|
“I believe that Veda to be the foundation of the Sanātana Dharma;
I believe it to be the concealed divinity within Hinduism - but a
veil has to be drawn aside, a curtain has to be lifted. I believe
it to be knowable and discoverable. The Vedās and Upanishads are
not only the sufficient fountain of the Indian Philosophy and
religion, but of all Indian art, poetry and literature.”
“Since our earlier ages the Veda has been the bedrock of all our
creeds, ….Our Darshana, Tantra and Puraņa,
our Shaivism, Shaktism and Vaishņavism, our
orthodoxy, heresy and heterodoxy have been the imperfect
understandings of one Vedic Truth . . . Our greatest modern minds
are mere tributaries of the old rişis… ”
“If Indians hardly understand the Vedās at all, the Europeans have
systematised a radical misunderstanding. Their materialist
interpretations, now dominant in cultivated minds, translated into
modern tongues, taught in our universities . . .has been more
fatal to Vedic Truth than our reverential ignorance…”
-Sri Aurobindo
“By the Vedās, the Hindus mean the accumulated treasury of
spiritual laws discovered by different persons in different times…
The discoverers of these laws are called ŗşis, and we honor
them as perfected beings…and some of the very greatest of them
were women.”
-Swami Vivekananda
The collection of books, Vedas, Vedāh, is the holiest for the
Hindus. They are in vedic Sanskrit. They were preserved orally for
a long time before they were committed to writing about two
thousand years ago or earlier.
The core of all these books are the hymns or sūktās. In the
beginning it was a single collection. It was later divided into
four collections or samhitās.
The four Veda Samhitās contain more than twenty thousand mantrās
or verses. It is moreover exquisite poetry. There is no real
poetry without extensive symbolism and Rigveda is no exception.
However the moderns completely ignore the symbolism and write all
sorts of essays on it portraying it as silly and devoid of wisdom.
They often quote a mistranslation of a small number of verses to
support their dubious contentions.
The questions raised by its critics can be broadly divided into
two categories:
(i) Some of the short comings of the modern Hindu Society can be
supposedly traced to the Rig Veda since it is its earliest
scripture. Hence how can it be relevant now?
(ii) Easily understandable Hindu scriptures like Srimad
Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads are praised by all.
Why bother to read Rig Veda at all and try to understand
its symbolism?
The question in (i) is based on a false premise. Some of the
untoward aspects in modern Hindu Society persist because of
ignoring the high ideals mentioned in the Rigveda, its earliest
book. The society pictured in Rig Veda had high regard for women
including their right for choosing their mates, high regard for
the concepts of freedom and equality, respect for sceptics and
unbelievers, respect for knowledge coming from all quarters etc.
All these ideals are very much relevant and necessary today. In no
other religious text do we find mention of such high ideals.
Moreover in all religions, there is a wide gap between precept and
practice.
The question in (ii) is handled in detail in the section on
Upanishads, and that on psychology. It is worthwhile to note that
the three yogas of Bhagavad Gita namely yoga of knowledge,
yoga of works and yoga of devotion and surrender, personal
relation to the deities can be traced to Rig Veda directly.
The specific yogic methods developed in the Vedās are unique and
highly effective. |
