Miracles, Myths and Words

Vishvanath Khaire
1. Jnadevas Background
Jnadeva, Marathi saint poet, yogi and philosopher, was born in Alandi, on Indrayani, a
tributary of Bhima, one of the major rivers of Maharashtra in Western India. The rivers rise from
a lofty mountain range in the west and flow eastwards in the extensive trap rock region in
channels stabilized between substantial plateaus. Excavations at various riverbank sites have
revealed some fairly developed agricultural habitations dating back to the 18th century BC. Some
of them have shown links with the reputed Indus civilization, considered the most ancient in
India.1
The next available historical records of the region are the Ashokan edicts (3rd century BC.), one
in the coastal strip west of the mountains and one in the plateau in the east. Almost immediately
followed the first of the series of impressive cave monuments in the solid trap tock, of which the
tradition continued upto the tenth century AC. These were executed for the votaries of
Buddhism, Jainism, Vedic and Puranic Hindusim in different periods. The unique feature of
these excavations chiseling the sculpture of the deity, the temple and the attendant precints, all
from one mount, has been alluded as the model for the practice of devotion, in a philosophical
verse by Jnadeva.2
Many of these monuments are located near trade routes of internal as well as overseas
commerce, that were in use from ancient to medieval times. Quite a few of these are overviewed
by forts on nearby promontories usually flanked by almost intractable rock-cliffs. Those provide
with heavy gateways, secret passages tunnelled upto the top, massive bastions and the like, were
considered invincible. Jnanadeva the yogi poet has used an extensive metaphor of the conquest
of such a fort, in describing the yogic practices for conquest of the mind.3
It has been shown that at the cave monument sites, old rude cults are also existing and are
worshipped to this age by faraway rural groups. The existence of similar cults at the forts would
indicate that the forts have been safety havens of antecedent cultures in the hilly regions. The
primitive cults and the caves for wandering ascetics would appear to fill the gap between the
excavated cultures and the Asokan dicts.4
The sect of wandering asceties known as Ntha Pantha owed allegiance to iva, considered as
their prime guru. The votaries were known in Maharashtra as knphe jog (torn-ear medicants)
from their pierced ears, carrying rings as sign of enunciation by the guru. Jnadeva has
described his spiritual genealogy in this sect, upto his brother and guru Nivttinth.5
He has however been considered the saint patriarch of Vrkars, devotees of the god Vithob of
Pandharpur on the river Bhma in the east. Rural and urban householders of all castes have been
walking from all parts of Maharashtra, twice every year, for pilgrimage to Pandharpur and back,
since before Jnadeva to the present day. His verses are mass chants during the walks and his
writing are read out and listened to, with devotion.6
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2. Jnadevas Literature
Jnadeva is traditionally taken to have been born in 1275 and gone into meditative communion
(samdhi) in 1296. During this short span of life he produced the monumental poetical works by
which he is really known to the Marathi speakers.
His magnum opus was Jnewar, the Marathi commentary on the Gt, running into about nine
thousand verses in the popular ovi meter. Both as poetry and philosophy, this work has been held
to be the acme of perfection by the learned and commoners alike. With imcomparable humility,
the poet repeatedly maintains that the splendid exposition is all due to the grace of his guru, the
brother. He also declares that he has taken guidance from the earlier commentators. Yet his
exposition is so replete with analogies, metaphors and imageries from contemporary life, that the
philosophy of the Gt almost receives new content at his deft hands. The devout as well as the
lay reader is led away by the tender beauty of his language almost to the point of getting lost in
the poetry rather than reaching the core of his philosophy.
The Anubhavmta meaning the elixir of the experience is a quintessential poem of eight
hundred ovi verses, dealing with the spiritual experience of the devotee in which ultimately the
knower, the knowledge and the known all become one. In this work too, the poets flair for
analogies and metaphors from the world around awaken the reader toe unimagined subtleties of
physical as well as spiritual experience.
Sixty-five ovi verses given the title Cgadeva Psa supposedly addressed to Cgaveda,
possessed of superior powers through yoga but uninitiated into the sublimity of devotion.
Numbering about a thousand, the abhanga poems are favourite recitaton for Vrkars. They do
not propose to be philosophical and often lean towards the tradition of folklore. While being easy
to go with, they too lead the believer into devotion and the spiritual joy of devotion. The basic
philosophy is the same as in the other three works.
All these works have come down through copies made by hand, by the members of a populace in
which literacy was microscopic. Mass circulation was mainly by word of mouth in pilgrimage,
fairs and day to day modes of religious communication like discourses, krtans and week- or
month long sessions of reading aloud complete works like the Jnevari. In the tradition-andcaste-bound society of the times, learning was restricted to Brahmins, and even for them spiritual
learning was confined to Sanskrit. The works of Jnadeva and some of his predecessors had
thrown both restrictions to the winds. The illiterate masses, till then being led by tradition alone,
in their devotional practices, were now provided with a philosophy in their own idiom. They
were avidly learning it - in the traditional manner, by word of mouth.
Over the centuries, the masses have continued to perform the two annual pilgrimages, chanting
the verses and carrying the footprints of Jnanadeva, from his samadhi at landi to his favourite
god at Pandharpur. The literate and the thinking have been religiously or critically reading the
elevating classics, following the dictum of the 13th century saint poet Nmadeva : One should
experience at least one ov of Jnewari. This was one of the first books lithographed in the
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19th century. It was the favourite of outstanding Maharashtrians like justice Ranade and Vinoba
the disciple of Mahatma Gandhi. It provided them with a large content of their models of life.
3. The Miracles of the Saint
While Jnadeva's works -are so extensively known among the Marathi speakers, his life story is
barely known only from traditions. Even his life span has been a constant subject of debate
though the most popular belief has been that all the outstanding literary output was the
achievement of a child Prodigy, alongwith this conviction, popular tradition holds that there were
a number of episodes in the saint's life, in which his role was nothing short of the miraculous.
These are briefly narrated below.
3.1 Jnadeva's father had recanted from renunciation into the householder's state, after which
the four children were born. The children were therefore denied the social status of Brahmins.
They approached for appeal to the acknowledged authorities in paithan. Before them Jnadeva
proved his prowess by making a water-carrier he-buffalo recite the Veda.7
3.2 Cgadeva, a yogi reputed to have lived 1400 years, rode a tiger for conveyance. He sent
messengers to Jnanadeva to inform his arrival. The foursomes were basking in the morning sun
sitting on a wall. For setting out to welcome the yogi, Jnadeva commanded the wall to move;
and the wall obliged.8
3.3 As part of the tribulations forced on them, Mukt the younger sister was divested of the
earthen pot and fuel required for baking a wheat bread delicacy. To the weeping girl, Jnadeva
offered his back to serve as the baking pan and heated it by yogic fire, of which the flames came
out of his mouth.9
3.4 On way back from Paithan, the children saw a boy's body on a funeral pyre. Jnadeva
breathed life into the boy, who grew to become Jnadevas scribe to take down verses of the
Jnesvari.10
These narratives are contained in the 18th century compendium Bhaktavijaya (The Devouts
Victories) which is based on a 16th century Hindi composition of similar content. The contents
purport to be life stories of devout saints, in ov verses, composed by a believer for the believers.
Episodes of miracles performed by the saints or by Divinity for the saints are contained in every
chapter.

4. Genesis of Miracles
The miraculous in many of them is based on words in the names of the devotees. Thus, about
Nmadeva, a contemporary of Jnadeva, it is narrated that he was born from a shell (shimpala)
picked up by his father from the Bhm river. This is obviously connected with shimpi meaning
tailor, the caste in which Nmadeva was born. When he became an ardent devotee of Vithob,
to the neglect of worldly duties, the god sent wealth in goni (sack) to his mother Go in
response to her irate complaints. The construction of miracles through words of similar sounds
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and dissimilar meanings, is a familiar device employed in ancient literatures of all societies. The
words had to be somehow connected or associated with the character in the narrative.11
For Jnadeva's miracles the words were passed down via the handwritten copies and the oral
transmission through generations over five centuries. Those were days of limited literacy seldom
going beyond the three Rs required for ordinary living. Neither the writing nor the reading of
the pithy but numerous verses of the genius could be devoid of flaws or in strict accordance with
his original delivery. The errors in transcription would be compounded by the errors in
comprehension and oral transmission. This would give rise to interpretations at will by the
imaginative faithfuls. The wide discrepancies in the redactions followed by different Vrkar
authorities and their interpretations of them provide ample instances of his process. By reasoning
objectively on these lines, we can trace the originating sources of Jnadevas miracles in the
texts of his poetic works.
4.1 The genealogy of the he-buffalo would go back to a concluding verses in the Jnewari.
This verse traces his spiritual ancestry to iva. The verse runs : Then, the one born in the line
of iva, son(like) to Nivtt Ntha, Jnadeva made the indigenous (local idiom) adornment to
Gt. For this the correct meaning to be correctly taken, the grammatically correct word in the
beginning should have been mhea with the sibilant and not with the retroflex syllable. If hasty
writting of the world in Nagari script slightly curls down the headstroke towards the headline, the
word would become mahia with retroflex . And that means a he-buffalo and the first line
would mean : Then, the once born in the line of the buffalo, and not of iva. The garbled
meaning would derive by reading Jnadeva as the causal agent, equating Gt to the Veda and
subconscious derision of Brhminic recitation as the drone of a he-buffalo.12
4.2 A histoirian of marathi literature has cited an abhanga ascribed to Jnadeva in support of the
actual occurrence of miracle of the walking wall : If God does it, whatever may not happen? A
river may be crossed by a stone afloat.. With legs sprouted, walls will walk; mount Meru and the
moth will weigh the same.. Says Jnadeva, the impossible happens,-the guru's grace unites one
with the great Brahma. If a learned historian could does believe Jnadeva to be the maker and
not mere narrator of the impossible rightly ascribed to God, the lay devotee of the age of belief
could do so as well and with greater conviction.13
4.3 A verse in the Anubhavmta refers to the consumption of non-knowing (avidy) with itself
as the fuel thrust into the flame of knowledge, resulting into the residual ashes of realization. The
first two lines mention the body being made fuel and entered into the fire. A layman who does
not follow the metaphorical string of verses in their true import, imagines this to be referring to a
yogi whose body itself becomes fuel to the internal fire. With implicit faith in Jnadevas yogic
powers, he ascribes the phenomenon to the saint-person and weaves a suitable narrative around
it.14
4.4 The personal name Satcidananda occurs in the concluding portion of Jnewari. The word
as acommon noun, however, occurs some 168 verses earlier in the same chapter with the epithet
sadeha (corporeal). The reference is properly to the words of the dialogue of Ka and Arjuna,
that are considered sat-cit-nanda incarnate. The three constituent terms referring to the
spiritual good, the supreme, and the joy, are dealt at length in the Anubhavmta. Verses like the
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following three could help in building up the miracle by deriving the imagined meaning given
thus : Satcidananda had been split. The three brothers feet were moving but bereft of joy. Then,
presenting face to the face, and walking up to the sleeping (Satcidananda), showing to his sight
the Seer, they took to their path in silence. Needless to say, this is NOT the proper meaning of
the verses at all. It is, however, parallel to the content of the narrative of the miracle.15

5. Miracles and Myths

These narratives are essentially mythical stories. They would loosely be called myths even
in academic writing. It is, however, necessary to distinguish between myth and mythical story.
Myth is the principle element or the character in the mythical story. The mythical story is a
narrative or story that is believed to be true in faith and not on the basis of concrete evidence,
historical or otherwise. The mythical story is a narrative concerning one or more myths that may
be conceptual (e.g. superior power) or corporeal (e.g. hero, villain and the rest). The Myth is
therefore, not the literal content of the mythical story of cultural history. The first step in such
interpretation should be to find out the myth(s) underlying or contained in the story.
In the narratives of Jnadevas miracles, the Myth is not the hero that is Jnadeva, for his
historicity is attested by the literary output bearing his name as the author, that has come down to
us. The myth is in the concept of supernatural power acquired by a yog or saint. The
supernatural power was manifested in the performance of acts bringing about physical events
which do not seen to follow the generally known laws of nature.
That myth in turn was a product of the belief of the masses in his written word. They implicitly
believed the description in the Jnevari, of a person deflecting away from yoga, and being
reborn in a house of piety. He, it says, is endowed with omniscience in the tender young age;
and with the acquisition of that unfailing wisdom, his mind secretes the nectar of the letters and
all the self-sustaining disciplines spring from his speech. The masses believed that Jnadeva
himself fitted to this description of a yogic prodigy of that sort.6
The seeds of the description lie in the text of the Git (6.40-43). But its expression came before
the masses from Jnevari. In the same way, the practice of Hatha Yoga was appearing before
them, in the votaries of Ntha Pantha and not from the aphorisms of Patajali.. Those aphorisms
contain affirmations to the effect that concentration of the minds faculties in special ways leads
to acquisition of various exemplary powers.17

6. Myths and Words

The yoga of Patajali in its turn, is said to have its roots in the Upaniads and back again in the
g Veda. To quote : In a late hymn of the g Veda we read a class of holy men different from
the Brhmans, the silent ones; (munis), who wear the wind as a girdle, and who, drunk with
their own silence, rise on the wind and fly in the paths of the demigods and birds...18

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It is obvious that the author believes that the vedic hymn refers to holy men treading this earth,
who yet have acquired the miraculous power of rising on the wind and flying in the paths of
birds. We have then reached the oldest source of words believed by the illiterate and the
learned alike. And those words convey the existence of supernatural power in some human
beings. Here is the myth.
The hymn referred to (10.136) called Kei Skta. The hymn of the Hairy One, describes an
object or personage that appears possessed of an attachment which resemble the flowing beard of
the human male. The word muni no doubt occurs in the hymn which has given rise to the belief
and the myth. The text however contains many physical descriptions as well, which cannot apply
to a human being, be he an ascetic or someone else.19
The first verse makes the statement that this brightness or heavenly body is called Kei The
second tells us that they get into motion like the wind. The fourth describes how Kei moves
in the atmospheric region, viewing objects in the west. These descriptions raise before our eyes,
the picture of a heavenly body, moving in rarefied from like that of the wind glowingly
traversing the universe, spread over the space between the east and west seas.
This heavenly body turns out to be the comet, the vast bright apparition that appears hairy on
account of the spread of its tail. The word comet is from Greek kometes, the hairy one,
which is exactly similar to Kei' in Vedic Sanskrit, The Greek word came into use as a common
noun, in which the analogy with human hair remained a matter of fact only. The Sanskrit word
kei became a metaphor for comet, the common noun for it being, ketu.20
The live metaphor was, however, the muni, the ascetic with his tresses and beard. Kei and
Muni, both became myths for the comet, in the hymn, the physical aspects associated with the
comet were described in statements made with Kei or Muni as the subjects. The verbs and
predicates, also often metaphorical were applied to any of them at will. The poet cannot be
faulted, for he had all the while the comet in mind. It is the latter-day interpreter who is in error
of taking the literal meaning as applicable to ascetics, and reffering to a totally different aspect
(silence) of their conduct, which has little in common with the hairy Kei. The hymn is a
mythical narrative, an ode to the physical phenomenon of comets, and not a statement of the
superior power of ascetics on earth. It certainly alludes to their attributes, with the object of
describing the comets as celestial ascetics of the starry heavens.21

7. Myth, Fact and Truth

The Kei hymn contains statements but no narrative about the ascetics who constitute the live
metaphor. Mythical stories could be and have been built, in which the ascetics, like
Vishvmitra, have been made the characters or heroes. The stories carried in themeselves,
metaphors in the characters as well as their actions or roles in the various episodes. Just as Kei
in the hymn were taken to be ascetics in the true sense of the term, so were the stories taken tobe
true, of true ascetics in some bygone past.

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The dictionary meaning of metaphor can be referred, to understand metaphor in the narrative :
Application of name descriptive term or phrase to an object or action to which it is not literally
applicable (e.g. a glaring error, food for thought. Leave no stone unturned); mixed metaphor :
combination of inconsistent metaphors (this tower of strength will forge ahead); {from meta
(phero : bear) : transfer}. In this difinition, the name applies to an object, and the
descriptive term to an action. The mixed metaphor combines the (metaphoric) name of one
object with the descriptive term for another's action. The inconsistency in the mixed metaphor is
often obvious. But a narrative with mixed metaphors would be faulted mainly for its figures of
speech, not for the truth of its statements.22
A metaphor and the narrative based on it, may be well thought and elaborately worked out.
Homeric similies are good examples of such metaphors, A large number of metaphors,
particulary by the ancient, were based on implusive feel-thought which perceives gross
similarities and analogies to construct metaphors. The real object and the metaphoric are
compared for shape, colour, sound or anything else. So the glowing object in the sky was
metaphorised as a bundle of hair, moving in the sky. Or it was compared to an ascetic and the
hair in the earlier metaphor were compared to a garment tied round the waist by an invisible
girdle of wind. The glowing objects action of movement was combined with the metaphoric
ascetics course and likened to the attribute of flying, of the wind and birds. All this gave rise to
the complex metaphors. A complex metaphor brings together the metaphoric name of one
object with the metaphoric or proper descriptive term for the action of another metaphoric or
real object. If the objects and actions are in plural numbers, the complexity will be increased.
The hymn of the comet contains complex metaphors, leading to the statement that, ascetics fly
like birds in the sky.
This mythical statement can be analysed for its truth value with the help of Platos discussion of
truth and falsehood in The Sophist. Plato takes two statements made by putting together a
thing with an action by means of a name and a verb. They are : Theaetetus sits and 'Theaetetus
flies, concerning the same Theaetetus. Plato then assigns the characters to them : the first is
true, the second is false; statement that states things different from the things that are.23
The judgement of flashood on the second statement is correct in the case of a real Theaetetus. If,
however, Theaetetus in the second statement is metaphorical and not real, it could also assume
the appearance of being true. The common man who knows of Theaetetus, only from the
metaphorical statement (without knowing that it is metaphorical) will believe that Theaetetus
possesses the flower of flying. And indeed, if the referent of the metaphoric Theaetetus has, in
fact, an attribute analogous to flying, the statement may not be considered false even by the
philosopher.24
Statements composed of complex metaphors are thus prone to be taken as true; they engender
belief in things different from the things that are. Mythical stories, being composed of complex
metaphors in nouns and verbs, do not lend themselves to easy grasp of the things that are and the
things that are not. They have been taken to be true on the strength of belief.

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8. Metaphor and Belief

The ambivalence of a mythical statement is partly the result of the nature of the word itself. The
word is mere signifier and does not concretise the thing or the action that it signifies. A word
that is used as metaphor by a speaker is signifying the thing that is not, to the speaker, but
some different thing that is, to the listener.
Jnadeva, the great master of metaphor as poet, has, as philosopher, brought out the
imperfection of the word in his Anubhavmta. His refrain is : The word is a mighty useful
entity as mnemonic; but it is no mirror to the unknown. By itself it cannot produce a semblance
of what is concrete, even though with its assistance even the blind can perceive, because its
sound is heard by the car.25
Plato who employs the metaphor of the cave to explain the philosophy of forms, defines word
as a vocal sign, used to signify being or nature which is a form (eidos), and also to stand for
an existing thing. The interplay of this shift of reference from the world of forms to the world of
things is reflected in the imprecision of terms used in his expositions. And he used words
aplenty in dialogues as the medium of his expositions. Yet he denounced poetry, as the imitator
of things that are themselves shadows.26
Aristotle, on the other hand, writes in his Poetics: Metaphor consists in giving the thing a
name that belongs to something else. It is a great thing, indeed, to make a proper use of these
poetical forms, as also of compounds and strange words But the greatest thing by far is to be a
master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learnt from others; and it is also a sign of
genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in dissimilar. He
defines words, as tokens or signs, of mental affectations that are likenesses of things. Metaphors
would therefore be further removed from the things as they are.27
Aristotle also tells us that, Diction becomes distinguished and non-prosaic by the use of
strange words, metaphors. But a whole statement in such terms will be a riddle if
made up of metaphors. The very nature, indeed of a riddle is this, to describe a fact in an
impossible combination of words (which cannot be done with the real names for things, but can
be with their metaphorical substitutes).28
A song containing a series of statements made in an impossible combination of words carries
the name-stamp of Jnadeva. It starts with a verse which can be translated as: On the tip of a
thorn, stood three towns/ Two desolate, one would stay not. This was followed by similar
triads, of which two would not form and one would not exist. The last verse means, Says
Jnadeva : you will not fathom this without the help of a guru. On the strength of this, serious
scholars have derived overtly spiritual or mystic meanings from those statements. As a matter
of fact, songs of the same content are found in South Indian languages, sung by children as an
interminable riddle describing other such triads connected by very thin threads.29

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In the Greek tradition, there is an exact parallel to this riddle : A man who was not a man threw
a stone that was not a stone at a bird that was not a bird sitting on a twig that was not a twig. In
the Republic Plato refers to this as the children's puzzle about a eunuch throwing a pumice
stone at a bat sitting on a reed. He calls such statements, ambiguous, neither one thing nor the
other, belonging to the fluctuating intermediate realm apprehended by the intermediate faculty,
of belief.30
Narratives built up of statements of complex metaphors, impossible combinations of
metaphorical words, and the like, give us mythical stories. They fall in the realm apprehended
by belief. To the extent that the myths (as metaphors) are based on facts or phenomena of the
universe, they are first steps towards the realm of knowledge. Even the knowledgeable have
their own realms or areas of belief. Jnanadeva deals with devotion at great length. As examples
he cites stories from Indian mythology. One of them, for example, relates how the great
elephant of the gods was caught by the leg by a crocodile and was freed as a result of his devout
prayers to Viu, the foremost god. Aristotle says that tragedy adheres to the historical
names for an aesthetic reason, because what has happened is absolutely possible and therefore
convincing. Taken together these two quotations show that the mythical stories in Homers
epics were believed to be true, by the great exponent of logical reasoning. This would not
appear as a contradiction if it is realised that reason and belief are complements in the totality of
the human mind. Both the faculties function mainly through the medium of words. They are
also the creators of words.31
It is now generally held that the conceptual capacity that creates language is coeval with the
emergence of Homo sapiens as primates in the evolutionary scale. Some sort of speech for
social communication did exist even among the lower primates. Attachment of meaning to
sounds or to a group of them is, however, the speciality of humans. That forms the capacity for
creating words or language. It is equipment for living and is given by the parents to the young
child. The infant possesses the ability to recognise faces almost from the first days. The ability
to pick up and reproduce language from the human environment appear at one and a half to two
years of age. To a small extent, the child can make his own language, but its major acquisition
comes from the parents. This consists mainly in the naming of things, in accordance with the
sounds received and repeated, on trust, as units of meaning. Though expressed in sounds, words
are essentially conceptual.32
The phenomena of the universe make impressions on the mind. They are so regular that the
concept of rationality is almost ingrained with the human mind. Acquisition of empirical
knowledge by the growing individual develops this innate rationality. Observed similarities
between things or phenomena also aid in the formation of concepts. All these concepts are
expressed in words. The rationality of phenomena in the universe such as cause-and-effect
relationships find expression in words. So also the similarities and differences between things
or phenomena. Thinking itself starts getting verbalised. As a result, words almost become
equated with the things they signify.33
Extraordinary phenomena or things are not understood in the rational mode. The mind then
takes recourse to perceiving their similarities to known entities. In expressing those similarities
in words, metaphors are born and then the myths. There was rationality perceived in the regular
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ity of the sun, moon, stars and even planets (the wanderers) in the sky. An irregularity like the
comets appearing in the sky with an impressive spread, led to the metaphor of a hairy entity,
live or inert, around which mythical stories were built. Believers sought rationality in them,
rationalists dubbed them as phantasies. It was all a war fought with words, in the arena of
words.
Miracles and myths have been created with words. That. Perhaps, is no wonder. For, word was
the first Myth. Word was the Mataphor on Sounds.34

NOTES
1.

The name of the language of Jnadevas writings is given as marht, which is also an
adjective meaning open, clear, unclosed. The adjective applies to die country as well, as
the plateaus and steep hillsides do not support vegetation and many districts in the rainshadow of the mountain present a bare visage. The name Mahrra as a sanskrit
compound meaning, great nation, appears to have been formed from the adjective
marhta, resulting in the change of meaning also. This can be called a phonational
metaphor.

2.

The verse is form Anubhavamrita, Ed. V.D. Gokhale 1967.

3.

The conquest of the yogic fort, yoga-durga, is described in jnewari 12.46-57. The
Sanskrit word durga is explained as one, difficult to go to. More correctly, it appears to
be Sanskritisation of the SI (South Indian) words turu, turuvu, turugu, tunnel, bore. The
Marthi word gada, fort is related to pit, cave. Mahrtra has over 450 forts remains.
Notably the Tamil poem, Tirukkurall Ck. 75 describes hill fort s likethose in Maharashtra,
the like of which, Tamil country has none.

4.

For example, villagers of the fisherman (koli) cast from coastal areas across the mountain
hold fairs for the goddess Ekvra at Karle, the famous Buddhist cave complex. The timber
arch supports there are carbon-dated to the 2nd - 3rd century BC.

5.

Jnevar 18.1730-37.

6.

The cult of devotion is traditionally held to have originated in South India and developed
in Karnaka and Mahrtra. The word varakari should be from Tamil varam, song of
devotion. The town of Pandharpur is derectiy south of Paithan, the capital of first-century
Stavhana kings, and more importantly, meeting point of ancient trade routes towards
north and south India. Precious stones from Sri Lanka should have passed through
Pandharpur and Paithan to Mohenjo-daro. The name pandharpur is related to Tamil pani,
hog; the constellation Pleiades (krttik). Vithob (ithuba in rural speech), the akimbo
god, appears to have developed from an original god-of-the-crossing: Tamil itu means
narrows and kol is a barge pole, leading to the name koli, boatmen, the local original

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devotees of the god For the last thousand years the god has been identified with Vishnu,
and mainly the Krishna incarnation of his.

7.

. ...
.

8.

. . .

9.

. .
. .

10. .
.
11.
. ...
. ...
. .
12. .
13.

- . . : .
14.
.
15. . .
...

.
16.
. ...
.
. .

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17. . .
.

18. The Wonder That Was India A.L. Basham, 8th Impression, 1989.25
19. The hymn can be translated as follows: Keshi holds fire, water, heaven and earth; he
brightens the hole of his space; this brightness is called kei (1). The kei are hermits grit
with winds and clad in unclean tawny skins. As they have attained the state of the gods,
they move with the motion of wind (2) Led into ecstasy by our life of hermits, we have
reached the ethereal state. What you mortals see, are just our bodies, they say (3). He
moves in the middle region, observing the panorama of the universe, He is live sage from
god. Winds horse friend of wind, sage sent over by god, friend sent for doing good. He
reaches both the seas, the one in the east and the one in the west, (5). Treading in the trails
of apsaras, gadharvas, and the antelopes of skies, kei is the knower of the skies, friendly,
agreeable and exhilarating (6). Wind churned and earth the inflexible pounded, to extract
that which he drank from the pot of position, with Rudra (7)
20. The word Ketu means a bright appearance, an apparition, comet. This hymn depicts the
comet as a benevolent messenger from god. In Varhamhiras Brihatsamhita in the
chapter on the comets, barely two varises attribute benevolence to some, against thirtyfive
that talk of their evil effects. This aspects is evident in the allophonic Tamil word keu, to
be destroyed, to run away defeated.
21. Similarly, the popular image of ascetics cursing people, is contained in the Tamil word
muni, to be angry with. The Sanskrit explanation of muni from mauna, silence, appears
to be deductive rather than linguistic.
22. Concise Oxford Dictionary.
23. Sophist 262E 263B; Platos Theory of Knowledge F. M. Comford, (1979) p. 309-310
24. For most Indians, the statement, Hanumn flies has a ring of truth. The character of the
monkey named Hanumn in the Rmyaa is believed to have had the power of flying
across the sky. It has been possible to decipher the myth of Hanumn. The monkey, a hairy
creature, is a metaphor for the comet Like in the Vedic hymn above, the mythical monkey
can expand and contract at will, and can fly towards the sun, over the ocean, and across the
country to the Himlayas and back. The word vl means tail in Sanskrit and Tamil. And
vlar in Tamil, mean monkey and celestial being respectively. We can visualize the
process by which the metaphor and myth would have been developed. The episodes in the
mythical narrative correspond to, the comets head always facing the sun and the tail
growing and vanishing erratically, during its passage towards and away from the sun.
25.
.
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26. pp. 305, 306, 307, - as per Note 23. Concluding pages of Republic as per Note 30 below.
27. Aristotle : The Art of Poetry, Translated by Ingram Bywater. Oxford University Press
Twelth Impression 1991. pp. 71-72, 78
28. As per 27, p. 75.
29. This riddle has been dealt as
a mythical narrative, in : Vishvanath Khaire , p.
, (the Tamil folk song)
30. Plato : The Republic A new Translation, by H D P Lee, Te Penguin Classics 1955. p.
243.
31. Aristotel (as per 27), Preface by Gilbert Murray, p. 12-13.
32. By that time (three years of age) a child perceives, remembers, and trusts fully the existing
norms, and reproduces what it has learned, The origin of the Human Race by V.P.
Alexeev, Progress Publishers Moscow, 1986. p. 197,
33. The sphere of empirical experience is one of elementary direct knowledge, or rather not so
much knowledge as acquaintance with are simplest properties of objects, the reperition of
natural processes, and the course of human life. Note 32 p. 231
34. The Original Greek term for myth (mythos) denotes word in the sense of a decisive,
final pronouncement. It differs from logos, the word whose validity or truth can be argued
and demonstrated. Because myths present extraordinary events without trying to justify
them, people have sometimes assumed that myths are simply unprovable and false stories
and thus have made myth a synonym for fable. Myth and Mythology p. 492, Vol. 12,
Encyclopaedia Britannica 15th Ed. The Sanskrit word mithy meaning falsely, untruly
is related to mithas, to or from or with each other, mutually. The word as
communication is mutual excellence. Expounding rjasa knowledge, Jnadeva employs
the metaphor of the grand plan of mithy that goes on, outside the precincts of the temple
of true knowledge, exhibiting the three states of worldly existence. -
. .

***

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