Dr.Thompson' dating of the RV...

[Vishal Agarwal]

Sri Iyer wrote:
"Shri Agarwalji,
Greek texts are much more varied in contents than
Vedic works - ritual priests' operation manuals usually. I understand that
you do not support Rajaram who is of course opposed to Jan Gonda and George
Thompson studying our holiest of the holy books. Reading Gonda and Thompson
I do not feel they deserve the honor - "absurdity".

Vishal responds:
First, please do not add honorific suffixes to my name. My age (28 years)
does not warrant it. Secondly, the Vedic texts are not merely ritual
manuals. The belief that 'all Vedas are meant for dravya yajnas' itself is
very old ('Yajno vai shresthhatama karma" Shatpatha 1.1.1.1) and dates from
the period of Brahmanas itself. The present collections/.arrangement of
Mantras might have been done to suit ritualistic applications, but the truth
is that a majority of them have no connect to rituals. Another point that is
missed by many is that the Brahmanas, (even though in Vedic Sanskrit), cite
several verses in 'Laukika Sanskrit' with the introduction "Atraita slokah'
and so on. Is there any strong reason to believe that these are later
additions?

Regarding Dr. Rajaram's attitude towards the Vedas, he informed us that
being a scientist, he cannot believe that they are of divine origin. So I
think we can safely discount any religious motives in his analyses. At best,
we can say that it favors Indian Nationalism (although the gang of 'Eminent
Historians' would prefer the term 'Hindu communalism.' For an expose on
them, 'Colonial Indology' by Chakrabarti is a good reference).

As far as my attitude towards Dr. Gonda is concerned, please refer to my
earlier post on him wherein I actually praised his works for their
comprehensiveness, thoroughness and my adjective 'Absurd' was restricted to
his English translation of the Rigvidhana. Secondly, I said that ' when
looks at the absurdities of his translations (again with reference to some
verses of Rgvidhana), one is left perplexed." So I have not condemned him
per se.. Rather I have carefully chosen a mild word to end my post. I still
say that many of his works do offer valuable insights, although others have
questionable merit.

Will respond to my views on Dr, Thompson later.

Best regards,

Vishal




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