Page 437 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

218 SAMAGRA TILAK - 2 • THE ARCTIC HOME
Sarasvati is that while the latter is described as Vritra-slayer or
Vritra-ghn£ in Rig. VI, 61, 7, Ardvi Sura Anahit~ is described
in the Aban Yasht ( V, 33 and 34) as granting to Thraetaona, the
heir of rhe valiant Athwya clan (Vedic Trita Aptya) who offered
up a sacrifice to her, a boon that he would be able to overcome
Azi Dahak, the three-mouthed, three-headed and six-eyed monster.
This is virtually the same story which is found in the Rig-Veda
X, 8, 8, where Trita Aptya, knowing his paternal weapons and
urged by Indra, is said to have fought against and slew the three-
headed son of Tva~htri and released the cows. This clearly estab-
lishes the connection between waters, as represented by Ardvi Sura
Anahita or Sarasvati, and the slaughter of Vritra. Many Vedic
scholars have tried to identify Sarasvati with the river of that name
in the Panjaub; but as the latter is an insignificant stream, the
indenti.fication has not been generally accepted. The above compari-
son now shows that the mighty Sarasvati, like Ardvi Sura Anahita,
is an aerial stream, which rises up from the nether store-house
of waters, travels over the sky and again falls back into the lower
ocean. A portion of these waters is brought down upon the
earth in the form ·of rain by the sacrifices offered to the river, and
along with it come the seeds of all the plants growing upon the
surface of the earth. Thus in the Vendidad, V, 19, (56), the tree
of all the seeds is described as growing in the middle of the sea
Vouru-Kasha, and the seeds are then said to be brought up by
the aerial rivers and sent down by them to the earth by means
of rain, an idea similar to that found in the Rig-Veda, 1, 23, 20,
where the sacri.ficer informs us that Soma has told him that all
medicines (medicinal herbs) are contained in the waters. We
have thus a complete account of the cosmic circulation of the
aerial waters and the production of the terrestrial waters and plants
therefrom. The nether world or the lower celestial hemisphere
is the home of these waters and it is expressly said to be bounded
on all sides by a mountainous range like that of Hara Berezaiti.
When the aerial waters are allowed to come up through this
mountain, they travel over the upper hemisphere and again fall
into the sea Vouru-Kasha, or the lower ocean, producing , during
their cour e, rains which fertilise the earth and make the plants
grow upon its surface. But instead of descending down in the form
of rain, these aerial waters were, it was apprehended, apt to turn
away into the region of the sun and deprive us of rain. It was