Traditional interpretations of the Vedic mantras might indicate following the interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya, a 14th-century Sanskrit Mimamsa scholar from the Vijayanagara Empire, on the Rig Veda, as that is the only interpretation of Rig Veda in complete form available now.
Even European scholars followed the interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya.
In order to understand the background, we need to keep in mind the major sources of understanding the Rig Veda. They are, as far as my understanding goes, Śaunaka’s Bṛhaddevatā and Yāska’s Nirukta, both being composed almost 2,000 years before Sāyaṇācārya came into existence.
Even by the time Śaunaka’s Bṛhaddevatā and Yāska’s Nirukta were composed, there was a considerable gap between their period and that of the period of Rig Veda. Hence, most of the meanings of the words used in Rig Veda were lost and some words were not in use.
Still, Śaunaka and Yāska tried their best to provide to the posterity the meanings of words used in Rig Veda.
By the time Sāyaṇācārya came into existence, the capacity to understand the meanings of the words used in Rig Veda lost further, and the influence of various concocted stories, on the names/incidents mentioned in Rig Veda in precise form, incorporated in the Puranas was tremendous on the interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya.
Hence, the the interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya, was not coherent and sometimes not understandable to persons like Swami Dayananda. Shri Aurobindo preferred spiritual oriented interpretation on Rig Veda.
The following is an extract from the Aurobindo’s book “The Secret of the Veda”.
In the course of several thousands of years there have been at least three considerable attempts, entirely differing from each other in their methods and results, to fix the sense of these ancient litanies.
One of these is prehistoric in time and exists only by fragments in the Brahmanas and Upanishads; but we possess in its entirety the traditional interpretation of the Indian scholar Sayana and we have in our own day the interpretation constructed after an immense labour of comparison and conjecture by modern European scholarship.
Both of them present one characteristic in common, the extraordinary incoherence and poverty of sense which their results stamp upon the ancient hymns. The separate lines can be given, whether naturally or by force of conjecture, a good sense or a sense that hangs together; the diction that results, if garish in style, if loaded with otiose and decorative epithets, if developing extraordinarily little of meaning in an amazing mass of gaudy figure and verbiage, can be made to run into intelligible sentences; but when we come to read the hymns as a whole we seem to be in the presence of men who, unlike the early writers of other races, were incapable of coherent and natural expression or of connected thought.
Except in the briefer and simpler hymns, the language tends to be either obscure or artificial; the thoughts are either unconnected or have to be forced and beaten by the interpreter into a whole.
The scholar in dealing with his text is obliged to substitute for interpretation a process almost of fabrication. We feel that he is not so much revealing the sense as hammering and forging rebellious material into some sort of shape and consistency.
But if we accept the current interpretations, whether Sayana’s or the modern theory, the whole of this sublime and sacred reputation is a colossal fiction. The hymns are, on the contrary, nothing more than the naive superstitious fancies of untaught and materialistic barbarians concerned only with the most external gains and enjoyments and ignorant of all but the most elementary moral notions or religious aspirations.
In view of the above, Shri Aurobindo did not go with Traditional interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya.
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Coming to the crucial part - What should be the criteria while accepting different interpretations of Rig Veda? - it is to be noted that the criterion will depend upon the motive to understand the Rig Veda.
If the motive to understand Rig Veda is only SPIRITUAL, then please go with Shri Aurobindo’s method of understanding otherwise one can follow Traditional interpretation of Sāyaṇācārya.
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One should have an independent thinking and one should read the Rig Veda and try to understand the Riks proper with spiritual oriented thinking, as Rig Veda is all about Spirituality.
(or)
One should approach an accomplished SPIRITUAL master, who will be able to give right perspective to the Riks in Rig Veda.
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For example: While going through the Riks composed by Rishi Atri, I had come across one Rik (Rig Veda 5.41.19), in which rishi Atri prayed to Urvaśī for enlightenment.
If we go by Puranas, Urvaśī was mentioned as a celestial damsel. Then, a question arises as to why a rishi like Atri prayed to a celestial damsel for enlightenment.?
My study revealed that Urvaśī, as per Rig Veda, is none other than Saraswati.
So, my independent thinking gave different understanding to me.
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