful companion sees through it all. Argos wags his tail, lays back his ears, and, having seen his master one last time, quietly dies. In Homer, true recognition has nothing to do with appearances. We are recognised not for what we possess or the roles we play, but for who we truly are.

It is one of the most moving scenes in all of literature because it speaks to one of our deepest longings. We want our lives to amount to something. But we also want to be known and loved for who we are, beneath all our roles, titles, and disguises. Home is not merely where we return. It is where someone knows who we are—and remembers.

Before Odysseus can reclaim his kingdom, he must first reclaim his story. At the court of the Phaeacians, he recounts everything that has happened to him since leaving Troy. By weaving his adventures into a coherent narrative, he recovers not only his past but himself. We make sense of our own lives in much the same way: not merely by living them, but by telling them. There’s a lovely irony here. At the very heart of the Odyssey, Homer hands the poem over to Odysseus himself. Odysseus quite literally rises into the narrator of his own life, before finally heading home.

Perhaps that is why the Odyssey still feels so modern. We, too, leave home, lose our bearings, and become distracted by ambitions, comforts, fears, and false identities. We, too, sometimes wonder how we ended up living the lives we are living.

The Odyssey endures because Homer understood that the longest journey any of us will ever undertake is not outward across the seas, but inward into our hearts.

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If this article spoke to you, you might look into The Meaning of Myth.

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If Not Physical Fitness, What Was Yoga Originally For?

Indian yogi in meditation
The original purpose of yoga was not to strengthen the body, but to free the mind.

By Dr Neel Burton — Psychiatrist, philosopher, and wine writer; Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford; author of over twenty books.

Millions of people practise yoga for stronger backs, greater flexibility, or relief from stress. These are genuine benefits. But they were never yoga’s original purpose.

The first yogis were not searching for physical fitness. They were searching for freedom.

More than two thousand years ago, Indian philosophers concluded that the root of human suffering lies not in the body but in the mind—or, more precisely, in our mistaken understanding of who we are. Yoga emerged as a practical method for overcoming that mistake.

The First Meaning of Yoga

One of the earliest surviving discussions of yoga appears in the Katha Upanishad, composed around the fourth century BCE. There, the brahmin boy Nachiketa rejects wealth, power, and a long life to ask Yama, the god of death, a single question: What becomes of us after death?

Yama replies that this knowledge cannot be gained through study alone, but only through yoga, which he defines as ‘the firm holding back of the senses’:

When the five organs of perception become still, together with the mind, and the intellect ceases to be active: that is called the highest state.

From the beginning, then, yoga was not a form of exercise but a discipline of inner stillness.

Why We Suffer

Classical yoga rests on Samkhya, one of the oldest schools of Indian philosophy. It seeks to explain both the nature of reality and the origins of human suffering.

According to Samkhya, reality consists of two fundamental principles. The first is Purusha, pure consciousness or the witnessing self. The second is Prakriti, which includes not only the physical world but also the body, the senses, the ego, and even the mind itself.

An ancient Indian image captures the idea beautifully. Two birds perch in the same tree. One pecks eagerly at the fruit, tasting now sweetness, now bitterness. The other simply watches. The first bird represents the self absorbed in the changing experiences of life; the second, the silent witness that remains untouched by them.

Yoga teaches that we mistake ourselves for the first bird when our true nature is the second. We identify with our thoughts, emotions, and fears, forgetting that these are passing experiences rather than our deepest identity.

Yoga Beyond Meditation

Composed in the centuries around the beginning of the Common Era, the Bhagavad Gita broadened the meaning of yoga. Alongside meditation, it described the yoga of knowledge (Jnana Yoga), selfless action (Karma Yoga), and loving devotion (Bhakti Yoga).

Its central message is that freedom comes not from withdrawing from life but from living without attachment to success or failure. Like Stoicism, the Bhagavad Gita teaches that peace of mind depends less on what happens to us than on how we meet it.

As the god Krishna tells the warrior Arjuna:

Work done for a reward is much lower than work done in the Yoga of wisdom.

Yoga was no longer confined to the forest or meditation hall. Everyday life itself could become a spiritual practice.

Patanjali’s Yoga

The philosopher Patanjali transformed these ideas into a practical discipline in the Yoga Sutra, the foundational text of classical yoga. He famously defined yoga as:

Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind.

To achieve this, Patanjali described an eightfold path combining ethics, posture, breath control, concentration, and meditation, culminating in samadhi, complete absorption. Significantly, the physical postures (asanas) formed only one stage of this much larger discipline.

How Yoga Became Exercise

If yoga began as a path to liberation, how did it become associated with stretching and physical fitness?

The answer lies in its long evolution. Later traditions, especially Hatha Yoga, placed increasing emphasis on physical postures, though still in pursuit of spiritual liberation.

The decisive shift came in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when Indian teachers such as Tirumalai Krishnamacharya presented yoga in dialogue with Western physical culture and modern medicine. Their students—including B. K. S. Iyengar and Pattabhi Jois—introduced these new forms of postural yoga to Europe and America, where they proved enormously popular.

Modern yoga is therefore not a misunderstanding of the tradition so much as one particular branch of it. While its philosophical roots remain ancient, its familiar image as a form of exercise is surprisingly modern.

The yoga practised by millions today is therefore only one chapter in a much older story.

The Original Purpose of Yoga

Millions of people come to yoga hoping for stronger backs, greater flexibility, or relief from stress. The first yogis hoped for something altogether more ambitious: freedom from suffering through a deeper understanding of the self.

Whether or not we accept their answers, the first yogis were asking one of humanity’s oldest and most profound questions:

Who am I?

For them, the search for that answer was the true purpose of yoga.

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To learn more about yoga and the world that it unfolded from, see my book Indian Mythology and Philosophy.

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