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

PRIMITIVE ARYAN CULTURE AND RELIGION. 453 go into their elaborate discussions in this place; nor is it necessary to do so, for eventually we have to fall back upon the view of Vyâsa and Patanjali, mentioned above, if the destruction of the Vedas during each pralaya, and its repromulgation at the commencement of the new age is admitted. Such, in brief, are the views entertained by Hindu ortho- dox theologians, scholars and philosophers in regard to the origin, character and authority of the Vedas; and on compar- ing them with the results of our investigation, it will be found that Patanjali's and Vyâsa's view about the antiquity and the eternity of the Vedas derives material support from the theory of the Arctic home which we have endeavoured to prove in the foregoing pages on strict scientific and historical grounds. It has been shown that Vedic religion and worship are both inter-glacial; and that though we cannot trace their ultimate origin, yet the Arctic character of the Vedic deities fully proves that the powers of Nature represented by them had been already clothed with divine attributes by the primitive Aryans in their original home round about the North Pole, or the Meru of the Purâṇas. When the Polar home was destroy- ed by glaciation, the Aryan people that survived the catastrophe carried with them as much of their religion and worship as it was possible to do under the circumstances; and the relic, thus saved from the general wreck, was the basis of the Aryan religion in the post-Glacial age. The whole period from the commencement of the post-Glacial era to the birth of Buddha may, on this theory, be approximately divided into four parts :— 10000 or 8000 B. C.—The destruction of the original Arctic home by the last Ice Age and the commencement of the post-Glacial period. 8000-5000 B. C.—The age of migration from the original home. The survivors of the Aryan race roamed over the northern parts of Europe and Asia in search of lands