Discoveries of The Vedic Rishis - Discoveries of The Vedic Rishis 303

Now here arises a tremendous amount of psychology. What is the relationship between knowledge and will? You know in our ordinary life, you will find in our human consciousness, there is one portion which is portion of knowledge, there is one portion which is portion of will-force. Now this distinction you will find very easily when you have a question, a very deliberate question: what should I do in a given situation? Whenever you have a question, "what should I do", you will immediately find out that there is in you a will-force which is backed by some kind of knowledge, maybe full knowledge, maybe partial knowledge, maybe small knowledge, but always there is some knowledge, and there is a tussle between the two. Sometimes you know what is to be done. A patient of diabetes knows that he should not take sugar. He knows it, there is a knowledge given to him, he should not take sugar.  But the desire, the will to take sugar, sometimes is very great. The temptation to take sugar is very great. So the will-force is to take sugar. The knowledge says: don't take sugar; the will-force says oh, it doesn't matter; once in a while you can take it and enjoy it. And then once in a while becomes more frequent because the will-force weakens. The more you indulge in the desire, the more you want it. There is always some kind of an equation or inequation between knowledge and will-force. So there is, you might say, in the Vedic terms, a great deal of equation or inequation between the cow and the horse. So if you read in a very ordinary manner, you will say that that these Rishis were only watching horses and cows and seeing how many horses and how many cows and they are discussing the battles between the two, horses and cows. That is how many people, who read the Veda, said that Vedas are written by barbarians, primitive people who were interested in cows and horses. But when you read in the depth, you find that there is a tremendous psychological knowledge. They knew what is light and what is will-force, and what is the relationship between the two.

Not only that, they found out that if you want to increase the force of light — if you want the cows more, the horses become more powerful, because they found that the greater the number of cows with you, the greater the power of horses, in other words, the greater the knowledge, the greater is the power of the will-force. If your knowledge increases truly, then the will-force also becomes powerful — How to do that? Is there any power, any god who controls the power of cows? Cow is Sanskrit means go. Go is the word for cow. So the question was: Is there anybody who can be called gomat? Mat means having, wala, gowala, gopal, is there anybody who is real gopal, who is the preserver, the controller of the cows. They made a lot of research on this and they found that there is one god whom they called Indra, this is another algebraic term. Indra is another term in the Veda. You often found that when Vritra came in your path, (Vritra, I told you, is the one who obstructs) they found that particularly when Vritra comes in your path, then the one force which can destroy Vritra is a good equation between go and ashwa, the cow and the horse. And the one who commands this is Indra. So Indra is called Gomat. He is the one who has power over the cows, over the light. This is the secret knowledge of the Vedas. If you really want to fight against the Vritra, then take the help of Indra.

Then how to take the help of Indra? In the Veda there are verses written down, if you recite those mantras, Indra will manifest. This was also a great discovery. What is the method of approaching Indra? Just as if you want to go to the office of a Joint-Secretary, and if you know his name, then you can more easily go into his office. If you simply say, I want to meet the Joint-Secretary, without the name, then there are so many Joint-Secretaries in the Ministry! But if you know his name, it is much more easy for you to enter. And if you know much more about him, then much more easily you can go to him. Identification becomes much more easy. So here also in the Veda, they found out that if you know that Indra is the name of that who has a command over cows and horses, then it is easier for you to approach him. So there are mantras, there are verses in the Veda which, if recited, will give you an access to Indra. There are some of the verses that Sri Aurobindo has translated in The Secret of the Veda, which sometime you should read. There are very, very powerful verses and Sri Aurobindo has explained them also quite well. And Sri Aurobindo has said: Indra represents, it is an algebraic name, Indra means illumined intelligence. This is the meaning. Whenever the word Indra comes, it is to be understood it is equivalent to illumined intelligence. Now Sri Aurobindo had to find this out with a great effort, it is not an easy thing to find out algebraic meanings. Only when you read thoroughly and when you have yourself experienced... There is a very fine sentence given in the Veda itself, that all the words which are important in the Veda are secret words. Ninya vachamsi. That is a Sanskrit expression. Secret words. Vachamsi means words. Ninya, which are secret, there are secret words but kavaye nivachane, but they reveal themselves before the Rishi. Because he has experienced, he himself has the key, he has the knowledge of Indra. Therefore the moment the word Indra comes up, the Rishi will understand: Indra stands for illumined intelligence. This is how Sri Aurobindo found out, not only about Indra, but about all the gods. Which are written in the Veda. All the names of Gods in the Veda are all algebraic terms. So you do not understand normally, what are they? It is only when you understand from inward experience that you can discover their meaning.