Re[2]: [tied] Re: Mitanni and Matsya

At 10:52:18 PM on Thursday, April 3, 2008, Patrick Ryan
wrote:

> From: "david_russell_watson" <liberty@...>

>> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan"
>> <proto-language@...> wrote:

>>> How the Vedas regard Varuna is of interest but not
>>> decisive.

>> Unless there's an older source than the Vedas which
>> mentions Varuna, then this of yours is a highly
>> irrational claim.

> David, one must first have an original thought before
> someone like yourself can characterize it as "irrational".

I don't know what function 'like yourself' serves here, but
in general a thought certainly needn't be original in order
to be legitimately characterized as irrational. And there's
no particular virtue in irrational original thought anyway.

> The development of Varuna after the period of the Rig Veda
> points the way to a better understanding of what he might
> have been before the Rig Veda.

> Surely that occurred to you.

The best evidence for what he was before the Rgveda is the
Rgveda, unless you've discovered an earlier source.

>>> Varuna existed long before the Vedas and long afterward.

>> Where do you find evidence of Varuna earlier than the
>> Vedas, that you can claim he existed so long before?

> Ancient peoples worshiped the same divine entities for
> thousands of years.

> The cult developed, rituals changed, and sometimes a later
> epithet took the place of an earlier one, but the
> divinities remained, at the core, the same.

In other words, you have no evidence.

Brian