Hundred rupees and five. That was all Alaka had. With great difficulty and tight spending, she was able to save that much. Alaka counted the money again and again. Still hundred and five only. Next day was the festival day. She was sad and she cried.
Alaka loved her husband Ashok very much. It was difficult to manage the expenses with the meager income of Ashok. Alaka’s tears dried. She wiped her face and stood near the window.
That festival was about expressing your love and affection. Wanting to give a proper gift, Alaka became worried. She looked at her face in the nearby mirror. Her long hair touching her knees made her happy. But her face lost its color.
The couple was very proud of two things. One was Ashok’s golden watch. That watch came down in the family and was always with Ashok as a close friend. Because it was old, the watch did not even have a chain. Ashok used to take it out often from his shirt pocket to see the time. The other thing of pride was Alaka’s long hair.
There was a shop with a sign-board – “Hair Articles and Goods”. Alaka entered the shop with zeal. Alaka asked the shopkeeper – “Do you buy my hair”? The shopkeeper replied – “I do buy hair. Remove your hat. I will take a look at your hair”. Alaka removed her hat. Her hair fell down till her knees. Seeing that hair, the shopkeeper was joyed and said – “Five hundred rupees”.
Alaka said – “Give it to me quickly”.
Having sold her hair, Alaka took the money and went from shop to shop. Many hours went by in finding a gift for Ashok. Finally, she got a good gift. That was a unique golden watch chain. Its price was five hundred and fifty rupees. She took the golden chain and the balance fifty rupees and reached her home.
After reaching home, Alaka’s uneasy mind quieted a little. She stood in front of the mirror and looked for a long time at her head with hair cut. With short hair, she was looking like a schoolboy. Alaka’s mind was weary of what her dear husband would say when he sees her new hairstyle. The dinner was ready at seven. Ashok never arrived home late. Alaka sat near the door and waited for her dear husband. After some time, Ashok entered the hallway. Alaka prayed to the god in mind – “My husband should not be upset with this lost hair”.
Ashok moved towards Alaka and saw her. Taken aback, he stood there for a couple of minutes. Perturbed by his silence, Alaka ran to him. She put her head on his arms and cried loudly. She said – “Dear, don’t look at me like that. I sold my hair. Don’t worry about it. My hair will grow back again. This is festival time. For a long time, I wished to give you a gift. I have got something that you will like very much.
Bewildered Ashok said – “Oh! You got your hair cut”? Alaka said – “Yes. Got it cut and sold it too. Let us not worry about it again. Let us celebrate this festival with joy. I am the same Alaka, your dear wife. Let your love not be lost toward me”.
Ashok stood there a while looking at his dear wife. Then he took out a cloth packet from his coat pocket and kept it on the table. He said – “Dear, your hair has no effect on my love. I always love you. Open this packet and see. The reason for my bewilderment will be clear.
Alaka opened the packet. Alaka was overjoyed by looking at what was in it. Then she wept again, but with joy. That thing was a comb. A beautiful comb with beads on it. Alaka had seen that costly comb many times in the shop. She had taken her mind off of it because of its price. Now, holding the comb she wanted in her hand, she said – “Dear, I am overjoyed by having this comb. My hair will grow back soon”.
Then Alaka eagerly opened her hand in front of Ashok and showed the golden watch chain. She said – “Dear, look what I got. This golden chain is very good for to tie your watch. With this, it will be easy for you to see the time. Where is your watch? Let us see how it looks with this chain”.
Ashok took a deep breath and sat down in the chair. He smiled and said – “Dear, let us keep away these two gifts in the cupboard for some time. Both of them are of no use for now. I sold the watch and bought the comb with that money. Let us eat dinner now”.
The hypothesis point #8: Panini has accepted many words without derivation.
Panini’s Ashtadhyayi, has many sutras just to derive a single special word. Panini could have easily written a few more sutras for those accepted without derivation. We need to keep in mind that by the time of Panini, many of the verb roots and etymologies were already lost.
The hypothesis point #9: The old-generation grammarians were more accommodative about changes to the Sanskrit language. This is evident by the works of Katyayana. And even Patanjali was open to this idea of revision of the grammar. The grammarians of the later era like Bhartrihari elevated Panini, Katyayana and Patanjali to the status of maharshis, thereby stopping the ability to question their work.
Actually, we should be grateful to the trio - Panini, Katyayana and Patanjali who established a solid framework that survived through all the tumultuous times of history. And we should be grateful to those grammarians who kept this framework alive by rigorously following it. If not for such measures, the language would have lost its very nature with the foriegn invasions. Even if there could be traces of some external influence on this language, it was very limited. And that too happened within a homogenous family of languages which had a similar culture. Just like there are no Vedic seers in these times, there are no shishtas (authoritative people) for this language now. Those interested to pursue the language, should take a serious look at what we got from our great ancestors and appreciate its very existence in that form. It is prudent to make a sincere attempt to preserve and adopt to it, rather than destroying it in the name of modernization and evolution.
The hypothesis point #10: In the works of the likes of Bhavabhuti etc., many words that are not in conformity with the grammar of Panini. Who are we to question such word forms? We should be ok to use such distorted word forms in our usage also.
Now-a-days, it is a fashion to talk about “evolving” the Sanskrit language. Sadly, Sanskrit being nobody’s native language is the harsh target of such attempts. In this age of fast forward and instant-gratification, such people might be finding it hard either hard for themselves or thinking it is hard for others to learn the language and use it. It is like - the Vedas are hard to remember and recite, so let us just change their style of composition so it would be easy for everyone. For that very reason, the many great works and songs were written in other languages to bring out the message of the Vedas. The insistence of wanting to use or speak in Sanskrit by distorting is uncalled for. If anyone and everyone starts imitating or doing what great or well-known people do, then there will be chaos. First, everyone is not at that level of likes of Bhavabhuti. Secondly, the well-known literary works have their own reasons to deviate - sometimes it could be to fit the verses to a desired metre, sometimes out of rebellion, sometimes mere negligence, or it could be the error of the scribes. Such non-confirming usages are very rare like 1%. Ignoring the 99% of the conforming usage, why should anyone itch to use the 1% portion?
The hypothesis point #11: Then there is a quote from Mahabhashyam of Patanjali that - Sanskrit was not spoken in the households for regular conversation, but only used for special purposes like in yajna etc. This raises the question: was Sanskrit ever a real spoken language amongst the commoners and for daily use?
Consider the theory that the Prakrit dialects existed for ever, either predating Sanskrit or in parallel with it. The term “Prakrit” itself is a Sanskrit word meaning “natural” or “original”. That hints at the “Sanskrit” language being a made up or refined language - probably adopted for some special purpose. Otherwise, what was the need for such refinement? And what could be that special purpose of this adoption? Though it can be used as an everyday spoken language, could it be that its main purpose was for use with quest for higher achievements of mankind? As a disciplined linguistic construct in pursuit of intellectual and spiritual goals? Literally, गीर्वाणभारती a godly language?
The hypothesis #4: An example quoted of word creep from Prakrit: The word पुरुष is broken down in Sanskrit as पुरि शेते. In that case, it should have become पुरिश or पुरिष, rather than पुरुष. In Prakrit, there is a word पुरुस. So, पुरुष of Sanskrit must have come from पुरुस of Prakrit.
This argument considers only one etymology of the given word. There are multiple etymologies for पुरुष in Sanskrit. One of them is पुरु स meaning पुरु (ब्रह्म) सरति (गच्छति) that is ब्रह्मज्ञानं प्राप्नोति. Nothing wrong if it comes from Prakrit. Many verb roots and etymologies are lost or have become less known over time. Those should also be researched and considered when doing such studies.
The hypothesis #5: It seems that the women and men used variation of the words to refer to the same object. For example: In Kalidasa’s Shakuntala play, the lead actress Shakuntala uses the word वृक्षक to refer to trees, whereas her father Kashyapa uses the word वृक्ष.
In the Sanskrit grammar, it is well documented that the “क” pratyaya (suffix) is used to refer to the smaller form of any object. वृक्षक here refers to a small tree – a plant. In the play, it is depicted that Shakuntala and her friends are watering the plants. They wouldn’t be watering a big tree. On the other hand, Kashyapa is saying – let us get to the shade of a tree. Obviously, a small plant won’t have a shade. He would be using वृक्ष, not वृक्षक. There are many words like this: बालः/बालकः, बाला/बालिका etc. Not sure, why this is being portrayed as a men-women thing.
The hypothesis #6: Panini defined the ten lakaras in his grammar, each one with a different purpose. The argument is that over a period of time, these special meanings of the lakaras were lost. This shows that in the olden days the Sanskrit language went through changes. As an example: in Ramayanam, use of these lakaras do not conform to these definitions.
But the Ramayanam was composed long before Panini. So, how could the lakaras definitions of Panini get mixed up in Ramayanam? Such mixed usage of lakaras is found through out the Sanskrit literature. Panini is only enumerating them and clarifying their original purpose. It is somewhat similar to English where “I go to a shop” sometimes intends the future tense, though grammatically the verb is in present tense.
The hypothesis #7: Then there is a story quoted that a girl not using the word for eye (अक्षि) and foot (पाद) in dual number, but using them in plural form. There is no dual number in the Prakrit language; so it is ok to for the woman to not to use the dual number in Sanskrit also. The grammarians despise this kind of usage. There is also a reference about the current “hybrid” nature of many Indian languages. Many Indian language speakers now-a-days rampantly use English words mixed with native languages. Similar "broad-minded" approach should be taken with Sanskrit too.
With this kind of approach, why even bother learning a language properly? It is like using the Sanskrit words in one’s own language. Like the dual number, many other constructs of the Sanskrit language are also apparently superfluous. Get rid of all those 10 verb forms, 10 verb classes, three genders randomly assigned to different nouns etc. Perhaps create a new language with simple structure borrowing the Sanskrit words. The English creep in the native languages is the result of generations of British education in the Indian subcontinent and the continued mental slavery even after the independence. Instead of cleaning up the mess, if this kind of corrupt usage is construed as an acceptable form of a language, then such a language is doomed.
The hypothesis point# 1: The Vedas have the language that predates the later version of the Sanskrit language. And it was probably influenced by regions that are north-west of India or some other lands. Some of these theories take the Aryan migration theory as their basis, and some do not. The similarity of many words in some European, Central Asian with the words in the Sanskrit languages has given rise to the manufacturing of the proto-Indo European (PIE) language being the mother of all these languages. The words similar to पर्दते exist in the European languages as “fart”. But this word is not seen in Sanskrit usage.
But this theory works on the assumption of taking the fake PIE language as the base and mapping the other languages against it. In such an assumption, Sanskrit language can also be taken as the base to map the other languages. Also, the composition Vedas dates back at least 40,000 years. And we all know what was the state of human living in other parts of the world in those times. This does not conform with the PIE hypothesis. As for the existence of the words in usage, each and every word from Sanskrit koshas and dhatupathas (noun and verb collections) may not be found in the works that are available today.
The hypothesis point# 2: In addition, the Sanskrit language was influenced by other languages like the old Persian language. The example quoted is: कृ changing to कृणोति - retained in the Persian, and supposed to be the “original” or the Vedic Sanskrit. And its variation करोति - is an adoption based on the Prakrit dialects.
There are two different verb roots of कृ listed in the धातुपाठः - collection of verb roots by Panini. The currently available (धातुपाठः) from Panini lists just under 2000 roots. However, it is well known that many of the verb roots were lost by the time Panini documented them. By the way, Persia or Iran was also part of the ancient Bharata Varsha.
The hypothesis point# 3: In the Vedas, it is said that there are four types of languages - men speak only the fourth type. That indicates there were many layers of the Sanskrit language.
This part of the Vedas could have a different meaning, and may be referring to four stages of the speech generation in a human being.
In summary: The Vedas are our highest spiritual texts that are revealed only to the capable sages when they are in a deep meditative state. In that transcendental state, the speech follows a different pattern and defies the regular linguistic framework. Trying to put them in a humanly perceivable context and trying to disprove a theory like that of Sheldon Pollock is going to get into a trap because such theories operate on a very different plain.
Many researchers have tried to study the various realms of the Indic sciences from the perspective of what they call “modern” or “scientific” approach. The definition of this term “scientific” means something that can be conceived to, something that can be verified by the human sensory organs. Everything in the universe has to fit in this boundary for it to be “scientific”. Something that cannot be explained becomes a mystery and is termed “mythical”. Researches with this approach to find the roots of many Indic sciences - like that of the vedas, the origin of Indic culture etc. have made to a very limited progress, and at best are left with guessing various hypothesis. Some linguistic experts have tried (and will try in future) to find the roots of the language called Sanskrit. The Sanskrit language is inseparable from the Indic roots. Traditionally, the Indic or the Vedic culture is thought to be very ancient, often times attributed to be ever-present. Many guesses have been made as to how ancient this culture could be. Many recent scientific researches have put the Vedic times not later than at least 40,000 years and even going as back as 75,000 years. The world history mostly tells us, in that timespan, there were ice ages, humans were dwelling in caves, hunting and gathering. The idea of existence of a culture already sophisticated in various facets of life that long ago goes beyond the hunters and cave-dwelling community.
The linguistic research community tries to fit the Sanskrit language in the same measuring scale as the other languages and attempts to connect the dots. That abundantly relies upon many assumptions. One assumption is: just like the other parts of the world where the history shows the humans and the communities evolved from hunters to farmers, similar thing happened in the Indian subcontinent. Recently, I came across a talk by Prof. Madhav Deshpande based on such hypothesis and analysis. The salient points in that talk are:
The primitive nature of the Vedic people
The etymological and regional connections
Vedas v/s the poetry
Evolution of the Sanskrit language
Openness of the earlier Sanskrit grammarians and the “highbrow” attitude of the later grammarians
In this 4-part series, I share my thoughts on these points.
