Page:Monier Monier-Williams - Indian Wisdom.djvu/59

 The word Veda, on the other hand, means ' knowledge,' and is a term applied to divine unwritten knowledge, imagined to have issued like breath from the Self- existent *, and communicated to no single person, but to a whole class of men called Rishis or inspired sages. By them the divine knowledge thus apprehended was transmitted, not in writing, but through the ear, by constant oral repetition through a succession of teachers, who claimed a" Brahmans to be its rightful recipients. Here, then, we have a theory of inspiration higher even than that advanced by the Pseudo-prophet Muhammad and his followers, or by the most enthusiastic adherents of any other religion in the world. It is very true that this inspired knowledge, though its very essence was held to be mystically bound up with Sabda or 'articulate sound' (thought to be eternal), was ultimately written down, but the writing and reading of it were not encouraged. It was even prohibited by the Brahmans, to whom alone all property in it belonged. Moreover, when at last, by its continued

1 In Maim I. 3 the Veda is itself called ' self-existent.' There are, however, numerous inconsistencies in the accounts of the production of the Veda, which seem not to have troubled the Brahmans or interfered with their faith in its divine origin. One account makes it issue from the Self- existent, like breath, by the power of A-drishta, without any deliberation or thought on his part; another makes the four Vedas issue from Brahman, like smoke from burning fuel; another educes them from the elements; another from the Gayatri. A hymn in the Atharva-vcda (XIX. 54) educes them from Kala or ' Time.' The Satapatha-brahmana asserts that the Creator brooded over the three worlds, and thence produced three lights, fire, the air, and the sun, from which respectively were extracted the Rig, Yajur, and Sama-veda. Manu (I. 23) affirms the same. In the Purusba-sukta the three Vedas are derived from the mystical victim Purusha. Lastly, by the Mlmansakas the Veda is declared to be itself nn eternal sound, and to have existed absolutely from all eternity, quite independently of any utterer or revealer of its texts. Hence it is often called tntta,' what is heard.' In opposition to all this we have the Rishis themselves frequently intimating that the Mantras were composed by themselves.