Page 159 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

144 SAMAGRA lJLAK - 2 • THE ORION
ii. I. 3 the raising of the· t6ne is described as ascending from top
to top ( agrat agram) and nediyas sankrama must, therefore,
mean a gradual lowering of the voice. In fact, nediyas sankrama
represents the same idea as low-er-ing, that is, not taking a sudden
leap down but descending from the highest point to the next lower
and so on. In all these places SAya1].a explains nedtyas as meaning
• nearer' according to Pal)ini; but in every case he has to strain
the words to suit the context. It was not, however, Sayapa's fault;.
for after nedtyas was once assigned to antika, all traces of its old
meaning were naturally lost, and none dared to question PAJ:!ini's
authority. But we now know that in other languages neath means
low, and in several passages in the BrAhmat:tas, we find ned£yas
contrasted with ' upper ' or 'top '. This, in my opinion, is sufficient
to prove that ned£yasmeantlower in the Vedic times. I have already
shown that the authority of PAt:tfni is not against understanding
the word in this way. All that he has laid down is that nedtyas
having no positive form should be derived from antika without
saying whether nedtyas was or was not used in any other sense.
I am therefore inclined to think that ned£yas might have had more
than one meaning even in Pa~ini's time, but he took the most
ordinary meaniog and derived the comparative form from antika.
This in course of time served in its turn to restrict the denotation
of the word only to one meaning viz., ' nearer '.
I ~ould therefore translate the verse thlls, "0 Vri~hakapi !
go to the house-the celestial sphere which is cut off and which
contains some ( unknown ) yojanas or stages. From you,r nether
house come to our house. Indra is in the upper (portion ) of
the universe." Nedtyas is thus contrasted with uttara in the burden
of the song. Both are comparative forms. lndra is in the uttara
(upper) regions, while Vri~hakapi is going to the nedtyas (lower)
world; and Indra expects or .rather requests Vri~hAkapi to come
back again to his ( Iridra's) house. That is the gist of the whole
v~rse. The idea that the sun falls down from the autumnal equinox
is an old one. In Ait. Br. III. 18 and in Tait. Br. i. 5. 12. I, the
ceremonies on the Visuvan or the equinoctial day in a satra are
descr'ibed, and there ~e are told that "gods were afraid of the
sun jdllfng (i(JII"fl from the sky and so supported him," and being
thus supported fie "became uttara to all." The Ait. Br. iii. 18 has
thus the same word uttara that we have in this verse, and it is
natural to suppose that both relate t9 the same subiect. I have also