वेदों की प्राचीनता एवं काल-निर्णय / ओरायन (लोकमान्य बाल गंगाधर तिलक - खगोलीय वैदिक शोध)

VEDIC MYTHS—THE CAPTIVE WATERS. 295 aerial waters, a theory which is also found in the mythology of many other nations, now clears up the whole mystery. If Indra is described as the leader or the releaser of waters (apâm netâ, or apâm srashtâ), the waters do not mean the waters in the clouds, but the waters or the watery vapours which fill the universe, and formed the material out of which the latter was created. In other words, the conquest over waters was something grander, something far more marvellous and cosmic in character than the mere breaking up of the clouds in the rainy season; and under these circumstances it was naturally considered to be the greatest of Indra's exploits, when, in- vigorated by a hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, he slew with ice the watery demon of darkness, shattered his hundred autumnal forts, released the waters or the seven rivers up- stream to go along their aerial way and brought out the sun and the dawn, or the cows, from their place of confinement inside the rocky caves, where they had stood still since the date of the war, which, according to a Vedic passage, hitherto misread and misunderstood, commenced in higher latitudes every year on the 40th day of Sharad or autumn and lasted till the end of winter. It is not contended that Indra had never been the god of rain. There are a few passages in the Ṛig- Veda (IV, 26, 2; VIII, 6, 1), where he is expressly mentioned as sending down rain, or is compared to a rain-god. But as Vṛitra-han or the killer of Vṛitra and the releaser of waters and the dawn, it is impossible to identify him with the god of rain. The story of the release of captive waters is an ancient story; for Vṛitra appears as Orthros in the Greek mytho- logy, and Vṛitra-han, as Verethragna, is the god of victory in the Parsi scriptures. Now this Vṛitra-han may not have been originally the same as Indra, for the word Indra does not occur in European Aryan languages, and it has, therefore, been suggested by some comparative mythologians that the con- quest of waters, which was originally the exploit of some other