Yoga

Discussion on Y?ska’s cognisance of Vedic symbolism ultimately converged on the relationship between adhibhuta, adhidaiva and adhyatma. We also saw how the idea of unity among these three levels of the reality was envisioned by Vedic seers themselves particularly Dirghatamas. This tradition was carried on by the Br?hma?as so much so, as to have led Y?ska to formulate so decisively his theory of Vedic interpretation concurrently on these three levels. Since the Upani?ads occupy a place intermediate to the Br?hma?as and Y?ska historically, it would be worth looking into them and see if they provide us with any further clue in this regard.

The problem with which we are going to look into the Upani?ads is the relationship between ?dhibhautika, ?dhidaivika and ?dhy?tmika. From this viewpoint, the beginning of the second chapter of the Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad is interesting. It is in the form of a dialogue between G?rgya, a Brahmin scholar, and Aj?ta?atru, the famous King.

Once upon a time, the Upani?ad narrates, G?rgya approached the King with the promise that he would like to instruct the latter into the secret of Brahman, the Ultimate Reality. G?rgya told him that he worshipped as Brahman the Puru?a indwelling the sun. The King retorted to him that he should not talk any more on the point as he himself worshipped the person indwelling the sun as the head and ruler of all things in the world and that one who worshipped that Puru?a with so much regard for him, became the head and ruler of all beings. (Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad, II.1.2.)

G?rgya further said that he worshipped as Brahman the Puru?a indwelling the moon. To this also the King retorted that he should not prolong his discourse on it any longer since he himself worshipped the Puru?a indwelling the moon as King Soma and that one who worshipped him as such got fulfilled in food. (Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad, II.1.3).

G?rgya now shifted to lightning and observed that he worshipped as Brahman the Puru?a in the lightning. Here also the King informed him that he himself worshipped that Puru?a as illumination and that one who worshipped him as such was blessed with lustrous progeny. (Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad II.1.3)

After listening to all this, the King took him to a person who was fast asleep and tried to awaken him by calling him as King Soma, etc., but all in vain. Then he pressed his hands tightly and got him awakened. Turning to G?rgya after this, he explained to him how in the state of sleep one becomes completely unaware of the external world since the self functioning through some seventy two thousand nerves spread over the body in the waking state withdraws itself to the heart in the state of sleep and remains there self-contented. It is the self which working through those nerves in the waking state becomes aware of the entire universe around it including senses, heavenly bodies, earthly beings, and gods. (Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad II.1.4-19)

It is not difficult to visualise that in this significant dialogue all the three orders of entities are involved — the physical, the divine and the spiritual. Physical are the sun, the moon, lightning, space, air, fire, water, etc. while divine are the Puru?as indwelling these physical entities. The latter may be treated as divinities representing these physical entities. G?rgya tries to convince the King that the divine Puru?a or the god concerned is Brahman but fails. He, of course, attained to a level of understanding in this regard higher than that of the common man who is most likely to regard the sun, the moon and lightning etc. in themselves as respective divinities. Even then he is rebuffed by the King and consequently submits before him despite of all his learning. The reason being that the King offered him something else which is still higher than what he knew and that is spiritual knowledge. G?rgya also happens to touch upon it while identifying Brahman in the form of the Puru?a lying within but what he mistakes for Brahman is probably the same as was called the divine mind, devam manah. While the King Aj?ta?atru leads him to the inmost principle of immortality lying within each and every individual. Thus, starting with the premise of Brahman, he ultimately reaches the Atman itself, suggesting thereby at the same time that Brahman, if knowable at all, can be known at its best only as the principle of immortality, eternity and infinity lying within and controlling everything.

We find in this scheme a process of introversion from outward to inward. When the common man worships the sun, the moon, the lightning and the fire, etc., he takes them to be lying over there at respective distant places and tries to please them so that they may prove beneficial to him from where they are. This is the ?dhibhautika mode of belief and worship. When G?rgya seeks to convince the King that it is the Puru?a indwelling the respective physical entities which is worth worshipping as Brahman, he tries indirectly to withdraw the object of his faith back to himself from the most distant, as the sun, to closer and closer, as the moon, lightning, fire, one’s reflection are, until he reaches his own self which being individualistic, proves to be just an agent of the real self or Atman. Through the process of gradual withdrawal, he raises the status of the object of worship from the physical, ?dhibhautika to the ?dhidaivika. To state this achievement summarily, when the physical entity is discovered to be indwelt by a principle cognate to our devam manah inside our physical body, we take a jump from the ?dhibhautika to the ?dhidaivika. This obviously is attainable through perseverance and digging within.

While the excellence of the King’s approach lies in digging still deeper until he reaches the inmost Self coinciding with Brahman, the source, sustainer and dissolvent of everything. It is that common source from which, as the Upani?ad puts it, all the senses including mind, all the worlds, all the gods and everything else emerge like flimsy sparks emerging out of the fire. It indeed is the reality of realities. If the senses and the mind, along with what they perceive and conceive, form the reality, the Self is the reality of the reality. (Brhad?ra?yaka Upani?ad, II.1.20.).

In this spectrum of the reality ranging from the physical to the spiritual, the exterior serves as the sign or symbol of the interior as it is the means of understanding of the latter. The physical world, as philosophers have been telling us since long and which is being corroborated by science quite for sometime, is not exactly the same as we perceive it; rather it must be very much different from what we see it as. Even then we take things as really what they look to be and this conviction of ours is working precisely well. As a matter of fact, entities lying over there in the outside world are just signs of what they really are serving the purpose of our understanding about them. If these signs were not formed, we could not have understood anything about the world at all, just as the blind man cannot see the form and the deaf cannot hear the word. Finally, to formulate the point, when mind without taking help of senses comes to form representative ideas about things outside, they get reformed and tend to become symbolic.

When G?rgya comes to conceive of Puru?as in the respective entities, such as the sun, etc., those physical entities become just dwelling places, indicators, outer appearances, signs and symbols of that higher entity supposed to be indwelling them and lying in transcendence of them. In this way, the entire Adhibhuta in the Vedas may be treated as symbolic of the Adhidaiva depending on the fact as to what degree the latter is independent of the former in its essence. If the U?as of the seer is the dawn itself for instance, there is nothing symbolic about it. But, if it is used to present something akin to dawn in appearance but is really independent of it and higher than it cognisable not through senses but through mind, it would certainly be symbolic of that higher entity or subtler principle, no matter whatever.

To extend this formula to the position of the King, what looks as the ideal reality worth inculcating to G?rgya, becomes something decidedly lesser in the eye of the King. This is evident from his rejection of it outright as Brahman. These very entities, however, at last have been used by him to identify tentatively the position of Atman and through the latter that of Brahman. To elucidate the point, all gods along with their respective abodes are regarded by him as having their origin and sustenance in that highest principle. Thus, the gods, as well as other entities, have been used by him as indicators of that principle lying in their transcendence. From this, we may draw the obvious conclusion that in the Veda if the Adhibhuta be supposed to have been used as the sign or symbol of the Adhidaiva, the latter would have to be taken as the same vis-à-vis the Adhyatma.

Aitareya Upani?ad explains the relationship among these three planes of being in a formulastic way. It recounts how Atman, when wishing to create the world, produced first of all a set of four principles known as Ambha, Marici, M?ra and ?pas. Out of these, it gave form to Puru?a. It made the Puru?a undergo a course of tapas. Due to the tapas opened out the organs of sense and action in the body of the Puru?a. From his mouth came out V?k and from V?k was born Agni. From his eyes was born the sun. From his ears were born the Diks while from his heart was born Manas. Agni, Sun, Diks, etc. were gods. After their birth, the Upani?ad tells us further, they felt hungry and thirsty and wished to have separate abodes for them where they could pacify their hunger and thirst.

For this, a prototypal Puru?a was brought to them. Assuming the form of V?k, Agni entered into his mouth, V?yu, as pr??a, entered into his nose, Aditya as eyesight entered into his eyes, Diks, as the power of hearing entered into his ears, Candramas as manas entered into his heart, so on and so forth.

Those who entered into different organs of the primeval Puru?a were gods while the organs, into which they entered, created through their respective functions the respective elements in the outside world such as space, air, fire, water and earth. The gods, the organs and the products of the functionings of those organs on the imperative of gods combined together to form the universe in which the individual as its epitomised product tended to behave as automation complete in itself. This tendency of the individual and, of course, of the universe as a whole, made ?tman, the Supreme, think how all this can work without itself, no matter howsoever automatic it be by virtue of the organs of sense and action functioning efficiently.

As the way out, it made a hole at the top of the head in addition to those already provided for in the body and entered into it through that hole and began to look around and found V?yu alone there outside as well as inside. It is by virtue of this all-comprehending understanding that this epiphany of the Supreme came to be called Indra whic h, as the Upani?ad explains it, is a combination of idam and dr, to see (Aitareya Up.I.1-3.).

In this Upani?adic account, we find the most profound integration of all the aspects of the reality made out in the Vedic tradition as the ?dhibhautika, ?dhidaivika and ?dhy?tmika. Due to its operation from the inmost being of the individual, the ?dhy?tmika is regarded here as the root cause of all. It is on the imperative of the V?yu lying in the inmost being of the individual that mind becomes charged and operative resulting in mobilisation and co-ordination of the functions of organs of sense and action. The organs, on the other hand, are able to operate on their respective elements in the outside world on account of those elements having themselves been born of the organs of the primeval Puru?a, as the Upani?ad states.

Thus by virtue of its admittance of Puru?a as the primeval integral reality giving birth to gods, organs of sense and action and their respective objects in the external world, the Upani?ad establishes organic relationship among all the three sorts of entities, that is, the ?dhibhautika, the ?dhidaivika and the ?dhy?tmika and provides us with the best clue for understanding their usage in the Veda.

This cognisance of the relationship existing among the Transcendent, the gods, the organs of sense and action and the world as a whole is an established fact in the Upani?ads, as is evident from its recurrence in them allegorically as well as axiomatically. The story of Um? Haimavat? narrated in the Kena Upani?ad, amounts to an expression of the same formulation. According to this story, gods at one time became proud of having defeated the Asuras by themselves. On this, a Yak?a appeared before them and stood at some distance. Gods asked Agni to go ahead and inquire who the person over there was. Being thus delegated, before Agni could ask him who he was, the Yak?a himself put the same question to Agni. On Agni’s claiming that he was the god of fire and could burn anything, the Yak?a put a blade of grass before him and asked him to burn it. Agni tried his best but could not burn it and returned crestfallen. Next was sent V?yu by the gods. The same happened with him also. The Yak?a put the same blade of grass before him and asked him to blow it off. V?yu tried his best, failed and therefore returned ashamed. Finally, was sent Indra. But, as soon as he reached the spot, the Yak?a disappeared and in his place emerged a beautiful lady named Um? Haimavat?. Indra inquired of her about the Yak?a. She told him that the Yak?a was Brahman and that it was with the support of Brahman that they were victorious over the Asuras and by no means on their own strength. Thus, the Upani?ad tells us that this is how Indra was the first amongst gods to know Brahman and consequently became prominent among them. Next in this respect came Agni and V?yu. (Kena Upanisad. III – IV).

Instances of actualisation of this possibility are to be found in the Ka?hopani?ad where it has been observed that just as fire, though one and the same, assumes diverse forms as per the substance it gets embodied in, or air, though one and the same everywhere assumes diverse forms as per the body it is embodied in, even so V?yu, the inmost Self of all, though one and the same, assumes all possible forms in the world and yet remains transcendent to it (Kathopanisad.V.9-10.). In this continuation, the Upani?ad refers to the sun also as the eye of the world and as yet not getting contaminated by whatever it makes visible. On the analogy of the same, it observes that the inmost common Self of all, though pervading everything, does not get affected by the sufferings of the world, since it is also transcendent (Kathopanisad, V.11.).

The Upani?ad even goes to the extent of quoting exactly an Rgvedic mantra to the effect that just as Agni remains hidden within the pair of fire-sticks, like the embryo in the womb of the mother, and is worshipped by people keeping awake and offering oblations, even so does the Atman lying in our inmost being. (Kathopanisad, IV.8 ). Agni as produced by rubbing the fire-sticks is obviously physical while the same as worshipped through the offering of oblations is supra-physical. Agni in both these forms is then used by the Upani?ad as well as is recognised by it to have been used as such in the Veda as a simile for bringing out the idea of the presence of the Ultimate Reality in each and everything in the world. So is the case with the air and the sun. Their serving as similes in this respect vindicates the possibility of their use in the Veda as symbols of the same Reality also, for, as has already been stated, a large number of symbols are simply similes having reached the acme of maturity.

Rgveda X.71.5 speaks of a person who has taken milk in good quantity and stands unrivalled in contests. On the contrary, the other person moves along with what are cows just in appearance, listening to words which are bereft of fruits and flowers (Rigveda .X.71.5). Obviously this mantra tells us of cow, milk, cowherd, taking of milk in good quantity and facing contests boldly and successfully. In the second place in prominence, it makes a passing reference to a situation of fruitlessness and flowerlessness of speech. The details embodied in the mantra are mutually incongruent if taken at the face value, since cow has nothing to do with language and the latter with flowers and fruits. Were this mantra to have been taken in isolation, it would have implied keeping cows well if one wanted to get milk from her, fare well in physical contests and reaping fruits from trees if maintained well. However, presence of the word v?cam puts a break to such a an interpretation. Taking cognisance of the mantra as well as the context, Y?ska straightaway substitutes cow with v?k and states cryptically, though, the real thrust of meaning of the mantra concerns v?k itself and not any cow or cowherd at all. He also substitutes milk by meaning of words and drinking of milk by the knowing of the real meaning. Likewise, he understands the physical context in the sense of the intellectual and spiritual. As regards the imagery of the flower and the fruit, he takes them as not products of any tree but as that of v?k itself with this alternative, however, that the flower of the meaning may in one case be symbolic of the benefits of sacrifice and in the other the attainment of divine while the fruit in one case may stand for attainment of the divine and in the other it may refer to the spiritual elevation (Nirukta, I.25). Thus, according to him, cow in the Veda may be symbolic of the Vedic word, milk of its meaning, cowherd of the aspirant of the meaning, flower of the external benefit of this knowledge while fruit that of the most essential one.

This equation leads to the conclusion that in Y?ska’s viewpoint, spiritual enlightenment or elevation is the basic thrust of ideas in the Veda, attainment of heavenly beatitude and sacrificial benefits being subordinate to it while physical objects and functions being just means for bringing home this thrust symbolically so as to get them materialised.

Another symbolic usage in the Veda attended to by Y?ska concerns representation of the phenomenon of life as a stream or reservoir of water and sacrifice as a boat. The imagery occurs in a Rgvedic mantra seen by K???a Angirasa. It talks of a group of persons who at the primeval stage involved themselves in the invocation of the Divine and created something worth listening to and yet not being easily fordable. In contrast to them, there is an account of those who are not capable of taking to the boat of sacrifice and consequently get sunk into destitution (Rigveda, X.44.6.). Commenting on this mantra, Y?ska traces the derivation of the word p?thak to the root prath suggesting thereby the eminence of the position attained by the primeval invokers of the Divine.

Y?ska’s suggests that this position is not only distinct from that attained by other people but is also one of width and openness. By virtue of their devotion, maintains Y?ska, these devotees of the Divine accomplished noble deeds which are difficult to be accomplished by those who are not devout like them. These noble deeds as well as the devotion lying at their root are characterised together by Y?ska after the seer as sacrifice. This sacrifice, in its turn, is conceived as a boat capable of taking people across channels and reservoirs of water unfordable otherwise. Those who take up to the way of sacrifice in life are imagined as boarding a boat and sailing safely towards their divine destination. In contrast to them, are those who non-devout who lack in the inclination to sacrifice and doing noble deeds, finally, get sunk into the water which has been conceived by Y?ska as symbolic of the debt of life. Emergence and sustenance of life in this world, from this viewpoint, is a process involving contributions of all those who are contributory to it. This would be oceanic in magnitude looming large before the person concerned as a sea of debts. Devotion, sacrifice and accomplishment of noble deeds are the only means by which one can get cleared of this debt. Clearance of it is like boarding the boat sailing for the divine destination. In the absence of such a boat, one is sure to get sunk into the water of debt. Further, this water has been conceived by Y?ska as symbolic of this world itself (Nirukta, V.25).

Another important symbolic interpretation we find in Y?ska concerns the struggle between Indra and V?tra. This struggle occupies a lot of reference in the Samhit?s, particularly the ?gveda forming the most important single theme of its contents. Y?ska’s thought on this important theme is interesting which occurs in the course of his comment on ?gveda I.32.10. The mantra talks of waters moving constantly and having submerged in them the body of V?tra. When V?tra is killed by Indra, the mantra states, his body lies enshrouded in long darkness while the waters make inroad in the secret place of his hiding (Rigveda I.32.10).

Commenting on this mantra, Y?ska on behalf of the Nairukta school of Vedic interpretation identifies V?tra in the form of cloud. Justifying this proposition, he makes out a significant point regarding formation of cloud and consequent rain. He observes to the effect that cloud is formed through combined action and interaction of water and light. This observation, no doubt, is highly significant particularly in view of the antiquity of Y?ska. Needless to point out that this is precisely how cloud gets formed. It is nothing but a mass of water vaporised by rays of the sun and moving visibly in the horizon. In course of its movement in the horizon, the cloud appears to assume various forms. Particularly at the time of rain, it appears to present a spectacle of war with movement of patches of cloud like chariots, elephants and horses and the shining of lightning appearing as swords in brisk use. In view of this similarity of the Vedic accounts of the encounter of Indra and V?tra with the scenario of cloud, lightning and rain, Y?ska, along with other scholars of his school, thinks that V?tra is simply the cloud appearing to be engaged by lightning so as to shed rain. Indra, in that circumstance, would be a figurative representation of the principle responsible for making clouds dissolve in the form of water. The apparent resistance of the cloud in this process would from that viewpoint be considered as V?tra’s unwillingness to submit to Indra. Thus, according to Y?ska, the entire story of war between Indra and V?tra is simply a figurative account of the spectacle of cloud, lightning and rain (Nirukta,. II.16).

This interpretation is ?dhibhautika and it would have been helpful had Y?ska appended this remark below the comment but he makes such notes only in the case of ?dhidaivika and ?dhy?tmika interpretations and scarcely in the case of the ?dhibhautika. This self-imposed economy of words seems to have been imperative in restraining him from making such a remark here which otherwise would have been immensely useful in deciding the real thrust of meaning of the Veda. In the absence of any such remark, scholars following Y?ska found it quite convenient to interpret Indra-V?tra accounts in terms of cloud, lightning and rain caring little for the possibility of other two ways of interpretation, i.e., the ?dhidaivika and the ?dhy?tmika. This legacy of misunderstanding was found handy by modern scholars to beat back the possibility of those interpretations to the extent of almost finality.

Another contribution to the understanding of the Vedic symbolism which Y?ska has made concerns the monosyllabic word Om. The word occupies a prominent position in the Vedic tradition right from the period of the Br?hma?as. Even as early a text as the Katha Upani?ad characterises it as the quintessence of all the Vedas besides forming the objective of all austerities and self-restraints (Kathopanisad, II.15). This word, however, though available right from the Yajurveda, is not visibly traceable in the ?gveda, the fountainhead of the entire Vedic literature. This conspicuous absence creates problem in the interpretation of several Vedic passages besides giving a jolt to the traditional belief that the sacred word Om is the source of all the Vedas. It has also led to the suggestion that this word is a somewhat later innovation and has managed to be associated necessarily with the recitation of each and every Vedic mantra, just like the Vy?hrtis getting added to the sacred G?yatr? mantra.

Y?ska, however, comes to the rescue of the traditional belief through his remark on a particular Rgvedic mantra. This mantra has been seen by D?rghatamas and it talks of parame vyoman as the source and resort of rks wherein all the gods dwell and further asserts that he who does not understand this parame vyoman has nothing to gain from the rks (Rigveda, I.164.39). Observing like this, the mantra also introduces the word ak?ara immediately preceding parame vyoman and that also in the same case and number. This ak?ara may plausibly be taken as an adjective qualifying parame vyoman. Ak?ara denotes the state of imperishability. In that case, aksare parame vyoman would mean the imperishable highest heaven. If this meaning is accepted, that imperishable highest heaven would have to be accepted as the source as well resort of both rks and gods.

However, there is an alternative possibility which may turn ak?ara into a substantive. In that case, it would be possible to take the ak?ara itself as the receptacle of rks while parame vyoman as the receptacle of ak?ara.

This second possibility opens the scope for tracing the word Om in the ?gveda. Om is monosyllabic, therefore, it can legitimately be regarded as an ak?ara, though not the simple one. On account of being a combination of a, u, and m, it does not remain an ak?ara from the linguistic viewpoint. But from the metrical viewpoint, it is an ak?ara, as this viewpoint treats au also as well an ak?ara as any of the simple vowels such as a, i, u, and e. As the viewpoint of the seer would much more probably have been metrical than linguistic, it is quite legitimate to infer that by ak?ara in the mantra he is intending primarily the monosyllabic sound Om itself rather than sheer imperishability qualifying parame vyoman. It is also true at the same time that the word ak?ara in the sense of syllable even is not exclusive of the sense of imperishability, since metrically syllable has been considered as the last unbreakable unit of language. Moreover, if language is admitted as co-ordinate to reality, as has been stated in the ?gveda itself, there does not remain any difference between ak?ara as a syllable and that as qualifying the imperishability of the highest heaven, as is meant by parame vyoman (Rigveda, X.114.8.).

Y?ska, in course of his comment on the mantra comes to concentrate on the word ak?ara and happens to ask as to what it is. At this juncture, he comes to be reminded of ??kap??i’s view on this word. According to him, ??kap??i understood ak?ara in this context as Om itself which Y?ska on his behalf characterises as V?k rather than ?abda as per the usage in the earlier part of the Vedic tradition. This shows the depth of the sense in which he himself takes the word in this context. Moving forward from this statement he further observes: “The Rks are contemplated upon in the imperishable highest transcendence of all things.” It is becomes clear from this statement that he does not refute the view of ??kap??i but rather accepts it. Finally, he puts the seal of his approval of it by quoting from the Kau??taki Br?hma?a to the effect that it is the same Ak?ara which has assumed various forms in the Vedic wisdom (Nirukta, XIII.10).

However, he considers the above explanation of Ak?ara as coincident to Om as only one of the possibilities, particularly on the lines of Adhidaiva and Adhyatma. By way of the possible ?dhidaivika explanation, he quotes the son of ??kap??i. According to the latter, Ak?ara is symbolical of the sun while gods based in Ak?ara represent the rays of the sun. As regards Rks said to be based in Ak?ara, he takes them as related to the sun by way of being addressed to it. Whatever of the sun stands beyond the reach of mantras, he observes, is Ak?ara. Whether Y?ska himself approves of this explanation or not, is not clear. On his own, he suggests the possibility of a third explanation, i.e., the ?dhy?tmika. From this viewpoint, Ak?ara stands for the principle of immortality in the human personality while Rk for the body. Under this scheme of explanation, gods are supposed to represent the senses as all of them meet together in Atman, the principle of immortality (Nirukta, XII.11).

Thus, we see how Y?ska moves ultimately back to the sun and the Atman in his effort to get the basic idea embedded in the mantras. The other sorts of explanation such as sacrificial, linguistic, metrical, historical, etc. are made subordinate to them. From amongst these two also, his final emphasis is laid on the spiritual rather than on the solar. As has been pointed out earlier, the solar has been introduced by him not for its own sake but for the sake of the spiritual on account of being somewhat analogous to the spectacle of the Atman enlarging itself in the external world through the sense organs in the same way as the sun enlarges itself by means of its rays. As the sun projects and withdraws the rays alternatively, even so the Atman projects out of itself the senses including manas and withdraws them within itself after they have served its intended purpose.

This way of de-symbolisation of the Vedic mantras is not Y?ska’s invention. It is embedded in the Br?hma?as already. But its most succinct account is to be found in the Asya V?m?ya hymn itself. D?rghatamas, the seer, opens the hymn obviously with an account of the solar phenomenon but after a few mantras settles down to the investigation of the Atman and its relationship with mind and senses and through them with the external world itself as formed, revealed and dominated by the sun. This close correspondence between the solar and the spiritual spectacles forms the central theme of the Vedas. Having rightly been cognised as such by Y?ska as well as by the Br?hma?as and the Upani?ads, it has been utilised by him in his formulation of the ?dhidaivika and ?dhy?tmika ways of de-symbolisation of the symbols in the Veda.

The equivalent of `symbol’ in the Sanskrit tradition is pratika. This is a significant word and has been noted down by Y?ska though only incidentally. Even then, a review of the word as used by him is likely to shed some light on our perusal on these lines.

While commenting on a mantra seen by Par??ara and making use of the word pratika, Y?ska comes to spell out such expressions as bhaya-pratika, mah?pratika and diptapratika as explanatory of the Rgvedic tve?apraika suggesting thereby that the word pratika has been used here in the sense of appearance as distinct from but expressive of the reality (Nirukta, X.21).

This is the function of symbol as it seeks to represent an object or thought-content in such a way as to communicate the intended message in the best possible form, almost in the same way as the lustre of the fire brings home the fact of the presence of the fire. It is in this sense that lustre has been described by the seer, as quoted by Y?ska, as a prat?ka of the fire. Here the relationship between prat?ka and object represented by it is evidently causal. A large number of Vedic mantras make use of this sort of symbol, and such symbols provide for the ?dhibhautika interpretation of the Veda. This goes well to some extent but gets stuck to that extent itself proving unhelpful. Such a situation arises due to a radical change in the modus operandi or nature of the symbol concerned. Instead of remaining consistently causal, it tends to become more and more analogical and thus breaks away from the routine course leaving the reader struggling on the lines being followed erstwhile without getting the way out. It is at this juncture that arises the necessity of studying the other possible varieties of symbols based on analogies but if perused in depth likely to have some or the other kind of deeper relationship with the content it seeks to symbolise. Spiritual interpretation of the Veda beyond the physical and the ?dhidaivika is the result of decipherment of symbols on these lines.

(Chapters on Yaska — Concluded)