Vedas and us
By Sandeep Kumar
The very word Veda means knowledge, derived from the root vid. Indeed, the Vedas are the fountainhead of the knowledge. Entire humanity recognizes that Rgveda is the oldest book in the library of the mankind. However, the truth is that the four Vedas (Rgveda, Yajurveda, Samaveda and Atharvaveda) were revealed to four Rsis at the dawn of the mankind on the earth. God’s Revelation of Vedas: Badaraymja, the author of Brahmasutra (also called Vedanta-Dariana) declares at the outset that God exists because Vedas exist — ilistrayonitvdt. It must be so because the most benevolent God must reveal the knowledge to the mankind once He creates the creation and His masterpiece that the man is. Pataajali, the author of Yoga Dariana declares that God is the original teacher for the mankind — sa parvesamapi guruh kalenanavacchedat. The common sense says that God’s revelation must appear at the onset of the creation so that everybody, the first generation included, benefits from the same. Any book that appears into the world after human beings have inhabited the earth for a length of time can’t claim to be God’s revelation. Also, God’s revelation of knowledge includes the knowledge of the language. So, any book that claims to be God’s revelation must appear before the knowledge of the language developed. That means that a book in Arabic can’t be God’s revelation if the Arabic language had developed before the book appeared. Similarly, a book appearing in Latin or Hebrew can not be God’s revelation if these languages had developed at the time of appearance of that book. On the same token, Gird can not be called as God’s revelation because the language of Sanskrit was very much in its developed form when Gita came into existence. Therefore, only Vedas can be God’s revelations because they only gave rise to the language that is called Sanskrit. Commensurate to the unique features of the Vedas, man’s greatest effort was focused on preserving them since his advent on the earth. He devised several methods to recite it to preserve the same without any infinitesimal change even in a letter and its pronunciation. We Indians should take extreme pride that our forefathers took utmost care to such an extent. Of course, they were guided in their zeal and effort by the belief that it is God given word which they must pass on to the future generations, come what may. There is no other book even remotely close to such a unique astounding feature that the Vedas are associated with. Both the Creation and the Vedas Show Harmony: The very next line 135.darayana wrote after the above quoted line was — tattu sanzanvayat. Vedas must be God’s revelations because all they contain tally well with the creation. For example, the earth is referred to as bhiigola, meaning the earth is round like a sphere as is indeed the case. This led the ancient people in India to know that the earth is round like a ball while, on the contrary, the people in West Asia and elsewhere I thought it to be flat like a mat. There is nothing in the Vedas that is contrary to what is seen in nature. Over and beyond what we know today, the Vedas may contain many more revelations that we might not even be aware of today. Vedas contain knowledge about both matter and spirit. The knowledge about matter is in seed form leaving ample room for man to discover further and create his own body of literature. On the other hand, knowledge pertaining to spirit is at its pinnacle that man will never be able to add anything to that body of knowledge. The Vedas will always remain relevant like the sun is. Though man has created many sources of light to dispel the darkness, He remains dependent upon the sun. The role of Vedas is like that of the sun albeit in the inner intellectual domain where man must exhibit greater perseverance to dispel the darkness of untrue knowledge, which leads to pains and agonies of much greater proportions. Let us hope that humanity will benefit from the Vedas as much as it benefits from the sun, both having been created by the most benevolent and merciful God. If man followed the path shown by the Vedas in the ancient India, the life was at its brightest zenith. When India deviated from the path of Vedas about 6000 years ago, her downfall began. Since India was the lighthouse for the entire world, it is seen that the humanity too has been in miserable condition in the last few thousand years.
Reference: Vedas and us Dr. Harish Chandra.
