The Secret Of The Veda Aurobindo - HolyBooks.com

The Seven Rivers 113
construction upon such expressions. Obviously these are the
waters of the Truth and the Bliss that flow from the supreme
ocean. These rivers flow not upon earth, but in heaven; they are
prevented by Vritra the Besieger, the Coverer from flowing down
upon the earth-consciousness in which we mortals live till Indra,
the god-mind, smites the Coverer with his flashing lightnings and
cuts out a passage on the summits of that earth-consciousness
down which they can flow. Such is the only rational, coherent
and sensible explanation of the thought and language of the
Vedic sages. For the rest, Vasishtha makes it clear enough to us;
for he says that these are the waters which Surya has formed
by his rays and which, unlike earthly movements, do not limit
or diminish the workings of Indra, the supreme Mind. They
are, in other words, the waters of the Vast Truth, r.ta ˙m br.hat
and, as we have always seen that this Truth creates the Bliss,
so here we find that these waters of the Truth, r.tasya dhārāh. ,
as they are plainly called in other hymns (e.g. V.12.2, “O perceiver
of the Truth, perceive the Truth alone, cleave out many
streams of the Truth”), establish for men the supreme good
and the supreme good 2 is the felicity, the bliss of the divine
existence.
Still, neither in these hymns nor in Vamadeva’s is there an
express mention of the seven rivers. We will turn therefore to
the first hymn of Vishwamitra, his hymn to Agni, from its second
to its fourteenth verse. The passage is a long one, but it is
sufficiently important to cite and translate in full.
2. Prāñca ˙m yajña ˙m cakr.ma vardhatā ˙m gīh. ,
samidbhir agni ˙m namasā duvasyan;
Divah. ´sa´sāsur vidathā kavīnā ˙m,
gr.tsāya cit tavase gātum īs.uh. .
3. Mayo dadhe medhirah. pūtadaks.o,
divah. subandhur janus. āpr.thivyāh. ;
Avindan nu dar´satam apsvantar,
devāso agnim apasi svas¯r.n. ām.
2 The word indeed is usually understood as “felicity”.