The Arctic Home in the Vedas c9.9

c9.9

But we need not depend on stray passages like the above to prove that the long night was known in early days. In the tenth Maṇḍala of the Ṛig-Veda we have a hymn (127) addressed to the Goddess of Night, and in the 6th verse of this hymn Night is invoked to "become easily fordable" to the worshipper (*naḥ sutarā bhava*). In the Parishishta, which follows this hymn in the Rig-Veda, and which is known as *Rātri-sūkta* or *Durgā-stava*, the worshipper asks the Night to be favourable to him, exclaiming "May we reach the other side in safety! May we reach the other side in safety!"¹ In the Atharva-Veda, XIX, 47, which is a reproduction, with some variations, of the above Parishishta, the second verse runs thus: "Each moving thing finds rest in her (Night), whose yonder boundary is not seen, nor that which keeps her separate. O spacious, darksome Night! May we, uninjured, reach the end of thee, reach, O thou blessed one, thine end!" And in the third verse of the 50th hymn of the same book the worshippers ask that they may pass uninjured in their body, "through each succeeding night, (*rātrim rātrim*)." Now a question is naturally raised why should every one be so anxious about safely reaching the other end of the night? And why should the poet exclaim that "its yonder boundary is not seen, nor what keeps it separate?" Was it because it was an ordinary winter night, or, was it because it was the long Arctic night? Fortunately, the Taittirīya Saṃhitā preserves for us the oldest traditional reply to these questions, and we need not, therefore, depend upon the speculations of modern commentators. In the Taittirīya Saṃhitā I, 5, 5, 4,² we have a similar Mantra or prayer addressed to Night in these words :—" O Chitrâvasu ! let me safely reach thy end." A little further, (I, 5, 7, 5), the Samhitâ itself explains this Mantra, or prayer thus :—" Chitrâvasu is (means) the night; in old times (purâ), the Brâhmans (priests) were afraid that it (night) would not dawn." Here we have an express Vedic statement, that, in old times, the priests or the people, felt apprehensions regarding the time when the night would end. What does it signify? If the night was not unusually long, where was the necessity for entertaining any misgivings about the coming dawn? Sâyaṇa, in commenting on the above passage, has again put forward his usual explanation, that nights in the winter were long and they made the priests apprehensive in regard to the coming dawn. But here we can quote Sâyaṇa against himself, and show that he has dealt with this important passage in an off-hand manner. It is well known that the Taittirîya Samhitâ often explains the Mantras, and this portion of the Samhitâ is called Brâhmaṇa, the whole of the Taittirîya Samhitâ being made up in this way of Mantras and the Brâhmaṇa, or prayers and their explanations or commentary mixed up together. The statement regarding the apprehensions of the priests about the coming dawn, therefore, falls under the Brâhmaṇa portion of the Samhitâ. Now the contents of the Brâhmaṇas are usually classified by Indian divines under the ten following heads¹:—(1) Hetu or reason; (2) Nirvachana, or etymological explanation; (3) Nindâ, or censure; (4) Prashamsâ, or praise; (5) Samshaya, or doubt; (6) Vidhi, or the rule; (7) Parakriyâ, or others' doings; (8) Purâ-kalpa, or ancient rite or tradition; (9) Vyavadhâraṇa-kalpanâ, or determining the