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We need to stress on the peculiar
character of the mantra, the revelatory origin of the
world-rhythm proceeding from the Infinite and caught by the
disciplined audition of the rişhi. It is not that there is no poetical
charm or other qualities that we associate with Poetry. On the
other hand there is sublime poetry in the Rig Veda-sublime
even when judged from modern standards. What is true of poetry in
a general way is preeminently true in the case of mantra-poetry.
It must be borne in mind that to know the thought-content of a
poem is not the same as to allow the soul and substance of
poetry to invade and possess the sense and feeling and thought in
the core of one's being in communion with the spirit of Poetry. Of
the untranslatable elements in poetry, especially in the mantra
poetry, the word-rhythm and the word-order stand prominently as
the two wings of the soaring soul of poetic sound. Nevertheless,
to the composer of the Vedic hymn it was only a help, a means for
his progress and a help for others. The act of expression was just
a means, not an aim. That is why pursuit of aesthetic grace or
beauty or richness does not act as an incentive to the rişhi
for varying the consecrated form which was an accepted
principle among the mystics of the Rig Veda. On this
point Sri Aurobindo's view is noteworthy. He explains the apparent
monotony in many places which even lesser minds could easily vary
or break by simple or artful devices or common poetical conceits.
"Only out of the sameness of experience
and out of the impersonality of knowledge, there arise a fixed
body of conceptions constantly repeated and a fixed symbolic
language which was the inevitable form of these conceptions... We
have at any rate the same notions repeated from hymn to hymn with
the same constant terms and figures and frequently in the same
phrases with an entire indifference to search for poetical
originality or any demand for novelty of thought and freshness of
language ....... The mystic poets do not vary the consecrated form
which has become for them a sort of divine algebra transmitting
the eternal formulae of the knowledge to the continuous succession
of initiates.
"The hymns possess indeed a finished
metrical form, a constant subtlety and skill in their technique,
great variations of style and poetical personality - they are not
the work of rude, barbarous and primitive craftsman...... They
differ in temperament and personality; some are inclined to a more
rich, subtle and profound use of Vedic symbolism; others give
voice to their spiritual experience in a barer and simpler dictum
...... There are risings and fallings in the same hymn ...... Some
hymns are plain and almost modern in their language; others baffle
us at first by their semblance of antique obscurity. But these
differences take nothing from the unity of spiritual experience.
In the deep and mystic style of Dīrghatamas as in the melodious
lucidity of Medhātithi, in the puissant and energetic hymns of
Vishvāmitra as in Vasişhţha's even harmonies we have the same firm
foundation of knowledge and the same scrupulous adherence to the
sacred conventions of the Initiates'' (Sri Aurobindo).
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