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

316 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS. of which we have established by independent Vedic evidence. The point has long remained unexplained, and it is only by the Arctic theory that it can be now satisfactorily accounted for. In connection with this subject it is necessary to refer to a riddle or a paradox, which arises out of it. The sun was supposed to move in the womb of his mother for ten months and then to drop into the nether world. In other words, as soon as he came out of the womb, he was invisible; while in ordinary cases a child becomes visible as soon as it is brought into the world after ten months of gestation. Here was an idea, or rather an apparent contradiction between two ideas, which the Vedic poets were not slow to seize upon, and evolve a riddle out of it. Thus we have seen above (I, 164, 32) that the sun is described as being invisible to one who made him, evidently meaning his mother. In V, 2, 1, we again meet with the same riddle; for it says, "Young mother carries in secret the boy confined; she does not yield him to the father. People do not see before them his fading face, laid down with the Arâti."* In I, 72, 2, we further read, "All the clever immortals did not find the calf though sojourning round about us. The attentive (gods), wearying themselves, following his foot-steps, stood at the highest beautiful standing p'ace of Agni;" and the same idea is expressed in I, 95, 4, which says, "Who amongst you has understood this secret? The calf has by itself given birth to its mother. The germ of many, the great seer moving by his own strength comes forward from the lap of the active one (apasâm)." It is the story of the hidden Agni, who is described in X, 124, 1, as having long (jyok) resided in *See Oldenberg's Vedic Hymns, S. B. E. Series, Vol. XLVI, pp. 366-68. The first two verses of the hymn are:—कुमारं माता युवतिः समु- ब्धं गुहा बिभर्ति न ददाति पित्रे। अनीकमस्य न मिनज्जनासः पुरः पश्यंति नि- हितमरतौ ॥ १ ॥ कमेतं त्वं युवते कुमारं पेषी बिभर्षि महिषी जजान । पूर्वीर्हि गर्भः शरदो ववर्धापश्यं जातं यदसूत माता ॥ २ ॥