The phrase "Numbers rule the universe" is a statement attributed to the ancient Greek philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras. It reflects the Pythagorean belief that mathematics is the fundamental principle underlying all of reality and is essential for understanding the cosmos. While the exact wording may be a later interpretation, the idea that numbers hold a deep and intrinsic connection to the order of the universe is central to Pythagorean thought, where numbers were seen as the basis of reality and endowed with mystical properties. Just as modern scholarship has shown that the culture of Archaic Greece was heavily influenced by those of Levantine and Mesopotamian cultures, which appears to have been recognized by authors later in the Classical and Hellenistic periods, who attributed many of Pythagoras's unusual and unconventional beliefs to invented travels to far off lands, where he learned from those people himself. Similarly, the cuture of ancient South East Asia was under the clothing of Hinduism and Sanskritization (long before Buddhism raised it head). The doctrine of metempsychosis , or reincarnation of the soul after death, Pythagoras had learned from the sages or gymnosophists in India- it is claimed. 1