 To understand the Mīmāṃsā doctrine of the eternality of the Vedas, we need to note that eternality implies the absence of both a beginning and an end. In Indian philosophy, two kinds of persistence are distinguished, namely the ever unchanging persistence (kūṭastha-nityatā), like that of a rock, and the continuous and yet incessantly changing existence of a stream like that of a river (pravāha-nityatā). The persistence claimed for the Vedas by the Mīmāṃsakas would appear to be of the kūṭastha (“unchanging persistence”) kind, while its continuous study from time immemorial would be of the pravāha-nitya (“fluid persistence”) kind. Further, the meanings which the words signify are natural to the words, not the result of convention. Mīmāṃsā does not think that the association of a particular meaning with a word is due to conventions among people who introduce and give meanings to the words. Further, words signify only universals. The universals are eternal. Words do not signify particular entities of any kind which come into being and disappear, but the corresponding universals which are eternal and of which the transient individuals are mere instances. Further, not only are the meanings eternal, the words are also eternal. All words are eternal. If one utters the word “chair” ten times, is one uttering the same word ten times? The Mīmāṃsakas say that, if the word is not the same, then it cannot have the same meaning. The word and the meaning both being eternal, the relation between them also is necessarily so. An important argument with which the eternality of the Vedas is secured is that of the eternality of the sounds of a language. 