# The Mythology of All Races/Volume 6/Indian/Chapter 2

CHAPTER II
THE ṚGVEDA (Continued)
GODS OF EARTH, DEMONS, AND DEAD
Fig. 1. Agni
The fire-god, with flames issuing from his mouths, rides his vāhana ("vehicle"), which is a ram. The divinity has three heads and three legs, symbolizing his triple birth and the three fires of Indian ritual, while his seven arms represent his seven rays of light. After Moor, Hindu Pantheon, Plate LXXX, No. 1.
​cannot suckle. The ten maidens who generate him are the ten fingers, and as "Son of Strength" his name bears witness to the force needed to create the flame. As thus produced for the sacrifice every morning he has the title of youngest, although as the first sacrificer he is also the oldest. Or, again, he is born in the trees or the plants or on the navel of earth, the place of the sacrifice.
But Agni is born also in the waters of the atmosphere; he is Apāṁ Napāt ("Child of the Waters"), the bull which grows in the lap of the waters. Possibly, however, in some cases at least, the waters in which he is found are those of earth, for he is mentioned as being in the waters and the plants. He is born likewise from heaven in the form of lightning; Mātariśvan brought him down, doubtless a reminiscence of conflagrations caused by the lightning. He is also identified sometimes with the sun, though the solar luminary is more often conceived as a separate deity. Thus he has three births—in the sky, in the waters, and on earth, though the order is also given as sky, earth, and waters. This is the earliest form of triad in Indian religion, and probably from it arose the other form of sun, wind, and fire, for which (though not in the Ṛgveda) sun, Indra, and fire is a variant. The three fires in the ritual correspond with the three divine forms. On the other hand, Agni has two births when the air and the sky are taken as one; he descends in rain and is born from the plants, and rises again to the sky, whence we have the mystic commands that Agni should sacrifice to himself or bring himself to the sacrifice. Or, again, he can be said to have many births from the many fires kindled on earth. Yet the number three reappears in the conception of the brothers of Agni. Indra is said to be his twin, and from him Agni borrows the exploit of defeating the Paṇis. Mystically Agni is Varuṇa in the evening, Mitra in the morning, Savitṛ as he traverses the air, and Indra as he illumines the sky in the midst.
Agni is closely connected with the home, of which he is the ​sacred fire. He alone bears the title of Gṛhapati, or "Lord of the House"; and he is the guest in each abode as kinsman, friend, or father, or even as son. Moreover he is the ancestral god, the god of Bharata, of Divodāsa, of Trasadasyu, and of other heroes. He brings the gods to the sacrifice or takes the sacrifice to them; and thus he is a messenger, ever busy travelling between the worlds. Beyond all else he is the priest of the sacrifice, and one legend tells that he wearied of the task, but consented to continue in it on receiving the due payment for which he asked. In another aspect he eats the dead, for he burns the body on the funeral pile, and in this character he is carefully distinguished from his form as bearer of oblations. He is, further, not merely a priest, but a seer omniscient, Jātavedas ("Who Knows All Generations"). He inspires men and delivers and protects them. Riches and rain are his gifts, as are offspring and prosperity; he forgives sin, averts the wrath of Varuṇa, and makes men guiltless before Aditi.
To the gods also Agni is a benefactor; he delivered them from a curse, won them great space in battle, and is even called "the Slayer of Vṛtra." His main feat, however, is the burning of the Rakṣases who infest the sacrifice, a sign of the early use of fire to destroy demons. By magic the lighting of Agni may even bring about the rising of the sun in the sky.
As Vaiśvānara Agni is the "Fire of All Men," and in him has been seen a tribal fire as opposed to the fire of each householder, though the name is more normally thought to mean "Fire in All its Aspects." As Tanūnapāt ("Son of Self") Agni's spontaneous birth from wood and cloud seems to be referred to; as Narāśaṁsa ("Praise of Men") he may be either the personification of the praise of man, or possibly the flame of the southern of the three fires, which is particularly connected with the fathers. Though Agni's name, which may mean "agile," is not Avestan, the fire-cult is clearly Iranian, and the Atharvan priests of the Ṛgveda, who are brought into close relation with the fire, have their parallel in the Āthravans, or ​fire-priests, of Iran. There is also an obvious parallel to the fire of the Indian householder in the domestic fire in the Roman household and in Greece.
Distinct from Agni in personality is the god Bṛhaspati, who is described as seven-mouthed and seven-rayed, beautiful-tongued, sharp-horned, blue-backed, and hundred-winged. He has a bow the string of which is "Holy Order" (Ṛta), wields a golden hatchet, bears an iron axe, and rides in a car with ruddy steeds. Born from great light in the highest heaven, with a roar he drives away darkness. He is the father of the gods, but is created by Tvaṣṭṛ. He is a priest above others, the domestic priest, or purohita, of the gods, and their Brahman priest; he is "the Lord of Prayer" under the title Brahmaṇaspati. He is closely connected with Agni, with whom he appears at times to be identified, has three abodes like him, and seems twice to be called Narāśaṁsa. Yet he has also appropriated the deeds of Indra, for he opens the cow-stall and lets the waters loose; with his singing host he tore Vala asunder and drove out the lowing cows; when he rent the defences of Vala, he revealed the treasures of the kine; being in the cloud, he shouts after the many cows. He also seeks light in the darkness and finds dawn, light, and Agni, and dispels the darkness. Hence he is giver of victory in general, a bearer of the bolt, is invoked with the Maruts, and bears Indra's special epithet of "bountiful." Like the other gods he protects his worshippers, prolongs life, and removes disease. As "Lord of Prayer" he can scarcely be anything more than a development of one side of Agni's character, but it is clear that the process must have been complete before the time of the Ṛgveda, since there is no trace of a growth of this deity in that Saṁhitā. The alternative is to lay stress on the Indra side of his nature and to regard him as a priestly abstraction of Indra, or to find in him an abstract deity, the embodiment of priestly action who has assumed concrete features from the gods Agni and Indra, but this hypothesis is unlikely.
​Soma, the Avestan Haoma ("the Pressed Juice"), is the deity of the whole of the ninth book of the Ṛgveda and of six hymns elsewhere. The plant, which has not been identified for certain with any modern species, yielded, when its shoots were pressed, a juice which after careful straining was offered, pure or with admixture of milk, etc., to the gods and drunk by the priests. The colour was brown or ruddy, and frequent mention is made of the stones by which it was pounded, though it seems also to have been produced by mortar and pestle, as among the Parsis. As passing through the filter or strainer, soma is called pavamāna ("flowing clear"). Besides milk, sour milk and barley water were commonly added, and hence Soma is lord of the waters, who makes the rain to stream from heaven. The waters are his sisters, and he is the embryo or child of the waters. The sound of the juice as it flows is likened to thunder, its swiftness to that of a steed.
The exhilarating power of the soma doubtless explains his divinity. It is a plant which confers powers beyond the natural, and thus soma is the draught of immortality (amṛta), the ambrosia. The gods love it; it gives them immortality no less than men, and one hymn depicts the ecstasy of feeling produced in Indra by the drink, which makes him feel able to dispose of the earth at his pleasure. Soma is also rich in healing and lord of the plants. When quaffed, he stimulates speech and is the lord of speech. He is a maker of seers, a protector of prayer, and his wisdom is extolled. He gazes with wisdom on men and so has a thousand eyes. The fathers, no less than men and gods, love him, and through him they found the light and the cows. The great deeds of the gods owe their success to their drinking the soma, with three lakes of which Indra fills himself for the slaying of Vṛtra. When drunk by Indra, Soma made the sun to rise in the sky, and hence Soma is declared to perform the feat; he found the light and made the sun to shine. So, too, he supports the two worlds and is lord of the quarters. Like Indra he is a terrible warrior, ever victorious, winning for ​his worshippers chariots, horses, gold, heaven, water, and a thousand boons. He bears terrible, sharp weapons, including a thousand-pointed shaft. Again like Indra he is described as a bull, and the waters are the cows, which he fertilizes. He rides in Indra's car, and the Maruts are his friends; the winds gladden him, and Vāyu is his guardian.
The abode of Soma is in the mountains, of which Mūjavant is specially mentioned, nor need we doubt that the mountains are primarily of earth. But Soma is also celestial, and his birth is in heaven. He is the child of the sky or of the sun or of Parjanya. He is the lord, the bird of heaven, he stands above all worlds like the god Sūrya; the drops, when purified in the strainer (mystically the heaven), pour from the air upon the earth. The myth of his descent from the sky is variously told: the swift eagle brought the soma for Indra through the air with his foot; flying swift as thought, he broke through the iron castles, and going to heaven, he bore the soma down for Indra. Yet the eagle did not perform his feat unscathed, for as he fled with the soma, the archer Kṛśānu shot at him and knocked out a feather. The myth seems to denote that the lightning in the form of the eagle burst through the castle of the storm-cloud and brought down the water of the cloud, conceived as the ambrosia, while at the same time fire came to earth.
Soma is also the king of rivers, the king of the whole earth, the king or father of the gods, and the king of gods and mortals; though often called a god, in one passage he is expressly styled a god pressed for the gods.
As early as the Ṛgveda there is some trace of that identification of the moon with Soma which is fully accomplished in the Brāhmaṇa period. Thus in the marriage hymn (x. 85) in which Sūryā, the sun-maiden, is said to be wedded to Soma he is spoken of as in the lap of the nakṣatras, or lunar mansions, and it is stated that no one eats of that soma which is known by the priest; while the same identification may be at the bottom ​of the expressions used in some of the more mystic hymns. The process of identification may have been brought about by the practice of calling the soma celestial and bright, as dispelling the darkness and dwelling in the water, and also by naming it the drop. This may easily enough have given rise to the concept that the soma was the drop-like moon, and so soma in the bowls is actually said to be like the moon in the waters. It has been held that Soma in the Ṛgveda as a deity is really the moon, the receptacle of the ambrosia, which is revealed on earth in the form of the soma that is used in the ritual. This view, however, runs counter to native tradition, which still realizes the distinction between Soma and the moon in the Ṛgveda, and to the clear language of the texts.
Comparison with the Avesta shows that in Iran also the plant was crushed and mixed with milk, and that in Iran, as in India, the celestial soma is distinguished from the terrestrial, and the drink from the god: it grows on a mountain and is brought by an eagle; it gives light, slays demons, and bestows blessings; but whereas in India the first preparers were two, Vivasvant and Trita Āptya,in Iran they are three, Vīvanghvant, Āthwya, and Thrita. Possibly the conception goes back to an older period, to the nectar in the shape of honey mead brought down from heaven by an eagle from its guardian demon, this hypothesis being confirmed by the legend of the nectar brought by the eagle of Zeus and the mead carried off by the eagle metamorphosis of Odhin.
In comparison with the celestial waters the terrestrial rivers play little part in the Ṛgveda. In one hymn (x. 75) the Sindhu, or Indus, is celebrated with its tributaries, and another hymn (ii. 33) lauds the Vipāś, or Beas, and the Śutudrī, or Sutlej. The Sarasvatī, however, is often praised in terms of hyperbole as treading with her waves the peaks of the mountains, as sevenfold, best of mothers, of rivers, and of goddesses. Even a celestial origin is ascribed to her, an anticipation of the later myth of the heavenly birth of the Ganges. With the ​Aśvins she gave refreshment to Indra, and she is invoked together with the Iḍā (or Iḷā), or sacrificial food, and Bhāratī, who seems to be the Iḍā of the Bharatas living along her bank. Sacrifices are mentioned as performed in the Sarasvatī and Dṛṣadvatī; and with her is invoked Sarasvant, who seems no more than a male Sarasvatī, or water-genius. The precise identification of the Sarasvatī is uncertain. The name is identical with the Harahvaiti of the Avesta, which is generally taken to be the Helmund in Afghanistan, and if the Sarasvatī is still that river in the Ṛgveda, there must have been Indian settlements in the Vedic period much farther west than is usually assumed to be the case. On the other hand, the description of the Sarasvatī as of great size with seven streams and as sevenfold accords better with the great stream of the Indus, and the word may have been a second name of that river. When, however, it is mentioned with the Dṛṣadvatī, a small stream in the middle country, it is clear that it is the earlier form of the modern river still bearing the same name, which at present loses itself in the sands, but which in former days may well have been a much more important stream running into the Indus. It was in the land near these two rivers that the Vedic culture took its full development, at least in the subsequent period, and it is not improbable that as early as the Ṛgveda the stream was invested with most of its later importance.
The earth receives such worship as is hers in connexion with the sky, but only one hymn (v. 84) is devoted to her praise alone, and even in it reference is made to the rain which her spouse sends. She bears the burden of the mountains and supports in the ground the trees of the forest; she is great, firm, and shining. Her name, Pṛthivī, means "broad," and a poet tells that Indra spread her out.
Apart from the obviously concrete gods we find a certain number who may be described as abstract in that the physical foundation has either disappeared or has never been present. The great majority of these gods belong to the former type: ​they represent the development of aspects of more concrete deities which have come to be detached from their original owners. Of these the most famous is Savitṛ, who is the sun, and yet is a distinct god as the stimulating power of the solar luminary. Tvaṣṭṛ represents a further stage of detachment from a physical background. He is essentially the cunning artificer, who wrought the cup which contains the ambrosia of the gods, and which the Ṛbhus later divided into four; he made the swift steed and the bolt of Indra, and he sharpens the iron axe of Brahmaṇaspati. He shapes all forms and makes the husband and wife for each other in the womb; and he also creates the human race indirectly, for Yama and Yamī, the primeval twins, are children of his daughter Saraṇyū. It seems even that he is the father of Indra, though the latter stole the soma from him and even slew him, as afterward he certainly killed his son, the three-headed Viśvarūpa. He is also closely associated with the wives of the gods. Obscure as is his origin, he presents many features of a solar character, and with this would accord well enough the view that his cup is the moon, where the ambrosia is to be found.
Much feebler personalities are those of Dhātṛ ("Establisher"), an epithet of Indra or Viśvakarman, of Vidhātṛ ("Disposer"), also an epithet of these deities, Dhartṛ ("Supporter"), and Trātṛ ("Protector"), an epithet of Agni or Indra, and the leader-god who occurs in one hymn. Of these Dhātṛ alone has a subsequent history of interest, as he later ranks as a creator and is a synonym of Prajāpati. That god's name, "Lord of Offspring," is used as an epithet of Soma and of Savitṛ, but as an independent deity he appears only in the tenth and latest book of the Ṛgveda, where his power to make prolific is celebrated. In one hymn (x. 121) is described a "Golden Germ," Hiraṇyagarbha, creator of heaven and earth, of the waters and all that lives. The "Golden Germ" is doubtless Prajāpati, but from the refrain "What god" (kasmai devāya) a deity Who (Ka deva) was later evolved.
"In the beginning rose Hiraṇyagarbha, born only lord of all created beings. He fixed and holdeth up this earth and heaven. What god shall we adore with our oblation? Giver of vital breath, of power and vigour, he whose commandments all the gods acknowledge: Whose shade is death, whose lustre makes immortal. What god shall we adore with our oblation? Who by his grandeur hath become sole ruler of all the moving world that breathes and slumbers; He who is lord of men and lord of cattle. What god shall we adore with our oblation? His, through his might, are these snow-covered mountains, and men call sea and Rasā his possession: His arms are these, his are these heavenly regions. What god shall we adore with our oblation? By him the heavens are strong and earth is stedfast, by him light's realm and sky-vault are supported: By him the regions in mid-air were measured. What god shall we adore with our oblation? To him, supported by his help, two armies embattled look while trembling in their spirit, When over them the risen sun is shining. What god shall we adore with our oblation? What time the mighty waters came, containing the universal germ, producing Agni, Thence sprang the gods' one spirit into being. What god shall we adore with our oblation? He in his might surveyed the floods, containing productive force and generating Worship. He is the god of gods, and none beside him. What god shall we adore with our oblation? Ne'er may he harm us who is earth's begetter, nor he whose laws are sure, the heavens' creator, He who brought forth the great and lucid waters. What god shall we adore with our oblation? Prajāpati! thou only comprehendest all these created things, and none beside thee. Grant us our hearts' desire when we invoke thee: may we have store of riches in possession."
This passage is the starting-point of his great history which culminates in the conception of the absolute but personal Brahmā.
​Another personification of the tenth book which later is merged in the personality of Prajāpati is Viśvakarman ("All-Maker"), whose name is used earlier as an epithet of Indra and the sun. He is described as having eyes, a face, arms, and feet on every side, just as Brahmā is later four-faced. He is winged, and is a lord of speech, and he assigns their names to the gods. He is the highest apparition, establisher, and disposer. Perhaps in origin he is only a form of the sun, but in his development he passes over to become one side of Prajāpati as architect.
Another aspect of the Supreme is presented by the Puruṣa Sūkta, or "Hymn of Man" (x. 90), which describes the origin of the universe from the sacrifice of a primeval Puruṣa, who is declared distinctly to be the whole universe. By the sacrifice the sky was fashioned from his head, from his navel the atmosphere, and from his feet the earth. The sun sprang from his eye, the moon from his mind, wind from his breath, Agni and Soma from his mouth; and the four classes of men were produced from his head, arms, thighs, and feet respectively. The conception is important, for Puruṣa as spirit throughout Indian religion, and still more throughout Indian philosophy, is often given the position of Prajāpati. On the other hand, there is primitive thought at the bottom of the conception of the origin of the world from the sacrifice of a giant.
Another and different abstraction is found in the deification of Manyu ("Wrath"), a personification which seems to owe its origin to the fierce anger of Indra and which is invoked in two hymns of the Ṛgveda (x. 83-84). He is of irresistible might and is self-existent; he glows like fire, slays Vṛtra, is accompanied by the Maruts, grants victory like Indra, and bestows wealth. United with Tapas ("Ardour"), he protects his worshippers and slays the foe. Other personifications of qualities are in the main feminine and will be noted with the other female deities.
The goddesses in the Ṛgveda play but a small part beside the ​gods, and the only great one is Uṣas, though Sarasvatī is of some slight importance. To Indra, Varuṇa, and Agni are assigned Indrāṇī, Varuṇānī, and Agnāyī respectively, but they are mere names. Pṛthivī ("Earth"), who is rather frequently named with Dyaus, has only one hymn to herself, while Rātrī ("Night") is invoked as the bright starlit night, at whose approach men return home as birds hasten back to their nests, and who is asked to keep the thief and the wolf away. Originally a personification of the thunder, Vāc ("Speech") is celebrated in one hymn (x. 125) in which she describes herself. She accompanies all the gods and supports Mitra and Varuṇa, Indra and Agni, and the Aśvins, besides bending Rudra's bow against the unbeliever. Purandhi, the Avestan Pārendi, is the goddess of plenty and is mentioned with Bhaga, while Dhiṣaṇā, another goddess (perhaps of plenty), occurs a dozen times. The butter-handed and butter-footed Iḷā has a more concrete foundation, for she is the personification of the offering of butter and milk in the sacrifice. Bṛhaddivā, Sinīvālī, Rākā, and Guṅgū are nothing but names. Pṛśni is more real: she is the mother of the Maruts, perhaps the spotted storm-cloud. Saraṇyū figures in an interesting but fragmentary myth. Tvaṣṭṛ made a wedding for his daughter with Vivasvant, but during the ceremony the bride vanished away. Thereupon the gods gave one of similar form to Vivasvant, but in some way Saraṇyū seems still to have borne the Aśvins to him, as well perhaps as Yama and Yamī, for the hymn (x. 17) calls her "mother of Yama." The fragmentary story is put together by Yāska in the following shape. Saraṇyū bore to Vivasvant Yama and Yamī, and then substituting one of like form for herself, she fled away in the guise of a mare. Vivasvant, however, pursued in the shape of a horse and united with her, and she bore the Aśvins, while her substitute gave birth to Manu. The legend may be old, for it has a curious similarity to the story of the Tilphossan Erinys, though the names do not philologically tally. At any rate the legend seems to have no ​mythical intention, but to contain some effort to explain the name of Mann as "Son of Her of Like Shape," which appears to be known as early as the Ṛgveda. Perhaps she is another form of the dawn-goddess.
Other goddesses are personifications of abstract ideas, such as Śraddhā ("Faith"), who is celebrated in a short hymn (x. 151). Through her the fire is kindled, ghee is offered, and wealth is obtained, and she is invoked morning, noon, and night. Anumati represents the "favour" of the gods. Aramati ("Devotion") and Sūnṛtā ("Bounteousness") are also personified. Asunīti ("Spirit Life") is besought to prolong life, while Nirṛti ("Decease" or "Dissolution") presides over death. These are only faint figures in comparison with Aditi, if that deity is to be reckoned among the personifications of abstract concepts. She is singularly without definitive features of a physical kind, though, in contrast to the other abstractions, she is commonly known throughout the Ṛgveda. She is expanded, bright, and luminous; she is a mistress of a bright stall and a supporter of creatures; and she belongs to all men. She is the mother of Mitra and Varuṇa, of Aryaman, and of eight sons, but she is also said to be the sister of the Ādityas, the daughter of the Vasus, and the mother of the Rudras. She is often invoked to release from sin or guilt, and with Mitra and Varuṇa she is implored to forgive sin. Evil-doers are cut off from Aditi; and Varuṇa, Agni, and Savitṛ are besought to free from guilt before her. She is identified with the earth, though the sky is also mentioned under the name Aditi. In many places, however, she is named together with (and therefore as distinct from) sky and earth; and yet again it is said (I. lxxxix. 10): "Aditi is the sky; Aditi is the air; Aditi is the mother, father, and son; Aditi is all the gods and the five tribes; Aditi is whatever has been born; Aditi is whatever shall be born." Elsewhere Aditi is made both mother and daughter of Dakṣa by a species of reciprocal generation which is not rare in the Ṛgveda; and in yet other passages she is hailed as a cow.
​The name Aditi means "Unbinding" or "Boundlessness," and the name Āditya as applied to a group of bright gods denotes them, beyond doubt, as the sons of Aditi. Hence she has been regarded as a personification of the sky or of the visible infinite, the expanse beyond the earth, the clouds and the sky, or the eternal celestial light which sustains the Ādityas. Or, if stress be laid not on her connexion with the light, but on the view that she is a cow, she can be referred to earth, as the mother of all. In these senses she would be concrete in origin. On the other hand, she has also been derived from the epithet Aditi, the "boundless," as applied to the sky, or yet more abstractly from the epithet "sons of Aditi," in the sense of "sons of boundlessness," referring to the Ādityas. As Indra is called "son of strength," and later "Strength" (Śacī) is personified as his wife (perhaps not in the Ṛgveda itself), so Aditi may have been developed in pre-Ṛgvedic times from such a phrase, which would account for her frequent appearance, even though a more concrete origin seems probable for such a deity. On the other hand, from her is deduced as her opposite Diti, who occurs twice or thrice in the Ṛgveda, though in an indeterminate sense.
Another goddess of indefinite character is Sūryā. She cannot be other than the daughter of the Sun, for both she and that deity appear in the same relation to the Aśvins. They are Sūryā's two husbands whom she chose; she or the maiden ascended their car. They possess Sūryā as their own, and she accompanies them on their car, whose three wheels perhaps correspond to its three occupants. Through their connexion with Sūryā they are invoked to conduct the bride home on their car, and it is said that when Savitṛ gave Sūryā to her husband, Soma was wooer, while the Aśvins were the groomsmen. The gods are also said to have given Pūṣan to Sūryā, who bears elsewhere the name Aśvinī. The sun as a female is a remarkable idea, and therefore Sūryā has often been taken as the dawn, but the name presents difficulties, since it does not contain any patronymic element; and, moreover, the conception contained in ​the wedding-hymn of the union of Soma (no doubt the moon) and the dawn would be wholly unusual.
The constant grouping of gods in the Ṛgveda comes to formal expression in the practice of joint invocation, which finds its natural starting-point in the concept of heaven and earth, who are far oftener worshipped as joint than as separate deities. Even Mitra and Varuṇa are much more frequently a pair than taken individually, and this use may be old, since Ahura and Mithra are thus coupled in the Avesta. A more curious compound is Indra and Varuṇa, the warlike god and the slayer of Vṛtra united with the divinity who supports men in peace and wisdom. Indra is much more often conjoined with Agni, and the pair show in the main the characteristics of the former god, though something of Agni's priestly nature is also ascribed to them. With Viṣṇu Indra strides out boldly, with Vāyu he drinks the soma, with Pūṣan he slays Vṛtras, and to their joint abode the goat conveys the sacrificial horse after death. Soma is invoked with Pusan and with Rudra, Agni very rarely with Soma and Parjanya. A more natural pair are Parjanya and Vāta ("Rain" and "Wind"), and similar unions are Day and Night, and Sun and Moon. Naturally enough, these dualities develop little distinct character.
Of groups of gods the most important are the Maruts, who are numbered now as twenty-one and now as a hundred and eighty and who are Indra's followers, although as Rudras they are occasionally associated with Rudra as their father. The Ādityas are smaller in number, being given as seven or eight, while the Vasus are indeterminate in number as in character, the name denoting no more than "the Bright Ones." All the deities are summed up in the concept Viśve Devāḥ ("All-Gods"), but though originally intended to include all, the term even in the Ṛgveda becomes applied to a special body who are named together with other groups, such as the Vasus and the Ādityas.
An odd and curious group of deities is that of the Sādhyas, ​who occur in the Ṛgveda and occasionally in the later literature. Neither their name nor the scanty notices of them justify any conclusion as to their real nature, though it has been suggested that they may possibly be a class of the fathers (the kindly dead).
Beside the great gods the Vedic pantheon has many minor personages who are not regarded as enjoying the height of divinity which is ascribed to the leading figures. Of these the chief are the Ṛbhus, who are three in number, Ṛbhu or Ṛbhukṣan, Vibhvan, and Vāja. They are the sons of Sudhanvan ("Good Archer"), though once they are called collectively the sons of Indra and the grandchildren of Might, and again they are described as sons of Manu. They acquired their rank as divine by the skill of their deeds, which raised them to the sky. They were mortal at first, but gained immortality, for the gods so admired their skilled work that Vāja became the artificer of the gods, Ṛbhukṣan of Indra, and Vibhvan of Varuṇa. Their great feats were five: for the Aśvins they made a car which, without horses or reins, and with three wheels, traverses space; for Indra they fashioned the two bay steeds; from a hide they wrought a cow which gives nectar and the cow they reunited with the calf, the beneficiary of this marvel being, we infer, Bṛhaspati; they rejuvenated their parents (apparently here sky and earth), who were very old and frail; and finally they made into four the one cup of Tvaṣṭṛ, the drinking-vessel of the gods, this being done at the divine behest conveyed by Agni, who promised them in return equal worship with the gods. Tvaṣṭṛ agreed, it seems, to the remaking of the cup, but it is also said that when he saw the four he hid himself among the females and desired to slay the Ṛbhus for the desecration, though the latter declared that they intended no disrespect.
In addition to their great deeds a wonderful thing befell them. After wandering in swift course round the sky windsped, they came to the house of Savitṛ, who conferred immortality upon them: when, after slumbering for twelve days, they had ​rejoiced in the hospitality of Agohya, they made fields and deflected the streams; plants occupied the dry ground and the waters the low lands. After their sleep they asked Agohya who had awakened them; in a year they looked around them; and the goat declared the dog to be the awakener. Agohya can hardly be anything but the sun, and the period of their sleep has been thought to be the winter solstice, and has been compared with the Teutonic twelve nights of licence at that period. The nights, it has been suggested, are intended to make good the defects of the Vedic year of 360 days by inserting intercalary days; and the goat and the dog have led to still wilder flights of speculative imagination. But as ṛbhu means "handy" or "dexterous" and is akin to the German Elbe and the English elf, and as the Ṛbhus are much more than mere men, it is not improbable that they represent the three seasons which mark the earliest division of the Indian year, and their dwelling in the house of Agohya signifies the turn of life at the winter solstice. The cup of Tvaṣṭṛ may possibly be the moon, and the four parts into which it is expanded may symbolize the four phases of the moon. They may, however, have had a humbler origin as no more than elves who gradually won a higher rank, although their human attributes may be due to another cause: it is possible that they were the favourite deities of a chariot-making clan which was admitted into the Vedic circle, but whose gods suffered some diminution of rank in the process, for it is a fact that in the period of the Brāhmaṇas the chariot-makers, or Rathakāras, form a distinct class by themselves.
Even more obscure than the Ṛbhus is the figure of the Gandharva; he bears the epithet Viśvāvasu ("Possessing All Good"), and this is later a proper name, while at the same time the single Gandharva is converted into many. This idea is not absolutely strange to the Ṛgveda, but it is found only thrice, and the name Gandharva is practically unknown to books ii-vii, the nucleus of the collection. Yet the figure is old, for the Gandarewa is found in the Avesta as a dragon-like monster. ​The Gandharva is heavenly and dwells in the high region of the sky; he is a measurer of space and is closely connected with the sun, the sun-bird, and the sun-steed, while in one passage he is possibly identified with the rainbow. He is also associated with the soma; he guards its place and protects the races of the gods. It is in this capacity, it would seem, that he appears as an enemy whom Indra pierces, just as in the Avesta the Gandarewa, dwelling in the sea Vourukasha, the abode of the White Haoma, battles with and is overcome by Keresāspa. From another point of view Soma is said to be the Gandharva of the waters, and the Gandharva and the Maiden of the Waters are claimed as the parents of Yama and Yamī, the first pair on earth. So, too, the Gandharva is the beloved of the Apsaras, whence he is associated with the wedding ceremony and in the first days of marriage is a rival of the husband.
The Gandharva has brilliant weapons and fragrant garments, while the Gandharvas are described as wind-haired, so that it has been suggested that the Gandharvas are the spirits of the wind, closely connected with the souls of the dead and the Greek Centaurs, with whose name (in defiance of philology) their name is identified. Yet there is no sufficient ground to justify this hypothesis or any of the other divergent views which see in the Gandharva the rainbow, or the rising sun or the moon, or the spirit of the clouds, or Soma (which he guards).
The companion of the Gandharva, the Apsaras, is likewise an obscure figure, though the name denotes "moving in the waters," and the original conception may well be that of a water-nymph, whence the mingling of the water with the soma is described as the flowing to Soma of the Apsarases of the ocean. Of one, Urvaśī, we have the record that she was the mother of the sage Vasiṣṭha, to whose family are ascribed the hymns of the seventh book of the Ṛgveda, and an obscure hymn (x. 95) contains a dialogue between her and her earthly lover Purūravas, whom she seems to have forsaken after spending ​four autumns among mortals and whom she consoles by promising him bliss in heaven. From this story has been derived the view that Purūravas is the sun and Urvaśī the dawn, which disappears at the rise of the sun.
Much less prominent than even the Gandharva and the Apsarases is the "Lord of the Dwelling" (Vāstoṣpati), who is invoked in one hymn (vii. 54) to afford a favourable entry, to bless man and beast, and to grant prosperity in cattle and horses. There can be no real doubt that he is the tutelary spirit of the house. Another deity of the same type is the "Lord of the Field," who is asked to bestow cattle and horses and to fill heaven and earth with sweetness, while the "Furrow" itself, Sītā, is invoked to give rich blessings and crops. It would, of course, be an error to conclude from the meagreness of their mythology that these were not powerful deities, but it is clear that they had won no real place in the pantheon of the tribal priests whose views are presented in the Ṛgveda.
So also the divinities of the mountains, the plants, and the trees are far from important in the Ṛgveda. Parvata ("Mountain") is indeed found thrice coupled with Indra, and the mountains are celebrated along with the waters, rivers, plants, trees, heaven, and earth. The plants have a hymn to themselves (x. 97) in which they are hailed, for their healing powers, as mothers and goddesses, and Soma is said to be their king; and the forest trees, too, are occasionally mentioned as deities, chiefly with the waters and the mountains. The "Goddess of the Jungle," Araṇyānī, is invoked in one hymn (x. 146), where she is described as the mother of beasts and as rich in food without tillage, and her uncanny sights and sounds are set forth with vivid force and power, though poetically rather than mythologically.
PLATE V
Apsarases
The celestial nymphs, who are among the chief adornments of India's heaven, are shown in frescoes which are the oldest extant specimens of Indian paintings. From a fresco at Ajantā, Berār. After Ajanta Frescoes, Plate II, No. 3.
​adoration of the sacrificial post, which is invoked as Vanaspati or Svaru and which is a god who, thrice anointed with ghee, is asked to let the offerings go to the gods. The sacrificial grass (the barhis) and the doors leading to the place of the sacrifice are likewise divine, while the pressing stones are invoked to drive demons away and to bestow wealth and offspring. Thus also the plough and the ploughshare (Śunāsīra) as well as the weapons of war, the arrow, bow, quiver, and armour, nay, even the drum, are hailed as divine. Doubtless in this we are to see fetishism rather than full divinity: the thing adored attains for the time being and in its special use a holiness which is not perpetually and normally its own. Such also must have been the character of the image or other representation of Indra which one poet offers to sell for ten cows, on condition that it shall be returned to him when he has slain his foes.
The religion of the Ṛgveda is predominantly anthropomorphic in its representations of the gods, and theriomorphism plays a comparatively limited part. Yet there is an exception in the case of the sun, who appears repeatedly in the form of a horse. Thus the famous steed Dadhikrā or Dadhikrāvan, who speeds like the winds along the bending ways, is not only conceived as winged, but is likened to a swooping eagle and is actually called an eagle. He pervades the five tribes with his power as the sun fills the waters with his light; his adversaries fear him like the thunder from heaven when he fights against a thousand; and he is the swan dwelling in the light. He is invoked with Agni and with Uṣas, and his name may mean "scattering curdled milk," in allusion to the dew which appears at sunrise. No glorification of a famous racehorse could account for these epithets. Tārkṣya seems to be another form of the sun-horse, for the language used of him is similar to that regarding Dadhikrā. Perhaps, too, Paidva, the courser brought by the Aśvins to Pedu to replace an inferior steed, may also be a solar horse; nor is there any doubt that Etaśa is the horse of the sun, who bears along the chariot of the god.
​After the horse the cow takes an important place in the mythology. The rain-clouds are cows, and the gods fight for them against the demons. The beams of dawn are also clouds, but it is possible that the cow in itself had begun to receive reverence, being addressed as Aditi and a goddess, and being described as inviolable, nor later is there any doubt of direct zoölatry. Indra, Agni, and rarely Dyaus are described as bulls; the boar is used as a description of Rudra, the Maruts, and Vṛtra. Soma, Agni, and the sun are hailed as birds, and an eagle carried down the soma for Indra, apparently representing Indra's lightning. The crow and the pigeon are the messengers of Yama, the god of death, and a bird of omen is invoked. The "Serpent" (Ahi) is a form of the demon Vṛtra, but there is no trace of the worship of snakes as such. Animals serve also as steeds for the gods: the Aśvins use the ass, and Pūṣan the goat, but horses are normal. Yama has two dogs, the offspring of Saramā, though she does not appear in the Ṛgveda as a bitch. Indra has a monkey, of whom a late hymn (x. 86) tells a curious story. Apparently the ape, Vṛṣākapi, was the favourite of Indra and injured property of Indra's wife; soundly beaten, it was banished, but it returned, and Indra effected a reconciliation. The hymn belongs to the most obscure of the Ṛgveda and has been very variously interpreted, even as a satire on a contemporary prince and his spouse.
The same vein of satire has been discerned in a curious hymn (vii. 103) where frogs, awakened by the rains, are treated as able to bestow cows and long life. The batrachians are compared to priests as they busy themselves round the sacrifice, and their quacking is likened to the repetition of the Veda by the student. The conception is carried out in a genial vein of burlesque, yet it is very possible that it contains worship which is serious enough, for the frogs are connected with the rain and seem to be praised as bringing with their renewed activity the fall of the waters.
We have seen gods conceived as of animal form and, ​therefore, in so far incarnate in these animals, not indeed permanently, but from time to time. Accordingly, in the later ritual, which seems faithfully to represent in this regard the meaning of the Ṛgveda, the horse is not always or normally divine, but it is so when a special horse is chosen to be sacrificed at the horse-sacrifice and for this purpose is identified with the god. It is possible, too, that direct worship of the cow and the frog (at least in the rainy season) is recorded. The question then arises whether the Vedic Indians were totemists. Did they conceive a tie of blood between themselves and an animal or thing which they venerated and normally spared from death, and which they might eat only under the condition of some sacrament to renew the blood bond? We can only say that there is no more evidence of this than is implied in the fact that some tribal appellations in the Ṛgveda are animal names like the Ajas, or "Goats," and the Matsyas, or "Fishes," or vegetable like the Śigrus, or "Horse-Radishes"; but we have no record that these tribes worshipped the animals or plants whose name they bear. Neither do we know to what extent these tribes were of Aryan origin or religion. There may well have been totemistic non-Aryan tribes, for we know that another worship which is now accepted and bound up with the form of Śiva—the phallic cult—was practised in the time of the Ṛgveda, but by persons whom it utterly disapproved and treated as hostile.
Beside the gods some priests and priestly families who are more than real men figure in the Ṛgveda. Prominent among these are the Bhṛgus, whose name denotes "the Bright," and who play the role of those who kindle Agni when he is discovered by Mātariśvan and establish and diffuse his use upon earth. They find him in the waters; they produce him by friction and pray to him. They are invoked to drink soma with all the thirty-three gods, the Maruts, the waters, and the Aśvins; they overcome the demon Makha and are foes of the historic king Sudās. They are mentioned in connexion with Atharvan, among others, and like them Atharvan is associated ​with the production of fire, which he churns forth. Āthravan in the Avesta denotes "fire-priest," nor is there any doubt that the Atharvan or Atharvans of the Ṛgveda are old fire-priests, while the Bhṛgus represent either such priests or possibly the lightning side of fire itself. Yet another set of beings connected with fire are the Aṅgirases. Aṅgiras as an epithet is applied to Agni himself, and Aṅgiras is represented as an ancient seer, but the chief feat of the Aṅgirases is their share in the winning of the cows, in which act they are closely associated with Indra; they are, however, also said to have burst the rock with their songs and gained the light, to have driven out the cows and pierced Vala and caused the sun to shine. They seem to bear the traces of messengers of Agni, perhaps his flames, but they may have been no more than priests of the fire-cult, like the Atharvans. Like the Atharvans they are bound up with the Atharvaveda, which is associated with that cult. The Virūpas ("Those of Various Form"), another priestly family, seem no more than they in one special aspect.
A figure of great obscurity connected with Agni is that of Dadhyañc ("Milk-Curdling"), a son of Atharvan and a producer of Agni. The Aśvins gave him a horse's head, and with it he proclaimed to them the place of the mead of Tvaṣṭṛ. Again it is said that when Indra was seeking the head of the horse hidden in the mountains, he found it in Śaryaṇāvant and with the bones of Dadhyañc he slew ninety-nine Vṛtras. Dadhyañc opens cow-stalls by the power of Soma, and Indra gives him cow-stalls. He has been interpreted as the soma because of the allusion to curdled milk in his name, which again connects him with the horse Dadhikrā, but a more plausible view is that he represents a form of lightning, the speed of which is symbolized by the horse's head, while the thunder is his speech and the bolt his bones. The legend is too fragmentary, however, to enable us to form any clear opinion of its significance. Atri, another seer, is famed for being saved from burning in a deep pit by the Aśvins, who restored him with a refreshing ​draught. But he also performed a great feat himself, for he rescued the sun when it was hidden by the Asura, Svarbhānu, and placed it in the sky. The same deed is also ascribed to the Atris as a family, and they are the traditional authors of the fifth book of the Ṛgveda, which often refers to them. Their name denotes "the eater" and may itself once have belonged to Agni, who is perhaps hidden in the guise of the blind seer Kaṇva, a protégé of the Aśvins, from whom he received back his lost sight.
Indra also has mythical connexions with the seers called Daśagvas and Navagvas who aided him in the recovery of the kine and whose names perhaps denote that they won ten and nine cows respectively in that renowned exploit. Still more famous is his friendship with Kutsa, to whom he gave constant aid in his struggles with Śuṣṇa; it was for him that Indra performed the feat of stopping the sun by tearing off its wheel, giving the other to Kutsa to drive on with. The myth is a strange one and seems to be a confusion of the story of the winning of the sun for men by Indra with his friendship for a special hero whom he aided in battle. Yet in other passages Kutsa appears in hostility to Indra. In the fight with Śuṣṇa, as the drought-demon, Indra also had the aid of Kāvya Uśanâs, who likewise made for him the bolt for the slaying of Vṛtra.
An independent position is occupied by Manu, who stands out as the first of men who lived, in contrast with Yama (like himself the son of Vivasvant), who was the first of men to die. He is par excellence the first sacrificer, the originator of the cult of Agni and of Soma, and to him indeed Soma was brought by the bird. Men are his offspring, and their sacrifices are based on his as prototype. Just as he embodies the concept of the first sacrificer, so the group of seven priests who play the chief part in the ritual are personified as the seven seers who are called divine and are associated with the gods.
Against the gods and other spirits invoked as beneficent are set the host of the demons, or more often individual spirits who ​are enemies both to gods and to men and whom the gods overthrow for the benefit of men no less than of themselves. The Asuras, as the demons are called throughout Indian literature subsequent to the age of the Ṛgveda, have not yet attained that position at the earliest period. Asura there means a spirit who is normally benignant; in four passages only (and three of those are in the tenth and latest book) are the Asuras mentioned as demons, and in the singular the word has this sense only thrice, while the epithet "slaying Asuras" is applied once each to Indra, Agni, and the sun. Much more commonly mentioned are the Paṇis, whose cows are won by the gods, especially Indra. Their name denotes "Niggard," especially with regard to the sacrificial gifts, and thus, no doubt, an epithet of human meanness has been transferred to demoniac foes, who are accused of having concealed even the ghee in the cow. Other human enemies who rank as demons are the Dāsas and Dasyus; and by a natural turn of language Dāsa comes to denote "slave" and is found in this sense in the Ṛgveda itself. Besides the historical Dāsas, who were doubtless the aborigines, rank others who seek to scale heaven and who withhold the sun and the waters from the gods; and the autumnal forts of the Dāsas can hardly have been mere human citadels. While, however, the transfer of name from men to demons is clear, can we go further and equate the Paṇis and Dāsas to definite tribes, and see in them Parnians and Dahae, against whom the Vedic Indians waged warfare in the land of Arachosia? The conjecture is attractive, but it shifts the scene of Vedic activity too far west and compels us to place the events of the sixth book of the Ṛgveda far distant from those described in book seven, the interest of which centres in the Indian "Middle Country," the home in all probability of the greater part of the Vedic poetry.
Much more common as a generic name of the adversaries of the gods is Rakṣas, either "the Injurious," or "That Which is to be Guarded Against." Rarely these demons are called Yātus or Yātudhānas ("Sorcerers"), who represent, no doubt, ​one type of the demons. They have the shape of dogs, vultures, owls, and other birds; appropriating the form of husband, brother, or lover, they approach women with evil intent; they eat the flesh of men and horses and suck the milk of cows. Their particular time of power is the evening and above all else they detest sacrifice and prayer. Agni, the Fire, is especially besought to drive them away and destroy them, and hence wins his title of "Slayer of Rakṣases." With the Rakṣases in later literature rank the Piśācas as foes of the fathers, precisely as the Asuras are the enemies of the gods and the Rakṣases of men, but the Ṛgveda knows only the yellow-peaked, watery Piśāci, whom Indra is invoked to crush. Other hostile spirits are the Arātis ("Illiberalities"), the Druhs ("Injurious"), and the Kimīdins, who are goblins conceived as in pairs.
There is no fixed terminology in the description of individual demons, so that Pipru and Varcin pass both as Asuras and as Dāsas. By far the greatest of the demons is the serpent Vṛtra, footless and handless, the snorter, the child of Dānu, "the stream," the encompasser of the waters, which are freed when Indra slays him. There are many Vṛtras, however, and the name applies to earthly as well as to celestial foes. Vala ranks next as an enemy of Indra: he is the personification of the cave in which the cows are kept, and which Indra pierces or cleaves to free the kine. Arbuda again was deprived of his cows by Indra, who trod him underfoot and cleft his head, and he seems but a form of Vṛtra. More doubtful is the three-headed son of Tvaṣṭṛ, Viśvarūpa ("Multiform"), who is slain by Indra with the aid of Trita, and whose cows, are taken. In his figure some scholars have seen the moon, but his personality is too shadowy to allow of any clear result. The overthrowing of the demon Svarbhānu is accomplished by Indra, while Atri replaces in the sky the eye of the sun which that demon had eclipsed. The Dāsa Suṣṇa figures as a prominent foe of Kutsa, a protégé of Indra, but his mythical character is attested by the fact that by overcoming him Indra wins the waters, finds the cows, and ​gains the sun. He is also described as causing bad harvests, while his name must mean either "Scorcher" or "Hisser"; and apparently he is a demon of drought. With him is sometimes coupled Śambara, the son of Kulitara, the Dāsa of ninety-nine forts, whom Indra destroys, though he deemed himself a godling. Pipru and Varcin also fall before Indra, the first with fifty thousand black warriors, and the second with a hundred thousand. As either is at once Asura and Dāsa, perhaps they were the patron gods of aboriginal tribes which were overthrown by the Aryans; but their names may mean in Sanskrit "the Resister" and "the Shining." Dhuni and Cumuri, the Dāsas, were sent to sleep by Indra for the sake of the pious Dabhīti; and their castles were shattered along with those of Śambara, Pipru, and Varcin. Dhuni means "Roarer," but Cumuri is not, it would seem, Aryan, and he perhaps, with Ilībiśa, Sṛbinda, and others of whom we know practically nothing, may be aboriginal names of foes or gods hostile to the Aryans.
A more perplexing figure and one famous in later literature is Namuci, which Indian etymology renders as "He Who Will Not Let Go." He is at once Asura and Dāsa, and in vanquishing him Indra has the aid of Namī Sāpya. The peculiarity of his death is that his head is not pierced, like Vṛtra's, but is twirled or twisted with the foam of the waters, and that Indra is said to have drunk wine beside him when the Aśvins aided and Sarasvatī cured him.
The king of the dead is Yama, who gathers the people together and gives the dead a resting-place in the highest heaven amid songs and the music of the flute. He is the son of Vivasvant, just as in the Avesta Yima is the son of Vīvanghvant, the first presser of the soma. His sister is Yamī, and a curious hymn (x. 10) contains a dialogue in which she presses her brother to wed her and beget offspring, while he urges religious objections to her suit. The story suggests what is confirmed by the later Persian record that Yama and Yima were really the twin parents of mankind. The Avesta also tells us that he lives ​in an earthly paradise which he rules, and though this trait is not preserved in the Ṛgveda, it is hinted at in the epic. His real importance, however, is that he is the first man who died and showed to others the way of death. Death is his path, and he is once identified with death. As death the owl or the pigeon is his messenger, but he has two dogs, four-eyed, broad-nosed, one brindle (śabala) and one brown, sons of Saramā, who watch men and wander about as his envoys. They also guard the path, perhaps like the four-eyed, yellow-eared dog of the Avesta, who stands at the Cinvat Bridge to prevent evil spirits from seizing hold of the righteous. Yet it may be that, as is suggested by Aufrecht, the object of the dogs' watch is to keep sinful men from the world of Yama. It does not seem that the souls of the dead have (as in the epic) a stream Vaitaraṇī to cross, though it has been suggested that in X. xvii. 7 ff. Sarasvatī is none other than this river.
Though Yama is associated with gods, especially Agni and Varuṇa, and though there is an obvious reference to his connexion with the sun in the phrase "the heavenly courser given by Yama," still he is never called a god, and this fact lends the greatest probability to the view that he is what he seems to be, the first of men, the first also to die, and so the king of the dead, but not a judge of the departed. Nevertheless, his connexion with the sun and with Agni has suggested that he is the sun, especially conceived as setting, or that he is the parting day, in which case his sister is the night. The only other theory which would seem to have any plausibility is that he is the moon, for the connexion of the moon with the souls of the dead is deeply rooted in the Upaniṣads. Moreover, the moon actually dies and is the child of the sun. This identification, however, rests in large measure on the unproved hypothesis that the few references in the Ṛgveda to Soma as associated with the fathers are allusions to their abode in the moon.
It is in keeping with the belief in the heaven of Yama that the burning of the body of the dead is the normal, though not ​the exclusive, mode of disposing of the corpse. The dead were, however, sometimes buried, for the fathers are distinguished as those who are burned by fire and those who are not burned. The dead was burned with his clothes, etc., to serve him in the future life; even his weapons and his wife, it would seem, were once incinerated, although the Ṛgveda has abandoned that practice, of which only a symbol remains in placing the wife and the weapons beside the dead and then removing them from him. Agni bears the dead away, and the rite of burning is thus in part like a sacrifice; but as "eater of raw flesh" in this rite Agni is distinguished from that Agni who carries the oblations. With the dead was burned a goat, which Agni is besought to consume while preserving the body entire. On the path to the world of the dead Pusan acts as guide, and Savitṛ as conductor. A bundle of fagots is attached to the dead to wipe out his track and hinder the return of death to the living. Borne along the path by which the fathers went in days gone by, the soul passes on to the realm of light and in his home receives a resting-place from Yama. Though his corpse is destroyed by the flame, still in the other world he is not a mere spirit, but has what must be deemed a refined form of his earthly body. He abides in the highest point of the sun, and the fathers are united with the sun and its rays. The place is one of joy: the noise of flutes and song resounds; there soma, ghee, and honey flow. There are the two kings, Varuṇa and Yama, and the fathers are dear to the gods and are free from old age and bodily frailty. Another conception, however, seems to regard the fathers as being constellations in the sky, an idea which is certainly found in the later Vedic period.
Those who attain to heaven are, above all, the pious men who offer sacrifice and reward the priest, for sacrifice and sacrificial fee are indissolubly connected; but heroes who risk their lives in battle and those who practise asceticism also win their way thither. Of the fate of evil-doers we hear very little, and it would appear that annihilation was often regarded as their ​fate. Yet there is mention of deep places produced for the evil, false, and untrue, and Indra and Soma are besought to dash the evil-doers into the abyss of bottomless darkness, while the prayer is uttered that the enemy and the robber may lie below the three earths. From these obscure beginnings probably arose the belief in hell which is expressed in clear terms in the Atharvaveda and which is later elaborated at length in the epic and in the Purāṇas.
But the fathers are more than spirits living in peace after the toils of life. They are powerful to aid and receive offering, while they are invoked with the dawns, streams, mountains, heaven and earth, Pūṣan, and the Ṛbhus. They are asked to accord riches, offspring, and long life; they are said to have generated the dawn and, with Soma, to have extended heaven and earth. They especially love the soma and come for it in thousands. Yet though they are even called gods, they are distinguished from the true divinities; their path is the Pitṛyāṇa, or "Way of the Fathers," as contrasted with the Devayāna, or "Way of the Gods"; and the food given to them is termed svadhā, in contrast with the call svāhā with which the gods are invited to take their portion. The fathers are described as lower, higher, and middle, and as late and early; and mention is made of the races of Navagvas, Vairūpas, Atharvans, Aṅgirases, Vasiṣṭhas, and Bhṛgus, the last four of which appear also in the Ṛgveda as priestly families.
In one passage of the Ṛgveda (X. xvi. 3) an idea occurs which has been thought to have served in some degree as stimulating the later conception of metempsychosis, of which there is no real trace in that Saṁhitā. It is there said, in the midst of verses providing for the dead being taken by Agni to the world above,
"The sun receive thine eye, the wind thy spirit; go, as thy merit is, to earth or heaven. Go, if it be thy lot, unto the waters; go, make thine home in plants with all thy members."
​The conception seems natural enough as an expression of the resolution of the body into the elements from which it is derived, just as in later Sanskrit it is regularly said of man that he goes to the five elements when he dies; and it is, therefore, much more likely that the phrase is thus to be interpreted than that we are to see in it the primitive idea that the soul of the dead may go into plants and so forth. The passage is almost isolated, however, so that the sense must remain uncertain.
* ↑ See A. Hillebrandt, Vedische Mythologie, ii. 122-23.
* ↑ Cf. Mythology of All Races, Boston, 1916, i. 208-09, 298.
* ↑ See M. Bloomfield, in JAOS xvi. 1 ff. (1894); H. Usener, in Rheinisches Museum, lx. 26 ff. (1905).
* ↑ See infra, pp. 265, 282.
* ↑ See A. A. Macdonell and A. B. Keith, Vedic Index, ii. 434-37.
* ↑ R. T. H. Griffith, Hymns of the Rigveda, iv. 355-56.
* ↑ See J. Rhys, Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion as illustrated by Celtic Heathendom, London, 1888, pp. 114-15.
* ↑ See L. R. Farnell, Cults of the Greek States, Oxford, 1896-1908, iii. 50 ff.
* ↑ This expression denotes first five tribes famous in Vedic history, and then all men generally.
* ↑ See A. Hillebrandt, Vedische Mythologie, iii. 418-19.
* ↑ See A. B. Keith, in JRAS 1915, pp. 127 ff.
* ↑ See infra, pp. 325-26.
* ↑ See L. von Schroeder, Mysterium und Mimus im Rigveda, pp. 304-25.
* ↑ See L. von Schroeder, op. cit. pp. 52, 63.
* ↑ See infra, pp. 306-09.
* ↑ Indische Studien, iv. 341 (1858).
* ↑ Hence iṣṭāpūrta, "sacrifice and baksheesh," go together; see M. Bloomfield, Religion of the Veda, pp. 194 ff.
* ↑ R. T. H. Griffith, Hymns of the Rigveda, iv. 133.