Page 133 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

118 SAMAGRA TILAI: - 2 • THE ORION

on the ground that no allusioR to .the position of the Krittikis
was to be found in the Vedic h)'JJl.ils.:We can now account for this
silence; for how can the hymns, which appear to be sung when
the sun was in Orion at the beginning of the year contain any
allusion to the period when the vernal equinox fell in the Kritti-
kis ? This could have been easily perceived if, instead of confining
to the controversy about the position of the KrittikAs and endea-
vouring to find out if some clue to the date of the Veda could be
obtained from the determination of the original number and source
of the Nak,hatras, scholars had pushed their inquiries further
back and examined the Vedic hymns in the same critical spirit. It_
would not have been difficult in that case to discover the real
meaning of the Vedic verse which states that" the dog awakened
the ~ibhus at the end of the year." I have in a previous chapter
already referred to the verse in the :{Ugveda regarding the position
of Yama's dogs and the death of Namuchi. These passages, as
well as the description of V rika or the dog star rising before the
sun after crossing the eternal waters, the terminus of the DevayAna
(&g. i. lOS. 11. ), sufficiently indicate the position of the equinoxes
in those days. In the next chapter I propose to discuss and exa-
mine two other important passages from the &gveda, which
directly bear out the 'statement in the Taittirtya SaJll}litA with
which we have started, viz., that the Phalgunl full-moon commenc-
ed the year at the winter solstice in days previous to those of the
Taittiriya Sa!JlhitA and the Brahma11s.

by itself; and be idea the difficulty of deriving Ahriman from Anghra
Mainyus, there seems to be no reason why Ahriman, if so derived,
should be contrasted with Ahura·Mazda. (See Phil. M:u:d. Relig. by
F. J, Dastur Jamasp Asa, §§ 71, ;-z pp. 54-6 ). Parsi mythology haa
another deity named Airyaman, and as this word is derived from
Sanskrit Aryaman, it may be objected that same word cannot be said
to have also given the name for the ev1l spirit. I do not think that the
objection is well founded. Cf; Andra ( Sk. Indra) and Verethraghna
( Sk. Vritrahan) both of which are the names of the same deity in
Sanskrit, but one of which baa become an evil spirit in the Avesta.
But I cannot fully discuss the subject in a note, and not being pertinent
to my case, I cannot also do more than merely record here an explana-
tion that may possibly be suggested.