Eka

The word eka is derived by adding the suffix kan to the verbal root in. The meaning of the verbal root in is “to advance obliquely or tapering to a point, while moving quickly”. Tiryak → tirachaa → teracha → tirachá / terachá / terechá. Where multiple ideas or propensities or purposes become pointed like a needle, become centered in a point, while moving in rapid step, then the verbal root in is used for that style of moving. That is, the etymological meaning of the verbal root in is “to become pointed”, “to arrive at a single point after abandoning multiplicity”. Thus the verbal root in implies leading the many forward on the path of synthesis. By adding the suffix kan to this verbal root in we get the word eka. The etymological meaning of the word eka is “the point of a needle”. Since the point of a needle cannot be many, cannot be two-three-four-five, its colloquial meaning is “one”.

This word eka, derived from the verbal root in, is originally Rgvedic. In this world there are a great many languages descended from Vedic. Latin and its European descendants are all Vedic. The northern languages of Central Asia are descended from Vedic. The languages of south and southeast Asia are either descended from Vedic or have vocabularies which are rich in Vedic words. From the Rgvedic word eka we get the old Persian word iyak which carries the same meaning. From this word iyak, in later times, comes the word ik in several languages, and from the numerical adjective ik we get the words ikái, ikká and so on.

There are many words used in Vedic which come from eka such as ekadá, ekaka, ekákii, and many others. Eka + ka = ekaka [solitary] which means “where work and business are centered on one”. Ekákii [alone] means “absence of multiplicity”. Ekadá means “once upon a time”. By adding the suffix dác to the root eka in the nominal inflection we get this word ekadá which means “at one certain time”. By adding the suffix dhác to the root eka we get the word ekadhá which means “to flow in a single stream” or “to proceed with a single inspiration”. The suffix dác is generally used to signify “temporal succession” and the suffix dhác “continuity”. Shatadhá [hundredfold] means “to be carried in the flow of shata [one hundred];” similarly, bahudhá [in many ways] means “to advance in the flow of bahu [many].” I wanted to explain the meaning of a few words derived from eka.

Roughly speaking, the languages descended from Vedic include the majority of the European languages, the Middle-East’s Turkish language, Armenian, Farsi, Uzbeki, Tazaki, Kazaki, Pashtu, Kashmiri, Pahari or Pahari Punjabi, Dogri, Punjabi, Sindhi, Multani, Hariyanwi, Hindustani, Marwari, Dhundharu, Miwati, Haraoti, Mewari, Malwi, Kacchi, Kathiawari, Gujrati, Marathi, Khandeshi, Niwari, Barari, Konkani, Garhwali, Kumayuni, Brajabhasa, Awadhi, Bundeli, Bagheli, Chattisgari, Halwi, Bhojpuri, Magahi, Nagpuri or Sadri or Sadani, Sambalpuri, Oriya, Bengali, Singhali, Angika, Maethilii, Gorkhali (Nepali) and Assamese.

Besides the languages descended from Vedic, there are many languages in the world which are not Vedic in origin but which contain a great number of Vedic Sanskrit words. In some cases the number is greater than that of some Vedic descendants. For example, among the Dravidian languages (drámil → drávil → dráviŕ → támil), the proportion of Sanskrit words in Malayalam is greater than that of the pure Vedic language Kashmiri. There is also a great abundance of Sanskrit words in Telugu and Kannad. In both the Thai and Indonesian languages, there is such an abundance of Sanskrit words that it exceeds that of Pashtu,⁽¹⁾ a direct descendant. Those languages which are not descendants of Vedic or Sanskrit, but which contain a great abundance of Sanskrit or Vedic words, we can call snigdha tadbhava [adopted descendants]. Each member of the Malay group of languages of southeast Asia (Malay, Sumatran, Balian, Javan, Tagalog, etc.) is an “adopted descendant”. The amount of adopted descent among the Indo-Burman languages is not equal in each case; the greatest affinity to Vedic among these languages is found in the Thai language (Siamese). There is no other language existing outside of India that has such a large Vedic and Sanskrit vocabulary.

Although there is some small Chinese influence in the pronunciation of the Siamese language and dialects, the influence of the Gaod́iiya (Bengali) style of Sanskrit pronunciation is significantly greater. The reason for this is most likely because a prince of Rarh, Sahasrabahu, founded his kingdom there in ancient times. After conquering parts of Thailand and Malaysia, he annexed them into his own kingdom and named his capital Singhapur (Singapore) after the capital of Rarh.⁽²⁾ Since the country was always shyámala [green] he named it Shyámadesh. In recent times the name of Shyámadesh has been changed, of course, but the word shyáma⁽³⁾ is still quite current in the people’s daily life there.

Anyhow, Sahasrabahu’s conquest of Siam took place approximately two thousand years ago. While staying in Thailand this fact especially attracted this writer’s ear. Many words that were used in the Bengali of that time (Eastern Demi-Mágadhii) still survive today in their original form in the Thai language. As a final word I will add that without the proper cultivation of the Sanskrit language, it is impossible, not only in the field of the science of language, but also in the world of psychic expression, to be considered a true scholar or learned person. The cultivation and teaching of Sanskrit is indispensable in the world of education. And although it is a little off the subject, it is good to mention here that as far as race or community or nation goes, while the Bengalees are Austrico-Mongolo-Negroid with little Aryan influence, the Bengali language is of pure Sanskrit lineage.

Ekarśi

Ekarśi. Eka + rśi = ekarśi. Ekarśi is the name of a kind of fire which was considered very sacred by ancient people. In the Vedas it is written:

Vrátyastvaḿ práńasya rśirattá vishvasya satpatih;
Vayamádyasya dátárah pitá tvaḿ mátarishva nah.

In the Atharvaveda, the word Práńa is frequently used for Parama Puruśa. For Paramá Prakrti the words Rayi, Rayá and Raye are used. In this shloka it is said, “O Práńa, O Parama Puruśa, You are a high, great object, as sacred as the ekarśi fire. Conversely, You are a very ordinary object like any other object. This universe is finally dissolved in You.” (Attá means “eater, devourer”.) “O Parama Puruśa, we offer ghee and many other objects for Your satisfaction. You are the very dynamism, the mobility, inherent in the existence of all entities.”

In prehistoric days, human beings did not know about fire. Prehistoric human beings used to live on fruits, roots, tender green leaves and raw meat. Those places where the Aryans used to live were also teeming with white bears, wolves and other animals. The Aryans would fall prey to attacks by these animals, but they also used to kill them with the help of their stone weapons. The raw meat of the animals they killed, especially the liver, spleen and heart, was their favourite food.

They knew neither how to light a fire, nor the use of fire. Out of fear and devotion they used to venerate Agni [fire-god] as their deity. They used to be afraid of lightening and believed that when the earth shook it was because it was afraid of lightening, that the earth was terrified. Indra, the king of this lightening was the absolute authority, so he was the best of all. One root meaning of the word indra is “best”. To them Indra deserved worship. The god of snow-storms, Marut [the wind], was another venerable entity to them. The huge waves of the sea brought terror to their minds, thus Varuńa, the god of the sea, was another of their chief deities. Agni, Marut, Indra, Varuńa and the rest stood out before these prehistoric humans as their chief gods. Behind these powerful, mighty, variously-manifest entities was another solitary entity. Those who searched for Him were the rśis of that initial era. With this search the first dawn of the Vedas filled humanity’s eastern cultural horizon with its crimson light.

The days passed. A few thousand years went by. They used to wear animal skins, not to cover their shame, but rather to save themselves from the cold’s fierce grip (for this they used the verbal root úrńu). Such was the condition of the humans of those days. Language was still undeveloped and they had yet to discover script, but they used to band together and live in mountain caves, and they used bone and stone implements. With the help of these implements they would draw pictures depicting their prehistoric thinking and experiences. These were the oldest examples of their art.

Time continued its inexorable march. Human beings discovered fire. The discovery of fire, or better to say, the invention of fire, marked the most significant day in human history. After the invention of fire, people began to use it. It took a few more centuries to refine the uses of fire. Gradually, people learned to use fire properly. They learned to eat roasted meat instead of raw meat and to make other kinds of food much tastier by partially cooking them.⁽⁴⁾ They learned the use of salt. Earlier they used to satisfy their bodies’ need for salt by licking salty earth. Ultimately, with the help of fire and other means, they were able to produce salt and learned how to use it.

We can look at this special stage of human civilization as the time when prehistoric humans stepped into the periphery and power of history. After the terrifying night of their dark caves, the first dawn of optimism started to peep over their eastern horizon. The crimson dawn was another of their gods.

This first moment of the invention of fire distinguished human beings as the greatest of living creatures. Through the use of fire, sky-kissing civilizations were built that could give everything to humankind – everything, that is, except life’s deeper beatitude. One of the contributions civilization did make was to give humans an engulfing, domineering pride over all life. This pride may one day tumble them from the highest peaks down to the ground and turn them into dust.

Fire is indispensable. Humans cannot survive without fire. Metallurgy, and the manufacture of wheels, vehicles, weapons, agricultural tools and weaving machines, are all by the grace of fire. It is not an easy task to prepare fire. In the initial stage, they produced fire through the frictional heat of rubbing two pieces of flint together. Fire could not be kept by just anybody. A few rśis [sages] were designated to keep fire.

In those days, people lived mainly in the forests, constructing shelters in tall trees in imitation of birds’ nests, or in mountain caves. Gotra [which also came to mean “clan”] was the Vedic word for both “mountain” and “large forest”.

In the beginning, a head woman would be the leader of each gotra. She was the gotramátá [matriarch]. Later came the age of male dominance. The head of the gotra would then be a male rśi. His followers took pride in the rśi, who was designated to keep the fire. That fire-keeping sage was called a ságnik or ágnihotrii. He would worship fire as a holy god. He would offer sumptuous foods into the fire for the satisfaction of Ágni, the fire-god. This was called havana. The general term for these offerings and sacrifices was yajiṋa. The word yajiṋa (yaj + na) means “action”, a special type of action, an auspicious action. The root verb yaj means “to do a work”. Yaj + ghaiṋ = yága. When a ságnik fell ill or was absent, his patnii [wife] or son would protect the fire and provide it fuel. In this connection, I would like to discuss something about the meaning of the term patnii.

Prior to Lord Shiva, there was no institution of marriage in human society. As fathers and mothers were not bound by the ties of duty, the innocent children suffered tremendous hardship. The mothers had to bear a great burden as they had to shoulder the entire responsibility of rearing the children. The result was that the women’s progress in different spheres of life was thwarted. Shiva, through the application of logic and strength, forced husbands and wives into a social bond. That was the first time social marriage took place in this world. The system that Shiva introduced has continued in different ways throughout the world into the modern age.

After Shiva’s time, opportunistic men divided the social status of women into various categories. We can roughly analyse the following levels:

Patnii: A patnii enjoyed equal religious and social rights as her husband.⁽⁵⁾ Her children were entitled to all religious and social rights as their inheritance.

Jáyá: A jáyá was deprived of the religious rights, but was entitled to the social rights of her husband. Her children were entitled to the religious and social rights of their father.

Bháryá: A bháryá was not allowed any of the religious or social rights of her husband. But as the marriage was recognized, her children were entitled to the religious and social rights of their father. A bháryá was married only to perpetuate the lineage, not to give the woman dignity. That’s why it was declared: Puttrárthe kriyate bháryá [“A bháryá is taken on only for the sake of male children”].

Kalatra: Some time before the Buddhist age, the system of kalatra was introduced, but it did not receive encouragement in the Buddhist period. It remained in an obscure form, but later gained ascendancy in the post-Buddhist age. In this husband-wife relationship, the wife did not enjoy the religious and social rights of her husband. The children were also denied any of the paternal religious or social rights; they inherited their mother’s gotra, caste and social rights according to the system of anuloma and pratiloma.⁽⁶⁾ For instance, if the father was a Vipra, an “intellectual”, and the mother a Shúdra, their child did not receive its father’s caste; that is, the child was not a Vipra, but was put into the caste of its mother, that is, was treated as a Shúdra. Or suppose the father belonged to the Bharadváj Gotra. His child did not necessarily belong to the Bharadváj Gotra. For instance, if the mother’s gotra was Káshyapa, then her child belonged to the Káshyapa Gotra. If, furthermore, the marriage was not socially recognized, the children were not entitled even to their mother’s gotra and caste. They were vrátya [outcaste].

The word vrátya occurs in the shloka in the earlier part of this essay. That is, in the period when this shloka was composed there was a rejected fifth caste suggested by this word vrátya.

Although kalatra means “wife”, it is neuter gender. It will not be declined as kalatrah or kalatrá but as kalatram. (Yad bharttureva hitamicchati tad kalatram [“One who wishes the welfare of her husband is kalatra”].)

(Similarly, the word dára means “wife”, but it is in masculine gender and plural number. So its declension will be like that of nara [“man”]. That is why when it is declined in the first case, it will always be dárá. When it is used in a sentence, dára is changed into dárá. But as the original word is dára, the Sanskrit expression is dára parigraha [“to take a wife”], not dárá parigraha when used in the sense of a man’s marriage. A widower will be called mrtadára, not mrtadárá, a bachelor is akrtadára and not akrtadárá.)

Needless to say, as the children of kalatras were not entitled to paternal religious and social rights, they were not permitted to keep fire either. If a kalatra marriage was socially recognized, the children were entitled to the maternal religious and social rights. Only if their mother was permitted to keep fire did her children inherit the right to keep fire.

Niyoga custom: When the kuliina [high born] system abruptly burst forth like a meteor or comet, cursing the whole society, its corollary, niyoga, spontaneously burgeoned.⁽⁷⁾

It was extremely difficult for the kuliinas who married so many women to maintain them all with food and clothes. Some of the wives stayed in their husband’s house and the rest of the wives would remain in their fathers’ houses. In many cases, even though a child of a kuliina wife was recognized as the legitimate child of its mother’s lawful husband, usually it was the offspring of a socially unrecognized mate of the wife. These socially unrecognized mates were called niyoga pati [niyoga husband]. The children would call that particular man niyoga pitá [niyoga father], and the children were niyoga putra [niyoga sons]. The Pandava brothers of the Mahábhárata were the niyoga putras of different fathers. Society somewhat accepted this system. Although the children inherited the gotra and caste of their mother’s legitimate husband, or even his social and religious rights, they did not inherit the natural inheritable qualities of their fathers, as there was no blood relation between the husband and the niyoga putras. In this niyoga system, the number of kuliinas increased by leaps and bounds, but the standard of quality could not be kept. The inevitable result of this ugly system was that the intellectual level of the kuliinas gradually declined. The children of the niyoga pitá could inherit the social and religious rights of their socially-accepted father, but were not authorized from the paternal side to keep fire. Most of them were not born or brought up in the paternal home, rather they would stay with their maternal uncles.

Pratiloma: In the cases where the father was of an upper caste and the mother was of a lower caste, the offspring born under such an anuloma system were entitled to their father’s gotra and caste but not his religious and social rights. (This was the case in the patriarchal social system. But in the matrilineal social system the children would inherit the mother’s gotra, caste and social and religious rights.)

But if the marriage took place under the pratiloma system, the children were only entitled to their father’s gotra, but not his caste nor any other rights whatsoever. Nor were they entitled to their mother’s gotra, caste, or social and religious rights. Hundreds of castes and sub-castes were created due to the children born out of this socially-unacceptable pratiloma system.

In Bengal also, many small castes and communities were created, and they exist to this day. Needless to say, none of these castes had the right to keep fire.

You can easily understand from these events and various marriage systems that women were merely playthings in the hands of a group of opportunistic, capricious men. Today their position has changed on paper, but the actual position remains virtually the same as before. People guided by righteous intellect should be vocal against these ugly customs and injustices to women. Further, they should work to abolish these things without any more delay. The path which Lord Shiva showed for social emancipation should be adhered to by His followers. The path should be made wider, paved well, and made easily accessible, instead of making it more thorny.

What I have said about the preservation of the sacred fire was the norm but there were some few exceptions. There were even some rśis who did the various works for preserving the fire by themselves such as the fire rituals, feeding it with wood and so on. They did not even take the help of their sons and wives. A fire that was preserved and tended by one such rśi was known as ekarśi. An ekarśi fire was considered extremely holy. The shloka which was quoted at the beginning refers to Parama Puruśa as being as ordinary as an outcaste and also as holy an entity as an ekarśi fire, that is, He is the best of the best and the commonest of the common, the supreme of the supreme and the lowest point among all low points.

In ancient times there was the custom of interring a person after death or floating the body on water. After the discovery and invention of fire people considered it proper to burn the dead body. Thus in the pre-Vedic and at the beginning of the Vedic era the prevalent custom was to bury the body. In later times, much later times, the system of cremation came into vogue. When the system of cremation became common people used to think: This rśi who tended, preserved and meticulously served the fire throughout his life with the help of orally-pronounced mantras will no longer preserve the fire with the help of those mantras. Thus, at the time of offering his dead body to the fire, the ekarśi fire should first touch his mouth one last time; then let the burning grass or hay consume the rest of him. This custom of touching the mouth with the ekarśi fire gradually became transformed into a social tradition. Those who did not maintain the ekarśi fire also had fire put into their mouths. The rule was even introduced for those who had nothing to do with the fire at all. What was tradition became a compulsory social observation.

When superstition entangles a person it likes to tie him up thoroughly, step by step. This fire-in-the-mouth ritual became one such type of thing. The priestly tradition also devised a new mantra to accompany this putting of fire in the mouth; this mantra has no relationship with the ekarśi fire of ancient times. I do not even like to think about the abominable way we put fire in the mouth of our recently departed loved ones at the time of performing their funeral rites. The mantra also is also unusual. The common people either do not understand the mantra or recite it out of fear; it bears no relationship whatsoever to the original ekarśi fire.

The mantra goes like this:

Krtvá tu duśkrtaḿ karma jánatá vápyajánatá;
Mrtyukálavashaḿ prápya naraḿ paiṋcatvamágatam.
Dharmádharmasamáyuktaḿ lobhamohasamávrtam;
Daheyaḿ sarvagátráńi divyán lokán sah gacchatu.

That is: “This deceased being may have committed bad actions, knowingly or unknowingly. Today he has been swallowed by death; today he has reached the state of dissolution into the five elements. In him was righteousness and unrighteousness. He was enveloped by greed and attachment. Now let his entire body be consumed by the fire. May he go to heaven.” Anyhow, whoever likes it, let them recite it, but superstition-free human beings act with due reflection and thought.

At one time people supported the inhumanness and cruelty or irrationality behind the practice of sati by using the scriptures as a pretext. Later it was seen that that scriptural support was not authentic. Wise and learned men should think carefully just how far this practice of putting fire in the mouth is desirable. This practice may not be as terrible as sati, but that it is an abominable practice there is little room for doubt.

The ekarśi fire that was put into the mouth of the munis was the fire that they themselves preserved. Today the fire that is put in the mouth is the fire that is produced from a match (deshlái).⁽⁸⁾ Is this not a mockery of history?

Women were considered unfit to maintain the fire; then why should fire be put in their mouths? This is yet another glaring example of illogic. Anyhow, I talk about it to bring it to the attention of all people of developed wisdom and intellect.

Ekaváhana

The word váhana means “that which, by riding, one goes from one place to another”, in English “vehicle”. There was an ancient conception that the gods and goddesses used certain animals as vehicles. Of course, in those days there were no planes or trains or rockets. If we take the case of a person using a vehicle – let us say a thousand people are riding the train from Calcutta to Delhi – these one thousand people will be called one another’s ekaváhana (co-passengers).

Ekaváda

[The following section was also printed separately as “The Science of Instrumental Music Has Multifarious Expressions” in Saḿgiita: Song, Dance and Instrumental Music. This is the Saḿgiita: Song, Dance and Instrumental Music, 1st edition, version.]

Eka + vad + ghaiṋ. That musical instrument which produces sound in harmony (mutually related notes of the scale) is called ekaváda. Among the musical instruments familiar to us, the harmonium and the tamboura fall into this category. Among insects and animals, the cricket, owl, frog and jackal follow to some extent this same system [producing sound in harmony]. The donkey, cuckoo and Indian nightingale follow it to a limited degree. The sitar or esraj do not fall into the category of ekaváda. Some people think that ekaváda means ekatárá [a one-stringed instrument]. No, the Sanskrit word for ekatárá is samaváda, not ekaváda.

The subject of ekaváda brings back a forgotten memory. At that time myself and Prasenjit used to go to the hills every evening to practise the esraj [four-stringed bowed instrument]. The esraj belonged to Prasenjit. I was trying to see if the esraj could be played as an ekaváda or not; and, if it could, how would it effect the surasaptaka [musical octave]? In what measure would it produce major and minor notes? Things sound very different under ordinary conditions and ekaváda conditions.

Every evening, after we had been practising for a little while, we seemed to be hearing someone playing an unknown rágińii [musical tunes] on an unknown instrument coming from the distant hills. Both of us would listen for some time. We couldn’t see anyone. Sometimes we would think that we were hearing the echoes of our esraj but after a few moments we would realize our mistake because how could the echoes of the esraj last so long? And moreover what we were playing was not the rágińii we were hearing in the echo. But there was no instrumentalist, no instrument that we could see anywhere. After spending some time in that astonishing environment, we would again come down from the hills. When we would get down to the plain at the bottom, that music would disappear over the horizon.

On this particular day it had gotten quite late. Why Prasenjit hadn’t come I didn’t know. Normally he would come first and I would come later.

I was sitting there alone when that intoxicating melody, that rapturous sound, came floating over the forest of shál [Shorea robusta] and palásh [Butea monosperma] trees. I thought to myself: As long as Prasenjit is not here, nor his esraj, why don’t I go on ahead a bit and look for that unknown, unfamiliar instrumentalist.

I started climbing. The moon had come out and everything was clearly visible. After the hill where I was there was a huge, uneven plateau filled with pebbles and broken stones and a catechu jungle. A few jackals sitting under a plum tree eating plums fled when they saw me coming. A little further on I saw three or four hyenas (gobághá, háṋŕol, tarakśu) sitting quietly; when they saw me they first tried to guess whether I was their friend or foe. After they saw that I wasn’t moving in their direction they continued sitting where they were. A bárshiuṋga deer appeared, running swiftly from north to south; perhaps a tiger had been chasing him.

I went ahead, on and on and on. The melody came in waves, sometimes clear and sometimes faint, sometimes close and sometimes far, very far. A little farther on I came to a small piyáshál (piyál – a kind of shál) jungle; the shál flowers were then in blossom, full of intoxicating nectar.

The music grew even clearer. Everything was glittering in the moonlight. I went ahead. The sound now seemed to be quite near. I came to a palásh jungle and started reciting a poem to myself:

Kiḿshuk bane áji nirjane ke tumi viińá bájáo
Dekhá dáo more dekhá dáo.
Aḿshuk-sama ujjval mane mádhurii chaŕiye jáo.
Cáoná to tumi kichu kakhano, hayto neiko prayojan kono
Bháver atiite vijane nibhrte e kii váńii shońáo
Ámár maner rikta nilaye, dhará deve ki ná-bale, ná-kaye
Jyotsná-snáta prayáta pradośe asiimer gán gáo.⁽⁹⁾

[Who are you, playing the viińá today, alone in the kiḿshuk forest?
Show yourself to me, show yourself.
Scatter the radiant, moon-like sweetness of your mind.
You never want anything, perhaps you have no need of anything.
What a message you play, beyond thought, in this lonely, solitary place.
In this empty abode of my mind, will you let me catch you without speaking?
Sing the song of endlessness in this late evening bathed in moonlight.]

The blooming flowers of the palásh trees looked as if they were lit with fire. In the middle of the jungle, in a place where the trees were sparser, I saw a young man about my age, nineteen or twenty, seated on a mound. His body was like a motion picture, a play of light and shadow. His face was bright and he was wearing an ornament in his ear and glittering bangles around his wrists. In his hands was a stringed instrument and he was playing according to his inspiration. When I approached he stopped playing, stood up and said to me in Sanskrit: “I’ve been waiting for you – for ma-a-a-ny days now.”

“Yes, I’ve often heard you play,” I replied. “What is that instrument you have?”

“It’s an ancient viińá, viiń in the spoken language. Seven or seven and a half thousand years ago this was the only musical instrument in the world. When Shiva first started his musical sadhana then he had to do it with this viińá. Can you tell me how long ago that was?”

“That was 7500 years ago,” I replied.

“Yes, I also guess it to be the same. I’ve been playing this viińá for the last 7500 years. For a long time I’ve had the desire to play once for you. This viińá is a quite simple stringed instrument. You must have heard its harmonies.”

“Certainly,” I replied.

“Over time,” he continued, “this viińá changed into different kinds of viińás and viińs, the sitar, esraj, tamboura, violin and so many others. Some of them had frets and others not. Just think of it! Shiva had to make practically superhuman efforts with this primitive viińá. He had to invent the scale. He had to string his instrument very carefully to get the proper sound. It was Shiva who made the rágas and rágińiis. He introduced soul-stirring modulation into them. He felt the need for musical metre – without metre and tempo there could be no song. To maintain the rhythm he invented the horn and the d́ambaru [a small drum shaped like an hourglass]. In the post-Shiva, Vedic era this tabor and horn took the form of the mrdauṋga. That was during the end of the Yajurvedic era and the beginning of the Atharvavedic era. From the original mrdauṋga developed in later times the Benares mrdauṋga and the Bengal mrdauṋga or khola (the Vaeśńavas also sometimes call it shriikhola). The mrdauṋga and khola, however, are not identical, so their sound is also not the same.

“Our tabla is a metamorphosed form of this mrdauṋga. Some people believe that the tabla came from Persia but this is not the case; the tabla originated in this country. From Persia we have gotten the sitar and the gazal, from Turkey, hává-gazal. Although the viiń originated in this country and has been here since the time of Shiva, we have gotten its descendant, the violin, from Italy. This viiń that I am holding fell out of use nearly six thousand years ago. I was thinking that I should play it for you, so I’ve been sitting here, day after day, night after night, playing it. I haven’t slept but neither my body nor my mind has become tired. I am a sound wave, the musical modulation in the minds of human beings.”

“I wasn’t able to hear the entire melody of the piece you were playing,” I said. “If it’s okay with you would you play once more?”

“Why just once? I’ll play a hundred times! The only reason I came to this shál-palásh forest was to play for you.”

He started to play. His fingers were remarkable, the way they danced over the strings. After he stopped I asked: “Was that the very ancient sindhubhaeravii that has disappeared?”

“You are quite correct. That was sindhubhaeravii.”

“Now I must go.”

“Okay. I’ll accompany you to the edge of the mountains.”

I started heading back with that extraordinary genius by my side. After a little way I stopped and asked: “Those luminous bodies⁽¹⁰⁾ who used to cultivate music were called gandharva. Those who used to cultivate various things in subtler spheres were called vidyádhara and those who were skilled in dressing or enamoured of beauty were called kinnara. Which of the three are you?”

He kept quiet. The luminous face of his luminous body glittered even brighter as he smiled and remained silent.

I kept on walking with him alongside me, that original viiń still in his hands.

“Do you know?” he said. “The world of music today is like a person without a proper guru or proper training. People want to show they can play without having paid their dues. They are selling themselves for gold without realizing that the real value of music is being lost thereby. Gold is becoming even cheaper than glass. Whenever a rágińii is a little difficult they only show that they can play the notes without going deep into the music. There is no way of doing this with sindhubhaeravii, the same with múltánii vasanta (not vasantabáhár), so you no longer hear either one of them.”

“You are right,” I replied. “I don’t hear anyone play sindhubhaeravii, nor múltáni vasanta any longer. I have heard one or two pieces going by the name of sindhubhaeravii. One or two songs also. But judging by the scale I could see that they were not sindhubhaeravii. They were different local styles of darvárii.”

“Right you are, quite right. That’s just what I wanted to say. You must have noticed that in sindhubhaeravii one must pay special attention to ascending and descending in the scale. Since such profound attention makes it difficult to articulate the notes, singers nowadays don’t want to take the risk.”

“Exactly,” I said. “Quite right.”

“It would be great if you would compose a song in pure sindhubhaeravii.”

“If I have sufficient time and capacity then I will try but I cannot give my word on it; I love music, you see, but I am not well-versed in it. Now, you didn’t tell me whether you were a ghandarva, vidyádhara or kinnara, but I can tell that you are one of them because you have a light-body.”

He smiled even more and said: “I am none of these three.”

“Where do you live? Do you live in this palásh forest?”

“I don’t live in the forest, I live in the mind. I’ve been living in your mind for these past seven thousand years.”

We reached the end of the mountains. I looked at him and suddenly saw his body slowly begin to dissolve into the moonlight; as it did I heard the sound of music floating over the top of the palásh forest. This time it wasn’t sindhubhaeravii; it was meghamallára. From the northeast I noticed a wisp of cloud in the sky.⁽¹¹⁾

The next evening I went back to the hill and heard again the same sound wave floating to my ears. Prasenjit hadn’t shown up the day before; who knows why, but again today he hadn’t come. The reason for it I couldn’t fathom. He was not like that. Whenever he couldn’t come for some reason he would inform me the day before.

Suddenly I saw Prasenjit rapidly approaching, esraj in hand. I said in a half-laughing, half-annoyed tone of voice: “What’s the matter? Yesterday you didn’t come and today also you are late. This isn’t like you.”

“You really upset me yesterday,” he replied. “I thought perhaps that you might drop by our house today knowing how much you upset me, so I waited for you for some time before starting off. That’s why I’m late today.”

“What did I do to upset you yesterday? Can you give me the details?”

I smiled a little.

“Is it a laughing matter to cause pain to another person?” he replied.

“Then I’ll say it in all seriousness. What did I do to upset you?”

“First you showed up just when I was leaving with the esraj to come here. Why couldn’t you have come a little earlier? Why couldn’t you have informed me earlier that you were coming? What objection did you have to taking a snack at my house?”

I was astonished. I kept quiet.

“Why aren’t you saying anything?” he asked.

“Say what you have to say,” I replied. “List your complaints.”

“You came into my house,” he went on, “but you wouldn’t sit down anywhere, neither on the cot, nor on a chair, nor even on a mat. Is that proper, I ask you, to remain standing like that when you visit someone’s home.”

I kept quiet.

“So you still have nothing to say? No answer at all. What’s going on with you?”

Again, I held fast to my silence.

“You picked up the esraj and started playing a strange rágińii. I asked you its name many times but you wouldn’t answer. If you had told me while you were playing perhaps I could have picked it up. But you told me much later, after I could no longer remember what I had heard.”

“Do you remember what name I told you,” I asked.

“Certainly I remember,” he replied. “You told me its name was sindhubhaeravii, and that it was a 7000 year old rágińii which has been lost nowadays. There were also some Sanskrit songs composed at one time in this rágińii but these songs have also been lost. You said that one must pay special attention to ascending and descending in the scale in sindhubhaeravii and that most singers are not prepared to take such a risk; for that reason the real sindhubhaeravii has disappeared. It has mixed with the moonlight and fled into the unknown.”

“And what else made you get upset?”

“The way you left so suddenly; it seemed to me as if you too had gotten lost in the moonlight. I looked everywhere but I couldn’t find you. I could only hear a vague melody floating in the air. It seemed to be meghamallár. And then a steady rain started falling.”

“Didn’t you get wet while you were walking home,” he asked.

“No, I didn’t get wet,” I replied.

I started listening attentively and Prasenjit as well, but that day we didn’t hear any rága or rágińii floating in from the shál-palásh forest.

I had listened to what Prasenjit had to say and it left me dumbfounded. I had no answer to give.

Where had that unknown player gone? Had he gotten himself lost in his own shál-palásh forest? Perhaps he really had gotten lost and with him the grandeur of so many unknown, unplayed, unsung melodies. Or perhaps he hadn’t gotten lost. Perhaps he was just waiting for the right persons capable of bringing to life again the world of melody, infusing it with the vital energy of the rágas and rágińiis.

Prasenjit and I climbed down from the hills. As we did an indistinct music seemed to start up, floating towards us from hidden recesses of the shál-palásh forest. I listened closely; it seemed as if someone was playing múltáni vasanta.

[end of section that was printed separately as “The Science of Instrumental Music Has Multifarious Expressions”]

Ekasharańa

The meaning of the verbal root shrr or shr (shar) is “to move while piercing something”, “to give shelter to someone”, “to get shelter”, “to deliver a blow”. Those who have one guru, one Iśt́a, one goal, or who are racing towards one shelter, are one-another’s ekasharańa.

Ekasarańa

Sarańa means “road”. All those people who move ahead while taking the same path, or a great procession which goes along a single path, or all those people who take part in all such processions, or all such processions, are called ekasarańa. The word ekasarańa can also be used for such a procession. Several persons are moving side by side along a single path. They are one-another’s ekasarańa. Another meaning of ekasarańa is “fellow traveller” – in Hindustani hamráhii.

Ekáuṋga

We get the word auṋga from the verbal root anj. The meaning of the verbal root anj is “of some portion going out or advancing from the original structure”. For this reason hands and feet and so forth are called the auṋga of the body. Thus, etymologically, one who has only one auṋga is ekáuṋga; its colloquial meaning is “the planet Mercury”.

In most cases planets are those heavenly bodies that revolve around stars, such as the earth, Mars, Mercury, Saturn and so on. When several or more stars collectively resemble a certain animal or some other figure, and if they rest within the orbit of the sun and moon or other planets of this solar system then they are called “constellation”(ráshi). A star or group of stars located in any of the portions of a constellation is called nakśatra. The smaller heavenly bodies that revolve around planets are called “satellites”, that is, the heavenly bodies that revolve around stars are called planets (graha) and the heavenly bodies that revolve around planets are called satellites (upagraha). For example, the earth’s satellite is the moon; Mars’s satellites are Deimos (daetya) and Phobos (bhaya). Because of the proximity of Saturn’s satellites from one another they appear to form a ring. Thus Saturn has a ring of satellites revolving around it. In ancient times astrologers were unable to find any satellite of Mercury so they gave it the name ekáuṋga.

When stars move in circum-rotarian fashion while remaining in a liquid or gaseous state then small portions of these stars shoot off and go into orbit around them. These portions of stars that break off and go into orbit around them are known as planets. It is not that a large portion always breaks away from the parent body; small and extremely small portions also break away. Some of these small or extremely small portions return to the parent star and some go into orbit around the newly-created planets. Those that go into orbit around planets become satellites.

It often happens that a newly-created planet has circum-rotarian motion. All newly-created planets revolve around stars but some revolve circumrotarian-wise and some do not. The earth does and for that reason it has both day and night. Those that do not revolve in such fashion remain in either eternal-night or eternal-day. When planets which revolve circumrotarian-wise remain in a gaseous or liquid state, portions of their body also often break off and go into orbit around them. These are also satellites. It was the opinion of ancient astrologers that the moon was formed in this way, that is, a certain portion of the earth broke away and went into orbit around it. It was the conception of those ancient astrologers that there was a great pit left in that portion of the earth from which the moon broke away, and that pit was the Pacific Ocean (the largest and deepest ocean). The old Sanskrit name for the Pacific Ocean was kśiiraságara or kśiirodárńava. Thus we even find in the moon’s dhyána mantra:

Divyashaunkhatuśárábhaḿ kśiirodárńavasambhavam;
Namámi shashinaḿ bhaktyá shambhormukut́abhúśańam.

[The divine, snow-coloured conch born of the Pacific Ocean.
I salute the moon with devotion, the one who adorns the crown of
Shiva.]

If any smaller star, planet or satellite falls on a larger star, planet or satellite then that smaller falling star, planet or satellite is called ulká [meteor]. A meteor need not be the entire body of a star, planet or satellite; it may also be a fractional portion of that structure. As a result of collision with a falling meteor, deviation of orbit sometimes occurs, or can occur. As a result of this deviation of orbit it is natural that a change occurs in the daily or yearly motion as well. In the last few thousand years certainly, and even in the last few hundred years, it is only natural that the earth’s daily and yearly motion has undergone some change, thus it is incumbent upon the astrophysicists that they recalculate the exact time of the earth’s daily and yearly cycles each year, or if this is not possible then at least every few years. Otherwise, we will be forced to carry the burden of our mistaken measure of time in many diverse spheres of life, and that is not at all desirable.

It will have to be carefully investigated if it is possible or not for any living being, microbe, living seed, plant or vegetable seed to travel from one planet to another through the medium of these falling meteors. Some people are of the opinion that the people of ancient times used to address as deva those beings who had arrived from other planets. The truth of their opinion should be carefully verified.

In many people’s opinion, if a powerful heavenly body or meteor approaches close to a star then often a loose portion of that star will separate from the original body and go into orbit around it. They are also planets and normally other small portions of the star do not break away along with them. And because the newly-created planet itself is not always in a gaseous or liquid state no satellite is produced from its body. Planets created in this way remain alone; they are ekáuṋga. Mercury is such an ekáuṋga planet, thus in the language of the ancient astronomers ekáuṋga meant “Mercury”. You can also use ekáuṋga to mean “Mercury” in Bengali. Budhavár [Wednesday] can also be called Ekáuṋgavár.

Footnotes

(1) We get the word pashtu from the Vedic word páshcáttya which means “native of the west”: pashcát + tyauṋ. It must have two “ta’s” plus y added to the consonants.

(2) Singur in present-day Hoogly District.

(3) Siam is the English corruption of shyám. –Trans.

(4) Warming up. For this they used the verbal root urju.

(5) Each member of the society of that time had rights to a certain specified degree of participation in different social and religious functions. Those rights correlated with the person’s social level. –Trans.

(6) A man marrying below or above his station, respectively, according to caste hierarchy. While anuloma was not encouraged, it was somwhat acceptable, but pratiloma was never condoned. –Trans.

(7) The niyoga custom originated long before the kuliina system as a means of producing offspring. A man would be given permission to mate with a deceased or sterile man’s wife. For example, in the Mahábhárata, King Dhritarastra, King Pandu, and the Pandavas, as well, were the offspring of such unions. –Trans.

(8) Diipashaláká → diiashaláá → diiyáshaláy → deshlái.

(9) This song is composed by the author in Madhumálaiṋca, Kolkata on 6/12/85; Prabhát Saḿgiita No. 3242. –Trans.

(10) Luminous bodies are entities which do not have a physical body made of five fundamental factors, but rather a structure comprised of three factors only – luminous, aerial and ethereal – in which the mind functions. –Trans.

(11) Megh means “cloud”. –Trans.