The Goddess of Speech is of course the mother of language. In the broadest sense of language, as the Word, she is the Mother of the Universe. In India she is called Vac.

'Vac', when used impersonally to signify speech, is a feminine form, and is usually translated as "speech", or "Word", and sometimes as "language" - but "language" does not convey the term's full purport. Vac, then, can mean what is uttered or the goddess who utters it. I shall use the "k" and call the Goddess of Speech "Vak."

Vak is the Power of the Silence before the Word is spoken as the Universe, as well as the Appearance of the Universe itself. Vak is one of the many names of Divine Mother, or Sakti, the fundamental Power or Energy underlying the Universe, without which her Form or consort Siva would be a lifeless corpse. We believe Vak is the ultimate personification of those feminine energies called "gnas" in the Vedas, also known in ancient times as the "wives of gods."

Speech has a magical creative power or maya, a term that eventually came to signify not only something that is made, but also the power of making it, as well as the process of making it; i.e., the triune: Maker, Making, Made. Since both men and women are born of woman, it is not surprising that Vak is female; she is the goddess who measures out speech; she is the Ma or Matr of Man, he whose thoughts are measured out.

The origin of the life-giving power that quickens the mind into speech and instigates the Universe into apparent existence is certainly mysterious and beyond even the most exhaustive description. Despite our best scientific efforts, the material world, or what is made (maya), often deceives us, as if it were some sort of grand magic trick. What is made by Mother is really there, as a thing; nevertheless, our perceptions of it are often illusions and our conceptions are sometimes delusions.  

Vak's Truth is presented in mantras or words of power, in sacred verbal formulae pregnant with riddles and infinite correlations. Vak is the Cosmic Cow from Whom flows the streams, rivers, lakes and oceans of milk that constitute the Universe of Discourse. Her words are called "the Footsteps of the Cow", the secret and mysterious tracks to the transcendental Truth followed by the sages.

Vak's primordial, original Truth is expressed in the single syllable OM (AUM). OM sums up Brahman, the Supreme Reality, the Universe, in an emphatic YES. The sound AUM as its three morae is the Universe of Past-Present-Future.

In India, the philosophy of Grammar is based on a linguistic theology which establishes that Wisdom, the Vedas, the words thereof, are of eternal import. That is to say, the Vedas are founded on the primacy of the Word or "vac", a term comparable but not quite identical to our Logos in the West.

Grammar, then, is a 'darsana', a view of Truth, an approach to Supreme Reality, and a philosophical school. Primary emphasis is placed here on the female aspect, energy or 'sakti'. This tradition has been maintained for over 5,000 years. Vak is the Word, the "Mother of the gods", the Godhead that creates and upholds the Universe. In the beginning there was the Word as living Force, our Mother who is at the same time Word, consciousness, breath, and vital energy. And, in Creation, there is no discontinuity between the cosmos and man the microcosm.

The Universe as it is spoken emerges in divine consciousness just as language emerges in human consciousness. But what is the Word good for? It is the means to human liberation. Yes, in the East and the West, the object of a liberal education is ultimately liberation. In the West, grammar is the first of the trivium and of the seven liberal arts.

Thus the Word is the means of returning to the divine Source of speech, wherein we shall be freed from the chains of becoming. Why is the baby crying? What is it that we all really want in our distress? Is it not to be picked up, to be held, to be fed with Mother's milk? And, when she puts us down, she teaches us to exchange Mother's milk for her words, the gift of grammar. Yet we long to return to her arms, to reality.

So we see here that liberation runs both ways, to and fro; yet, ultimately, freedom and absolute autonomy are fundamental characteristics only of the Godhead from whence we were born. For when the Word becomes human language it is restricted or bound by human conventions, hence grammarians are urged to rebel, to cast off the restrictions of ignorance and to return to the arms of Vak.

Again, Vak is one of the several important names associated with Divine Mother. She appeared as a folk divinity, gained influence, and as men became liberated, she took precedence over the great god of fire, Agni. She was associated with the river goddess, Sarasvati, therefore it would be disrespectful not to say a few words about Sarasvati, adored by poets and writers as the Goddess of Eloquence and Wisdom. Wherefore we quote  the Rigveda, one of the oldest if not the oldest statements of wisdom know to man - the hymns therein provide the singer with access to the magical powers of Vak:

"So may Sarasvati, the Hero's Consort, brisk with rare life, the lightning's Child, inspire us, and, with the Dames (Gnas) accordant, give the singer a refuge unassailable and flawless." (VI 49.7, Griffith)

Sarasvati ("watery, elegant") was once a famous river, now almost dried up, described as "best mother, best of rivers" who became "best of goddesses", the tutelary deity of authors. She is presently worshiped in libraries with offerings of flowers, fruits, and incense. In ancient times, one of the most important centers of brahmanic culture was on the banks of the Sarasvati. It was said that without her water and fish, the brahmins would be too hungry to remember the sacred scriptures. She was referred to as "queen of the gods", "the melodious cow who milked forth sustenance and water", "the Mother of the Vedas", "the wife of Indra, who contains within herself all worlds," and "Mother of Mantras." Sarasvati's most popular attributes are wealth, fatness, fertility, and ability to purify.

We hope the foregoing serves to adumbrate the Goddess of Eloquence to some small extent so that others of greater vision may pierce the veil of Maya for a more illuminating view. Thus do we lay our shadow at her feet and close with a few quotes from Mandala Ten of the RigVeda. The speaker here is Vagambhrini, now known as Vak, who is describing her powers and functions:

"I go with the Rudras, with the Vasus, I go with the Adityas and the All-gods. I bear both Mitra and Varuna, Indra and Agni, and both the Asvins.

"I bear fermenting Soma, I bear Tvashtar, and also Pushan and Bhaga. I assign wealth for the sacrificer, for him that offers firsts, that presses the Soma.

"I am the queen, the assembler of treasures, the wise, the first of the worshipful ones. In manifold placed did the Gods divide me, who dwell in many abodes, causing me to penetrate many regions.

"Through me he eats food who perceives, who breaths, who hears what is spoken. Unknowing they repose upon me. Hear, O illustrious one, that which is worthy of belief I say to thee.

"I even of myself say this, an utterance acceptable to Gods and men: whomever I desire, him do I make strong, him do I make the priest, the seer, the sage.

"For Rudra I stretch the bow, that the arrow may smite the hater of the spell. For the people I make strife. I penetrate heaven and earth.

"I give birth to the father in his head. My birthplace is within the waters, the ocean. Thence I spread through all beings, and touch with my head this heaven.

"I blow forth even as the wind, reaching all beings, beyond heaven, beyond this earth. Such have I become through my greatness."

 

---AUM---

 

VEDIC HYMNS, translated from the Rigveda by Edward J. Thomas, M.A., D.Litt. London: John Murray, 1923, Chapter XL. To VACH, SPEECH  

HYMNS OF THE RIGVEDA, Transl. H.R. Griffith, Benares: Lazarus, 1920