Education in Ancient India c6.49

c6.49

Holidays for Bad Weather, etc:—Abnormal weather conditions giving rise to untimely clouds, thunder, heavy showers, frost, dust-storms etc. were also regarded as sufficient causes to suspend studies. Holidays for these causes seem to go back to hoary antiquity, when students and teachers lived in humble cottages and were engaged in agricultural pursuits. It must be further remembered that the teaching and learning of the Vedic hymns in the manner in which it is done traditionally was physically impossible when a storm or lightning was thundering abroad. In later times when teachers were well-to-do men living in towns and villages and not directly concerned with active agricultural pursuits, it is doubtful if studies were suspended when there was a dust-storm or frost. When the howling of jackals, crying of wolfs, screeching of owls, braying of donkeys or barking of dogs was heard, teaching was temporarily stopped, partly, on account of superstitious beliefs and partly due to the notion that the Vedic study was so sacred an affair that it could be prosecuted only under ideally pure circumstances. It was apprehended that gods would become angry if the sanctity of the Vedas was defiled by their being studied on such occasions.¹