The Vedas and Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati

 

• The Vedas and Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati •

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- Swami Vidyanand Saraswati

The Vedas are the bed-rock on which the edifice of culture and civilisation has been raised. They are the quintessence of India's moral and spiritual philosophy - the fountainhead of all knowledge. The Vedas have always exercised, and do still exercise the highest influence on the minds of the Indian people, particularly the Hindus. Whatever the differences among the various religious sects, all of them hold the Vedas in the highest respect. All the scriptures admit the eternality of the Vedas which consists in the unbroken continuity of their tradition, study and application.

The entire Aryan literature of ancient India not only shows reverential attitude towards the Vedas, it regards them the final authority in all matters, mudane or spiritual. Whatever is in the Vedas is supreme; it is the self-luminous light which needs no other light to establish its validity or identity; it is known as the Absolute Authority or self-evident testimony (स्वत: प्रमाण). All other literature comes under the category of परत: प्रमाण, that is, they are held in esteem or authority, in as much as they are in conformity with the Vedas and do not disagree with or do not oppose the Vedic texts. Such literature is deemed to have received light from the Vedas.

During the middle ages intellectuals like Sayana, Mahidhara and Uvat wrote commentaries on the Vedas according to classical Sanskrit, instead of following the ancient Vedic Rishies. That made all the differences. They suited the western scholars in their deliberately erring in their exposition of the Vedic texts.

At the time when the Europeans came into direct contact with India, it was undergoing a decline and they took it for granted that the Indians were all uncivilised and unclutured people. Their thinking was circumscribed and coloured by the teachings of christianity. It is to the credit of the western scholars that the Vedic and other oricntal texts havc been scientifically edited with their glosses, indexes and concordonces. But their translations, annotations and the critical study lacked in sympathy and credibility which a scripture meant to elevate mankind through all times deserves. But it is not the fault of those scholars so much as of our own saholiasts for whom the Vedic texts, instead of being the source of knowledge and inspiration, remained for centuries merely a means of ritualistic and ecelesiastical practices. Their meaningfulness was entirely lost to them. It was a great blessing for all of us that towards the close of the nineteenth century we had a man of the stature of Dayananda who saved the Vedas for us from the ravages of time and gave us a new insight into the Vedic text after nearly five thousand years.

Dayanand gave a new interpretation to this scripture of Divine knowledge, Divine worship and Divine action and presented it in its pristine purity and glory. The earlier this original and powerful commentary is widely accepted as the definite word on the Veda, the better it would be for all mankind.

The great scholiast and savant, Aurobindo was convinced that "whatever may be the final interpretation, Dayananda will be honoured as the first discoverer of the right clues. Amidst the chaos and obscurity of old ignorance and age-long misunderstanding, his was the eye of direct vision, that pierced to the truth and which was essential. He has found the keys of the doors that time had closed and rent asunder the seals of the imprisoned fountains." (The Arya, 1912)

Dayanand's idea is being increasingly supported by the recent trend of knowledge about the ancient world. The ancient civilisation did possess secrets of science which modern science has recovered, extended and made more rich and precise. There is then nothing fantastic in Dayananda's idea that Ved contains truths of science as well as truths of religion. To this Dayanand has added his own conviction that "the Veda contains other truths of science the modern world does not at all possess, and in that case Dayanand has rather understated than overstated the depth and range of Vedic wisdom."

[Source:  On the Vedas, Preface, pp. 3-4, 1st edition, 1996, Publisher: Vijaykumar Govindram Hasanand - Delhi, presented by: Bhavesh Merja]