Page 459 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

240 SAMAGRA TILAK - 2 • THE ARCTIC HOME
( parvatas ), which, on the analogy of mountains usually seen on
the horizon, were believed to lie between the upper and the lower
world; and how the waters, and with them the sun and the dawn,
were prevented from coming up from the nether world for a long
time in the Arctic home of the ancestors of the Vedic bards. Another
point elucidated by the present theory is the four-fold character
of the effects of Indra's conquest over V{itra a point which has
peen entirely neglected by ancient and modern Nairuktas, not
pecause it was unknown but because they were unable to give any
~atisfactory explanation of the same, except on the hypothesis
-that different effects have been confounded with one other by the
poets of the ~ig-Veda. But the theory of the cosmic circulation
.of aerial waters, a theory which is also found in the mythology of
many other nations, now clears up the whole mystery. If lndra is
.described as the leader or the releaser of water ( apamneta, or apam
sra~hta ), the waters do not mean the waters in the clouds, but the
.waters or the watery vapours which fill the universe, and formed
,the material out of which the latter was created. In other words,
the conquest over waters was something grander, something far
more marvellous and cosmic in character than the mere breaking
up of the clouds in the rainy season; and under these circum-
.stances, it was naturally considered to be the greatest oflndra's
,exploits, when, invigorated by a hundred nightly Soma sacrifices, he
.slew with ice the watery demon of darkness, shattered his hundred
autumnal forts, released the waters or the seven rivers upstream
to go along their aerial way and brought out the sun and the dawn,
..or the cows, from their place of confinement inside the rocky caves
where they had stood still since the date of the war, which accord-
·ing to a Vedic passage, hitherto misread and misunderstood, com-
.menced in higher latitudes every year on the 40th day of Sharad or
autumn and lasted till the end of winter. It is not contended that
Indra had never been the god of rain. There are a few passages in
.~ig-Veda (IV, 26, 2; VIII, 6, 1 ), where he is expressly mentioned
_as sending down rain, or is compared to a rain-god. But as Vri-
tra-han or the killer ofVritra and the releaser of waters and the dawn,
;it is impossible to indentify him with the god of rain. The story of
.the release of captive waters is an ancient story; for V~itra
.appears as Orthros in the Greek mythology, and Vritra-han, as
Verethraghna, is the god of victory in the Parsi scriptures. Now
,t.bis Vptra.-l;ta1.1 may not have been originally the same as Indra