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Term in Hindu (not mythology) texts From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Prachetas (Sanskrit: प्रचेतस्) lit. '"the prescient one"'[1] [2] is a term in Hindu mythology with a number of definitions:
Prachetas are those which bring consciousness to the outside, through the development of the senses that are active as sensations. These senses are the five forces of mind, five different angles of reflection; their formation took place with the help of the Prachetas.[6]
In the Rigveda mantra I.41.1, which reads:
The word, prachetas, refers to men of knowledge, the men who are learned and wise.[7] But in the Rigveda mantra I.5.7, which reads:
This refers to the "super-conscious" being in whom it is prayed that the "impatient seekers" be allowed to enter (i.e. be merged with).[8]
According to the Puranas, Prachetas was a descendant of Druhyu; he was the son of Duryaman who was the son of Dhrita, the great-great-great grandson of Druhyu. Pracetas had one hundred sons who were the kings of the Mlechchhas, the barbarians of the northern Indian subcontinent.[9] Prachetas is one of the Prajapatis, and an ancient sage and law-giver.
It is also said that there were ten Prachetas who were the sons of Prāchinabarhi and great grandsons of Prithu and Archi; according to the Vishnu Purana, they had passed ten thousand years in the great ocean, deep in meditation upon Vishnu who made them the progenitors of royal humanity and Shiva gave them the Rudra Gita to pray to Vishnu to make them kings of the Earth.[10]
As the story goes, the eldest of the ten sons of Prāchinabarhi, collectively known as Prachetas, became their ruler; they cleared forests and made the lands fit for agriculture; they married the ten daughters of Chandra and Rohini, who begot 49 sons each called Daksha Prachetases. There were 49 kings called as Daksha Prachetas.[11] The Prachetas emerged from the ocean after their long sojourn to find the Earth covered by trees; they created wind and fire and destroyed the trees.[12] Brahma, then, told them that they not do so because that thing is over now, and solemnized their marriage with their wives, the ten Marisha again then; and it was their union that gave the incarnated body to Daksha.[13]
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