The Ontic Bloom of ऋ

Some etymology: Pāṇini defined the root √ṛ as gatau and gatiprāpaṇa- motion/ movement and attainment of motion.

Ṛta is derived from this by affixation or pratyaya- ṛ+kta (ऋ + क्त). This pratyaya denotes a sense of the passive past tense. Ṛta thus means “was put into motion” or “has been done,” (where done refers to the action denoted by the verb, in this case movement/motion.)

Not only is this cosmogony at play, it is the birth of the ontic. Simply the etymological rooting of ṛ informs us of the “moment in time” when motion/ movement/ change/ time came into existence. Since it came into existence, it cannot be Being or Existing in itself. You see, that which is eternal and unchanging is sat (सत् )- it simply Is.

It is not ‘existence,’ a phenomenological thing and thus an ontical form. It is Existing, Being- the Ontological. It derives from the root √as (अस्) which means “is.” सत् is the present participle of अस्, which is to say that it is not exactly “is” but rather “ing”- is happening, going on.

Thus do we say that it is not existence- which implies the coming into existence, or coming into being at some earlier point. As the present participle of is, it is Existing or Being– what the thing is to itself, or the ontological that Heidegger gave up on. To Terence McKenna, it awaits us at the end of time- which is of course true. But it also sits behind us before the emergence of time. It is why sat holds the status it does in dhārmika ontology. Existing such, eternal and unchanging- there is no motion by definition. No movement, no time, no gati. Not a single ontical form in existence

But then, at some point, ṛ + kta has been done -> movement has been attained– gatiprāpaṇayoh comes into being. The cosmic bubble which will contain things, or ontical forms. And so this bubble is called (ṛ+kta) ṛta. This explains the design of our schema. We shape it around ṛta since it denotes the pure, closest branching of sat. It is nothing but motion, rhythm. It is a-sat, yes, but it is still true, right, proper, efficient. It is a consonant reflected shard of reality, and an elaborate trail of ontic blooming is now possible for us:

Sat and Bhava

1. The ontologically complete interpretation of ṛ + kta is that motion has been attained by “Being,” by “Sat.” This is different to saying that Sat has come into existence.
2. To come into existence is understood in Sanskrit as bhav– a cognacy to the modern “be” in English. In turn this gives us the word bhāva- expression, form or manner. The phenomenological and experience world is through bhav, through ontical forms coming into existence.
3. Bhav proceeds at its emergent pace or happening, but ṛta continues- it is both gatiprāpaṇayoḥ and also gatau- the attainment of motion and also movement itself.

Ṛta, Dharma, Ārya

The Indian imperative has been to be in flow and consonance with this motion, ie.- dharma is the endeavor to conduct life and society in consonance with ṛta.

Another pratyaya to ṛ evokes the idea of “wanting to do” the action denoted by the verb, called the ṇyat pratyaya. Ṛ + ṇyat (ऋ + ण्यत्) gives us the word ārya – आर्य, ie. desiring gatiprāpaṇa- wishing to be in step with the rhythm of natural motion. All the expert philology and comparative linguistics of decades has not cared to factor such things in its imagined definitions of ‘Aryan.’ Or it has deliberately not done so. Ignorance or malice- we leave this open.

The Ride is not Free

To be in motion, ie. to exist in ṛta, accumulates entropic debt. In the modern world we understand this through notions like sustainability, ‘give-back-to-community’ and carbon credit. The ancient Indians understood this as ṛṇa, or essential obligation.

Ṛṇa is simply another ‘kta pratyaya’ of ṛ- ṛ + kta = ṛna (ऋ + क्त = ऋण ). The difference is that ṛta is the gatiprāpaṇa of Sat, while ṛṇa is the gatiprāpaṇa of you and me.

Only a few steps above the dhātu ladder, we are able to get core insights into the Indian mind. It perceives a deeper ontology to being and existence than we realize, discerns what existence is at core- motion, change, temporality; and formulates an elaborate set of design principles- dharma– that bring harmony with the motion. And it doesn’t stop here, on the branches of ऋ alone there is further core ontology such as:

ṛṣi – ‘possessed of mastery over gati’, ie., can see beyond the illusions of temporality; or cleaves through it with vision. In similar vein, one who cleaves through land, physically (for agriculture and irrigation- more flow), is kṛṣi.

ṛca – where the ‘ca’ is of the same evocation as the sound holds in notions like citta and cit ⇒ luminosity, sparkle. Ṛca is most literally a ‘throwing of light on ऋ,’ which explains why it took ṛṣi-level vision to compose ṛcas.

To find a tethering within ṛta, a purpose or aim that situates it specifically (a relative but not absolute sthā), is artha (अर्थ).

This demonstrates that the schema we build is capable of fulfilling the first of the two test criteria we had set for validity in Part 1: rooting our thinking in Sanskrit opens new pathways, or seeds reconnection to the civilizational core.

The ontic bloom of ṛ connects us to the civilizational imperative, the harmony and consonance inherent to the design of dharma. Another way to put it is that what ṛta is to Existing, dharma is to Existence. Ṛta is flow, motion, movement in the ontological Sat, dharma is flow, tradition, sustenance in the ontical Bhav. This is why our aspiration is to be Āryas, why we consider rivers- ever in motion- to be sacred, and why flow- pravāha- is valued in sanātana dharma. In this light let us now examine the Ārtava and Ātmya layers again, this time with special focus on the civilizational thinking they reconnect us to. Each layer can yield ontic blooms like ṛ did.

Authored by Amritanshu Pandey. Published by Brhat.