Kanchi Mahaperiyava on Western Vedic Research:
A number of
Westerners saw the similarity between Sanskrit and their own languages
and devoted themselves to the study of our scriptures.
I concede
that European scholars have made a very valuable study of the Vedas. We
must be thankful to them for their work.
Some of them like Max Muller
conducted research out of their esteem for our scriptures. They took
great pains to gather the old texts and published volume after volume
incorporating their findings.
"The discovery of the Vedas of the Hindus is more significant than Columbus's discovery of America, " thus exclaimed some indologists exulting in their findings.
It was because of the labours of Mackenizie who gathered manuscripts from various parts of India that we come to know about many of our sastras. The department of epigraphy was started during British rule.
We may applaud European indologists for their research work, for making our sastras known to a wider world and for the hard work they put in. But they were hardly in sympathy with our view of the Vedas.
What is the purpose of these scriptures? By chanting them, by filling the world with their sound and by the performance of rites like sacrifices, the good of mankind is ensured. This view the Western indologists rejected. They tried to understand on a purely intellectual plane what is beyond the comprehension of the human mind. And with this limited understanding of theirs they printed big tomes on the Vedas to be preserved in the libraries.
Our scriptures are meant to be a living reality of our speech and action. Instead of putting them to such noble use, to consign them to the libraries, in the form of books, is like keeping living animals in the museum instead of in the zoo.
It was because of the labours of Mackenizie who gathered manuscripts from various parts of India that we come to know about many of our sastras. The department of epigraphy was started during British rule.
We may applaud European indologists for their research work, for making our sastras known to a wider world and for the hard work they put in. But they were hardly in sympathy with our view of the Vedas.
What is the purpose of these scriptures? By chanting them, by filling the world with their sound and by the performance of rites like sacrifices, the good of mankind is ensured. This view the Western indologists rejected. They tried to understand on a purely intellectual plane what is beyond the comprehension of the human mind. And with this limited understanding of theirs they printed big tomes on the Vedas to be preserved in the libraries.
Our scriptures are meant to be a living reality of our speech and action. Instead of putting them to such noble use, to consign them to the libraries, in the form of books, is like keeping living animals in the museum instead of in the zoo.
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