Madhuvidya

Author(s): S D Laddu, T N Dharmadhikari, Madhvi Kolhatkar, Pratibha Pingle
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 155

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M. A. MEHENDALE
in the RV where vipra and the participle stuvat occur in identical case forms, e.g. viprāya stuvaté 8.85.5; viprasya va stuvatak 8.19.12 etc. Therefore, he argues, in our passage also we should expect a dat. of vipra by the side of stuvaté. (2) Secondly, víprah, as nom. sg., has to be interpreted as referring to Varuņa - and this is what Geldner, for example, does" -but, argues Fr.E, although vipra in the RV is used with reference to other deities, chiefly Agni, it is never used with reference to Varuņa.
Both the arguments are inconclusive. Let me start arguing this way. If the SK heard viprāi in the text recited to him and he understood it correctly - Fr. E does not grudge this to the SK - he would have rendered ví prāi into víprāya and not viprah. To say that he did not do it because it would have given him one syllable more is not convincing because the SK has allowed metrical irregula. rities to remain elsewhere any way, and, he was not so insensible to meaning as to change a dat. into nom. And, if the number of syllables was his main concern, and not the meaning, why did he not change viprãi to vipre (loc. sg. ) as Fr.E himself believes he has done elsewhere? In fact vipre would have been better instead of the “unfitting" viprah.
The conclusion, therefore, to be drawn is that the SK heard viprah in the text learnt by him and he faithfully preserved it. In fact we should be grateful to him for having resisted the temptation to change viprah to viprāya in view of the parallel passages mentioned by Fr. E. These passages, certainly, could not have gone unnoticed by the SK.
As mentioned above, earlier scholars have understood víprak to refer to Varuna. In support Geldner refers to stanza 4 of this very hymn where Varuga is clearly called vípraḥ (vásistham ha váruno nāvyádhat... stotáram víprah ... ). But Fr. E wants to get rid of this evidence, inconvenient to him, by blaming the SK for having changed there the original vípram to viprah. And why should the SK do it there? Fr. E says in order to give support to his change in the stanza under discussion and to show that Varuna was called vípra in the RV!
But there is one more passage where víprah is clearly used with reference to Varuna. In 6.68.3, which is addressed to Indra and Varupa, we read vajrenan. yáh śávasa hánti vytrár síşakty anyó vrjáneșu víprah. But here too Fr. E wants to change viprah to his dative viprai because the root sac governs dat. (and more frequently accusative). But that is no reason to change víprah to víprai in this verse. It is not necessary that the seer should have clearly expressed the object of the verb. Obviously he has chosen to keep it unexpressed. And if the SK
41 Keith JRAS 1908.1127, on the other hand, looks upon this as an example of the
use of nom. As voc. 2 ". ...the SK's locatives aro original datives. ...." Proc, Tr. 22nd AIOC II.25,
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