Barahin-e-Ahmadiyya Part IV — Page 292
BarĀhĪn-e-a H madiyya — Part Four 292 beef into pieces can be correct in terms of eloquence only if it is proven that, in Vedic times, beef was openly sold in markets and butchers cut it into pieces and gave them to the A ryas. But the contemporary A ryas certainly do not believe that to be the case. Hence, it is obvious that to give a simile in a composition without there being corresponding external facts, and to liken [in it] one thing to such a thing that is detested by the people, is utterly beyond the pale of eloquence. Even if a boy were to use such a simile in his speech, he would be censured, and regarded as stupid, by the wise. For, a simile is appreciated only when the likeness is obvious to such a degree that the thing to which something is likened is well known to the listeners and is such that they [the listeners] hold it to be self-evident and of proven existence and is such that they are not disgusted by its being mentioned to them. But who can prove that during the Vedic age the selling, buying, and eating of beef was a common practice to which A ryah people were not averse! Even if it were argued that the Veda’s mention of it is proof of this practice, it would not wholly meet the objection because the likeness between the beef and blood of cows on the one hand, and water on the other, is not a suitable likeness. Yes, cow’s milk can be lik- ened to pure, limpid water. Hence, if the 12th shurt i of mand a la 1, sukt a 61 of the Rigveda, 1 wherein it is written, ‘O Indra, hurl your vajra [thunderbolt] against Vritra and cut it up into pieces as butchers cut up a cow into pieces’, would have been [written] as, ‘When Indra pressed Vritra with his vajra, then water emerged therefrom as milk emerges from a cow’s udder when they are pressed’, then the intended poetic idea would have been conveyed and the simile would have been relevant. Moreover, no Hindu’s nature would have then detested the simile because Hindus drink cow’s milk without hesitation. Irrespective of all this, such poeticism is not the objective of my 1. Various mantras of Rigveda are classified into shurt i s, mand a las, and sukt a s. [Publisher]