Sanskrit is the language of the Ancient Vedic scriptures of India and a title which appeared some 2500 years ago around the time of Panini and before this the language was known as 'Deva Bhasa' whose meaning is the language ( bhasa ) of the gods ( deva ).

 

Sanskrit possesses its own little word factory which contains over 2000 roots and when these roots are adorned with a variety of affixes they make up the language of Sanskrit and unless it possesses a root from the language of Sanskrit it cannot be declared to be Sanskrit.

 

According to tradition this means there are no loanwords within Sanskrit, no words which have been borrowed from other languages yet this Ancient language of Sanskrit has been accused of borrowing up to 100 words which have been taken from other languages.

A borrowing of 100 words may seem a lot but to put this into context we have the mongrel language of English which has borrowed over 80% of its language and we have the classical language of Europe known as 'Greek' which has borrowed around 1700 words.

 

And so one hundred words is not so bad after thousands of years of wars and trade and social interactions, yet when we examine the list of these so called 'borrowings' we find this to be incorrect and many of these Sanskrit words should not be classed as 'borrowings'.

 

Sanskrit is accused of borrowing thirteen words from Greece yet in other articles it is shown how two of these borrowings are incorrect and here we look at 'Ares' a word from Greece meaning 'god of war' which is supposedly borrowed by India and seen within the Sanskrit language as 'Ara'.

 

'R' as displayed above is one of over 2000 roots which reside within the language factory of Sanskrit and its meaning, like most of the 'R' roots, is related to 'motion' and 'movement' as in to 'move towards' to 'reach' to 'arrive' and to 'move towards the top'.

 

'R' can be seen within 'Rj' a root whose meaning is to 'go' to 'obtain' to 'acquire' it can be seen within 'Ir' a root whose meaning is to 'go' to 'move' to 'rise' and it can also be seen within 'Rs' a root whose meaning is to 'go' to 'approach' to 'flow'.

 

'R' is the root of words such as 'Rta' meaning that which has 'gone' 'moved' 'risen' 'truth' 'cosmic law' it can be seen within 'Rna' whose meaning is 'going' 'flowing' 'running' 'water' and it can be seen within 'Rdh' whose meaning is to 'grow' to 'thrive' to 'increase' to 'flourish'.

 

'R' meaning to 'reach' to 'move' to 'obtain' becomes 'Ar' meaning to 'reach' to 'obtain' to 'procure' and this is seen within 'Arth' whose meaning is to 'strive' to 'obtain' to 'desire' which then becomes 'Artha' as seen in the 'Arthasastra' whose meaning is 'purpose' 'aim' 'reason'.

 

'R' meaning to 'reach' to 'move' to 'obtain' which then becomes 'Ar' a root whose meaning is to 'reach' to 'obtain'  to 'procure' can also be seen within 'Arya' as in the 'Aryan race' whose meaning is one who is 'worthy' one who is 'honourable' and one who is 'noble'.

 

'R' meaning to 'reach' to 'move' to 'obtain' which becomes 'Ar' a root whose meaning is to 'procure' to 'reach' to 'obtain' can also be seen within 'Arhat' whose meaning is that which is 'worthy' that which is 'honourable' and that which is 'perfect'.

 

 

Sanskrit began with the root 'R' which does not belong to Greece as its one of over 2000 roots within the language factory of Sanskrit and then it expands as 'Ar' which forms words such as 'Artha' 'Arya' 'Arhat' hence its difficult to see how any of this has come from Greece.

 

'R' meaning to 'reach' to 'move' to 'obtain' which becomes 'Ar' meaning to 'reach' also becomes 'Ara' the word Greece accuses Sanskrit of taking from their god of war 'Ares' and a word whose meaning is that which is 'going' that which is 'speedy' that which is 'swift'.

 

'Ara' meaning 'swift' and 'speedy' also means the 'spokes of a wheel' the 'rim of a wheel' and we can easily imagine a primary and secondary connection between such concepts, however for some reason we find it also means 'Saturn' and 'Mars' hence the connection with 'Ares' the god of war.

 

 

'Ara' is also mentioned within Mahayana Buddhism as the 'spokes of a wheel' and it has been described within the Buddhism of Tibet as the 'spokes of a circle' and within the religion of the Jains it has been described as the 'wheel of time' hence this word is also inherent to the Indo/Aryan culture.

 

'Ara' is not a word which has been borrowed from any other language yet its meaning of 'Saturn' and 'Mars' is a mystery and one which seems to be related to matters of Indian and Greek astronomy as ten of the thirteen so called 'borrowings' are all words related to astronomy.

 

'Ara' cannot be declared a borrowing from Greece as we cannot ignore how it has developed within the language factory of Sanskrit and whose original meaning seems to be centred around 'movement' and 'wheel' hence we may have to consider that the thirteen so called borrowings from Greece may have been reduced to 'ten'.