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

462 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS. subject matter of the Vedic hymns is here referred to almost in the same terms in which it is expressed by Vyâsa in the Mahâbhârata verse quoted above; and with such express- texts before us, the only way to reconcile the conflicting state- ments about the human and the superhuman origin of the hymns is to refer them to the form and the matter of the hymns respectively, as suggested by Patanjali and other schol- ars. Dr. Muir notices a passage (VIII, 95, 4-5) where the poet is said to have "generated (ajîjanat) for Indra the new- est exhilarating hymn (navîyasîm mandrâm giram), springing from an intelligent mind, an ancient mental product (dhiyam pratnâm), full of sacred truth."* Here one and the same hymn is said to be both new and old at the same time; and Dr. Muir quotes Aufrecht to show that gir, that is, expres- sion or wording, is here contrasted with dhî or thought, ob- viously showing that an old thought (pratnâ dhîḥ) has been couched in new language (navîyasî gîḥ) by the bard to whom the hymn is ascribed. In other words, the hymn is ancient in substance though new in expression,—a conclusion to which we have been already led on different grounds. We may also cite in this connection the fact that amongst the different heads into which the contents of the Brâhmaṇas have been classified by Indian divines, we find one which is termed Purâ-kalpa or the rites or traditions of a by-gone age, showing that even the Brâhmaṇas are believed to contain ante-diluvian stories or traditions. The statement in the Taittirîya Saṃhitâ that "The priests, in old times, were afraid that the dawn would not terminate or ripen into sunshine," is quoted by Sâya- ṇa as an example of Purâ-kalpa, and we have seen before that this can be explained: only by supposing it to refer to the Arctic dawn,—an incident witnessible by man only in the in- ter-glacial times. If the Brâhmaṇas can be thus shown to contain or refer to the facts of a by-gone age, a fortiori the

• See Muir O. S. T., Vol. III, p. 239.