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Presidential Address
793.
pretation, of the word " Veda" is justified by the doctrine of Logos in Western Philosophy. The same applies mutatis mutandis to the wider problem into which the above question has been subsequently enlarged: that problem is the eternity or non-eternity of Sabda. Prima facie the position of the Mimāınsakas who hold that yote is face will appear absurd. But here too if we bear in mind that they distinguish between you and safe, and yoc in their philosophy is the permanent reality which reveals itself in safat, the proposition will become very different and fairly tenable. To give another example : Apparently one of the crudest arguments for proving the existence of God is one mentioned in Nyāya-Kusumānjali where it is said that the existence of God can be inferred from the necessity of teaching the use of language-words and their meanings-to the first man (qara' ). But here too, if we only scratch the surface we realise that the argument instead of being the crudest is one of the profoundest ever employed in the service of Theism : it is that God is the author of Human Civilization : it is He Who establishes community of thought and possibility of its exchange between man and man, and thus makes civilization possible. This re-interpretation or extension of meaning, if any, is not without a precedent elsewhere. Christ's Kingdom of Heaven was once an event in time, which soon comes to be understood as an eternal verity.
These are some of the suggestions I beg to put forward in regard to the future work of this section. In doing so I have trespassed too much upon the ૧૦૦
