Page 585 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

366 SAMAGRA TILAK - 2 • THE ARCTIC HOME

I cannot conclude this chapter without briefly examining
the bearing of our results on the views entertained by Hindu
theological scholars regarding the origin, character and autho-
rity of the Vedas. It is a question which has been discussed with
more or less acuteness, subtlery, or learning ever since the days
of the Btihmap.as; and from a purely theological point of
view I do not think there remains anything to be now said upon
it. Again, for the purposes of scientific investigation, it is necessary
to keep the theological and the antiquarian aspect of the question
quite distinct from each other. Yet when our investigation,
conducted on strict scientific lines, is completed, we may usefully
compare our conclusions with the theological views and see how
far they harmonise or clash with each other. In fact no Hindu
who reads a book like the present, can avoid making such a
comparison; and we shall be lightening his task by inserting in
this place a few remarks on this subject. According to the view
held by Hindu theologians, the Vedas are eternal (nitya), without
a beginning ( an#i). and also not created by a human author
( a-paur~heya); and we are told that these attributes have been
predicated of our sacred books from the most ancient times known
to our divines or philosophers. The whole of the third Volume
of Dr. Muir's Original Sanskrit Texts is devoted to the discussion
of this subject, a number of original passages and arguments
bearing on which are there collected, including Sayap.a's lucid
summary in the introduction to his commentary on the ~ig-Veda
and more recently the late Mahamahopadhyaya RajArAma
Shastri Bodas, the editor of the Bombay edition of the ~ig-Veda,
has done the same in a Sanskrit pamphlet, the second edition of
which is now published by his son, Mr. M. R. Bodas, of the
Bombay High Court Bar. I shall, therefore, give in this place only
a summary of the different views of Hindu theologians, without
entering into the details of the controversy which can be studied
from the above books. The question before us is whether the Vedic
hymns, that is, not only the words of the hymns but also the
religious system found or referred to therein, are the compo-
sitions of the ~i!his to whom they are assigned in the Anu-
krama!likas, or the ancient Indexes of the Veda, in the sense in
which the Shakuntala is a composition of KalidAsa; or whether
these hymns existed from times immemorial, in other words,
whether they are eternal and without a beginnin~. The hymns