On parading through the history of India, one encounters five different religious philosophies that have influenced Indian culture before the Common Era. All the religious traditions have different rituals, gods, and distinct sets of doctrines; each of the doctrines lay down rules of conduct to attain salvation and eternal happiness. Brahmanism is the earliest definable religious thought of India followed by two contemporary traditions: Jainism and Buddhism. The importance of prayer, and its relation to the Gods and the universe through various ritual practices form the central idea of Brahmanism. Jainism and Buddhism seem to have originated due to remorse at carnage and suffering in the world. Both the traditions preached asceticism and rigid discipline to attain salvation.
Due to different beliefs and traditions, one observes that the image of fire has a different symbolic meaning to the different philosophies of the Indian tradition. The Vedic tradition recognizes fire with the God Vishnu and also regards it as the liaison between men and heavenly figures. Fire has a different meaning to a Jain Monk and a layman. Like the hindus, the layman uses fire for poojas, in different rituals and bonds. However, the Jain monk has no place for fire in his world due to the support of the doctrine of extreme ahimsa. Buddhism, like Jainism has very minimal importance of fire in its tradition: both the Theravada and Mahayana Buddhist only use fire to illustrate the cycle of re-birth and in analogies. .
To a layman, fire is used for cooking, keeping people warm and other rudimentary things; however, fire has a very deep and symbolic meaning to the eyes of the Brahmanical tradition. The Vedic hymns emphasize the need to control the body and actions to achieve matierial good and happiness through sacred fire rituals. As stated in the hymnes, fire formed an integral part of the hindi ideology; prominent that atleast 200 hymns are dedicated to Agni.
