This question came in to the Yogi Blog in September, but was not posted to the website at that time.

If we were in India, we would refer to them as the Holy Scriptures of India – perhaps more correctly the Holy Scriptures of Hindus.  They are a collection of writings (of lessons or Wisdom) learned by Sages (Rishis) while they were deep in meditation.  Some say they are lessons all of us knew at one time, but forgot.  The Rishis while in meditation remembered these lessons and taught them to us again.  Another name for the Vedas is Shruti.  It means, “that which is heard”.  In the beginning, the information of the Vedas was given orally, or sung – so it was heard by the people.

 They hold a vast amount of knowledge.  That of medicine, herbs, healing, history.  Much of what we know today as yoga came from the Vedas and the writings that followed the hearing of the Vedas.  It was a great period of history within the Indus Valley (the Vedic Period).  Only a fraction of the vast knowledge was written down.  What ever else they may have contained has been lost.  Many of the Sages felt the Shruti should never be written, they should always be heard and remembered.  These Sages felt that writing would diminish the people’s ability to learn and remember.  They may have been correct.

 The wisdom of the vedas came to the people over 5,000 years ago.  The roots of formal written language is as yet unclear, historians used to say they knew when the alphabet and writing occurred in history; that is not so clear now.  What is clear is that the human ability to hear and remember what they heard was much more advanced millennia ago.  Reading, just as computers and texting utilized today has diminished our ability to take information in, hold it and repeat it correctly. 

 What we have recovered of the written texts is quite amazing.  There are texts that tell of surgical technique used 5,000 years ago that are astounding – cataract surgery - used just as it is today to return sight to individuals afflicted with “clouds” of the eyes.  There are many online versions that can be studied.  Or better yet, find a vedic scholar and listen to the wisdom that was remembered.