true meaning of the Vedas can be apprehended only
through intuition, contemplation, and spiritual realization .
this deeper understanding is essential for a complete and authentic interpretation of
the Vedas.
the hymns were not written by
a single author or group of authors, but rather were
compiled over a period of several centuries by differ-
ent sages and poets. The Rigveda thus represents the
collective spiritual heritage of ancient India.
the Vedic Rishis, like other poetic masters, carefully selected and used words with their intended meanings in verbal combinations.
There are some words in the Vedas that have a clear
psychological meaning, but there are also many oth-
ers that can have both an external, material meaning
and an internal, psychological meaning, depending on
how we understand the general meaning of the Vedas.
For example, words like rāye, rayi, rādhas, ratna etc.
can refer to either material wealth or internal hap-
piness, which applies equally to the subjective and
objective worlds. Similarly, words like dhana, vāja,
and posạ may refer to external wealth, or to all pos-
sessions, both internal and external, and their abun-
dance in an individual’s life.
Sri Aurobindo argues
that even words like rāye, which in the Upanishads
refers to spiritual happiness, could also bear that
same meaning in the original text of the Vedas.
By adopting this interpretative approach to the Vedas,
we can gain even deeper spiritual insights from the
ancient hymns.
Over time, language
has naturally changed so that it can be used for intellectual purposes.
In the past, language was used to express ideas in a vague and imprecise way, but now it uses fixed symbols that have clear intellectual meaning.
The original meaning of words did
not refer to any precise idea but rather had a general
character or quality that could have multiple applica-
tions and implications. Language initially developed
as a communal system in which words had a shared
pool of meanings, and every word had equal access
to those meanings. Over time, language evolved into
a system of individual ownership, where words had
specific intellectual implications and belonged to certain families or clans.
The process of partitioning
became increasingly strict, allowing families and in-
dividual words to develop independently.
The final
stage of language development occurs when the mean-
ing of a word is solely determined by the concept
it represents, with the sound of the word being secondary.
This progression from communal to individ-
ual ownership and from sound determining sense to
the idea being paramount is a natural evolution in
the growth of language.
Sri Aurobindo claims that
in the early days of language, there were only a few
words for things like light, motion, touch, substance,
extension, force, speed, and so on. Over time, ideas
became more specific and varied.
They went from
being general to being specific, from being vague to
being precise, from being physical to being mental,
from being concrete to being abstract, and from ex-
pressing different feelings about similar things to ex-
pressing clear differences between similar things, feel-
ings, and actions. This progression occurred through
the association of ideas, which followed recurrent and
fixed natural laws of development shaped by the
environments and experiences of the people who spoke
the language. These laws can be seen as procedures
that have developed as an ingrained part of human
behaviour in response to the demands of their envi-
ronment and are thus considered natural laws.
Sri
Aurobindo explains that the history of language can
provide valuable insights into the meaning and devel-
opment of individual words. By studying the rules
that govern how sound and meaning are related in
Sanskrit as well as the word families in great detail,
it becomes possible to understand why words have
certain meanings and how those meanings changed
over time. Also, by using the laws of association that
governed the development of the ancient languages,
it is possible to restore the hidden meaning of words
and the meanings of words that are similar. However,
it should be noted that just because one Vedic word
may have had a particular meaning at one point does
not mean that this meaning can apply to the actual
Vedic text. Nevertheless, figuring out the meaning of
a word based on its history often sheds light on how it
is used in the text, and the meaning that the situation
calls for is often the same meaning that the word’s
history leads to. This provides a sufficient basis for
moral, if not absolute, certainty. Another interest-
ing thing about language when it was young is that
a single word could have a huge number of different
meanings, and a huge number of words could be used
to represent a single idea. However, as the need for
precision and economy grew, the number of words for
the same idea decreased. The Sanskrit language was
an exception, as it had an abundance of synonyms,
making it highly suitable for rhetorical devices such
as double sense. Despite this, the Sanskrit language
never quite got to the end of this process because it
broke up into the Prakrit dialects too early. Com-
pared to classical languages, the language of Vedic
Sanskrit is from an earlier time in the history of lan-
guages. It is fluid and adaptable, with many differ-
ent forms and inflections that use different cases and
tenses. The psychological side of the language has not
yet hardened into rigid forms of intellectual precision.
The words still carries within it, the memory of its
roots and is still conscious of its own history. This
ancient psychology of language was reflected in the
Rishis’ use of language. For instance, as Auribindo
mentions in his text [1], the word “vrika” meant the
tearer and therefore, among other applications of the
sense, a wolf; “dhenu” meant the fosterer, nourisher,
and therefore a cow. However, while the original and
general sense predominated, the derived and partic-
ular sense was secondary.
This permitted the au-
thor of the hymn to manipulate ordinary language
in a highly versatile manner, employing descriptions
of wolves or cows at times to enhance the more gen-
eralized meaning, and at other times to serve as a
conventional metaphor for the psychological ideas he
was contemplating.
The partitions made by the mind between differ-
ent senses of the same word were much less separative
than in modern speech. in Vedic lan-
guage, “bhag” meant enjoyment and sharing and was
not considered different words but one word that had
developed two different uses. The Rishis could use it
in one of the two senses while keeping the other in
the back of their minds, colouring its overt conno-
tation or even using it equally in both senses at the
same time. “Chanas” meant food but also enjoyment
and pleasure which allowed the rishi to suggest dif-
ferent meanings to the secular and initiated minds.
For the secular mind, the term referred to food of-
fered during a religious offering to deities while to
those with deeper understanding, it denoted the ex-
perience of divine bliss (Ananda) permeating the ma-
terial consciousness. Additionally, it evoked the no-
tion of Soma, a divine beverage associated with both
divine sustenance and the experience of divine joy in
Vedic tradition.
the hymns
dedicated to Agni are of fundamental importance for
the psychological interpretation of the Vedas.
The
hymns dedicated to Agni also highlight the impor-
tance of fire in Vedic rituals and symbolize the trans-
formative power of knowledge.
The psychological meaning of the Hymn to Agni
emerges with significant intensity and clarity in the
fifth through eighth verses [1].
Agnir hotā kavikratuḥ