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

VEDIC MYTHS—THE CAPTIVE WATERS. 293
that the Vedic deity, Varuṇa, was so named from the country
called Varena by the worshippers of Mazda ; and the same
may be said of Rasâ and Sarasvatî. Rasâ and Sarasvatî
sometimes denote the terrestrial rivers even in the Ṛig-Veda.
But there is ample evidence to show that they were originally
the aerial rivers. It is, therefore, more natural to hold that
all these were ancient mythological names brought with them
by they Aryan settlers to their new home and there applied to
new places or objects. There are places in Burma which are
named Ayodhya, Mithila, &c., and this is explained on the
ground that they were so named by the Indian settlers in
Burma after the well-known places in their native land.
There is no reason why the same theory should not be applied
in the case of Hapta-hindu, especially when we see that the
rivers set free by Indra by slaughtering Vṛitra cannot but
be celestial.
It will be seen from the foregoing discussion that the true
nature and movements of waters released by Indra from the
grasp of Vṛitra has been misunderstood from the days of the
most ancient Nairuktas, or, we might say, even from the days
of the Brâhmaṇas. There are passages in the Ṛig-Veda where
Pûshan is said to cross the upper celestial hemisphere in boats;
but the Ashvins and Sûrya are generally described as travers-
ing the heaven in their chariots. This led the ancient Nairuk-
tas to believe that the upper celestial hemisphere was not a
seat of aerial waters, and that when Indra was described as
releasing waters by slaughtering Vṛitra, the waters referred to
could not but be the waters imprisoned in the rain-clouds.
The seven rivers set free to flow by killing Vṛitra were simi-
larly understood to be the rivers of India, like the Ganges, the
Jamuna, &c., while the piercing of the mountains was ex-
plained away by distorting or straining the meaning of such
words as, parvata, giri, &c., as stated above. It was at this
stage that the subject was taken in hand by Western scholars,