A Note on Jataska Tales 5

I have already stated
the problem around which my deliberation revolves. Siddhartha Buddha
spread his message in Pali and he did it in the 6 th century BC. One
wonders was not then Sanskrit spoken by the masses even though
Sanskrit was the chief vehicle for literary communication in Northern
India till the advent of Islam. In classical literature such as in the
dramas of Kalidasa women folk speak in Prakrit while men speak in
Sanskrit. I have read, I donot know where , that women folk some where
in West Indies speak in a different language from that of the male
folk. But this is not the case here.
We could describe classical Sanskrit as the language in which playwrights like Bhasa and Bhavabhuti or poets like Bharavi and Jaidev or prose writers like Bana and Sri Harsha wrote. There is great difference between Vedic Sanskrit and classical Sanskrit on many counts. True that the vocabulary is much the same . But the meanings of the words had organic link with the derivative roots of the words in Vedic Sanskrit that were largely missing in the classical Sanskrit. For example AGNI in classical Sanskrit always means Fire god or fire But in the Vedas AGNI has other meanings also. They are derivative meanings AGNI means one who was born first. Thus according to the Vedic hymns the Firegod was the eldest among the gods AGNI being derived from AGRA--Hindi or Bengali AAGE as in AAGE BADH JAWAN could mean -- foremost among the
gods In early English window literally meant the wind's eye; later on the metaphorical meaning got the currency Similarly the word purohita meant both the priest as well as a person who goes in front.

Purohit in classical Sanskrit means priest but in Vedic Sanskrit it means both ----one who stands before as well as a priest. Indeed it is the priest who stands in front of us when we pray. I have already sent two notes where I pointed out 1. Siddhartha Buddha gavesermons in Pali Which was the language of the common man of his time in the districts of today’s Bihar and UP. But there is a difficulty. Sanskrit has been the chief vehicle of literature in Northern India till the advent of Islam. If Pali were the spoken language already in the 6th century BC do you think that a literature with reasonable élan vital could continue for 1700 years even when it is not a spoken language. In England Bede and Thomas More and Baconand Milton wrote in Latin but their works do not belong to the best of the Latin literature. But Kalidasa who belonged to 3rd century AD or Bana who belonged to 6th century AD wrote in an Archaic language ---tis is asking too much of us to believe . In recent years we have two astounding instances. In the 19th century Jewish language was out of use unless for liturgical excecises. The Jewish patriotism was such however that when Israel was born the language of the liturgy was so developed that Israel imparts highest education in its native tongue