Myth, Ritual And Religion Volume II Part 14

* The Brahmanic legend of the birth of the Adityas (Aitareya Brahmana iii. 33) is too disgusting to be quoted.

** _Religion Vedique_, iii. 88.

This vague and floating term was well suited to convey the pantheistic ideas natural to the Indian mind, and already notable in the Vedic hymns. "Aditi," cries a poet, "is heaven; Aditi is air; Aditi is the father, the mother and the son; Aditi is all the G.o.ds; Aditi is that which is born and which awaits the birth."* Nothing can be more advanced and metaphysical. Meanwhile, though Aditi is a personage so floating and nebulous, she figures in fairly definite form in a certain myth. The _Rig-Veda_ (x. 72, 8) tells us the tale of the birth of her sons, the Adityas. "Eight sons were there of Aditi, born of her womb. To the G.o.ds went she with seven; Martanda threw she away." The _Satapatha Brahmana_ throws a good deal of light on her conduct. Aditi had eight sons; but there are only seven G.o.ds whom men call Adityas. The eighth she bore a shapeless lump, of the dimensions of a man, as broad as long, say some.

The Adityas then trimmed this ugly duckling of the family into human shape, and an elephant sprang from the waste pieces which they threw away; therefore an elephant partakes of the nature of man. The shapen eighth son was called Vivasvat, the sun.**

* Rig- Veda, i. 89, 10.

** Muir, iv. 15.

It is not to be expected that many, if any, remains of a theriomorphic character should cling to a G.o.ddess so abstract as Aditi. When, therefore, we find her spoken of as a cow, it is at least as likely that this is only part of "the pleasant unconscious poetry" of the Veda, as that it is a survival of some earlier zoomorphic belief. Gubernatis offers the following lucid account of the metamorphosis of the infinite (for so he understands Aditi) into the humble domestic animal: "The inexhaustible soon comes to mean that which can be milked without end"

(it would be more plausible to say that what can be milked without end soon comes to mean the inexhaustible), "and hence also a celestial cow, an inoffensive cow, which we must not offend.... The whole heavens being thus represented as an infinite cow, it was natural that the princ.i.p.al and most visible phenomena of the sky should become, in their turn, children of the cow." Aditi then is "the great spotted cow". Thus did the Vedic poets (according to Gubernatis) descend from the unconditioned to the byre.

From Aditi, however she is to be interpreted, we turn to her famous children, the Adityas, the high G.o.ds.

There is no kind of consistency, as we have so often said, in Vedic mythical opinion. The Adityas, for example, are now represented as three, now as seven; for three and seven are sacred numbers. To the triad a fourth is sometimes added, to the seven an eighth Aditya. The Adityas are a brotherhood or college of G.o.ds, but some of the members of the fraternity have more individual character than, for example, the Maruts, who are simply a company with a tendency to become confused with the Adityas. Considered as a triad, the Adityas are Varuna, Mitra, Aryaman. The name of Varuna is commonly derived from vri (or Var),* to cover, according to the commentator Sayana, because "he envelops the wicked in his snares," the nets which he carries to capture the guilty.

As G.o.d of the midnight sky, Varuna is also "the covering" deity, with his universal pall of darkness. Varuna's name has frequently been compared to that of Ura.n.u.s (------), the Greek G.o.d of heaven, who was mutilated by his son Cronos.

* Max Muller, Select Essays, i. 871.

Supposing Varuna to mean the heaven, we are not much advanced, for _dyu_ also lias the same meaning; yet Dyaus and Varuna have little in common.

The interpreters of the Vedas attempted to distinguish Mitra from Varuna by making the former the G.o.d of the daylight, the latter the G.o.d of the midnight vault of heaven. The distinction, like other Vedic attempts at drawing a line among the floating phantasms of belief, is not kept up with much persistency.

Of all Vedic deities, Varuna has the most spiritual and ethical character. "The grandest cosmical functions are ascribed to Varuna."

"His ordinances are fixed and una.s.sailable." "He who should flee far beyond the sky would not escape Varuna the king." He is "gracious even to him who has committed sin". To be brief, the moral sentiments, which we have shown to be often present in a pure form, even in the religion of savages, find a lofty and pa.s.sionate expression in the Vedic psalms to Varuna.* But even Varuna has not shaken off all remains of the ruder mythopoeic fancy. A tale of the grossest and most material obscenity is told of Mitra and Varuna in the _Rig- Veda_ itself--the tale of the birth of Vasistha.**

In the Aitareya Brahmana (ii. 460) Varuna takes a sufficiently personal form. He has somehow fallen heir to a role familiar to us from the Russian tale of _Tsar Morskoi_, the Gaelic "Battle of the Birds," and the Scotch "Nicht, Nought, nothing"*** Varuna, in short, becomes the giant or demon who demands from the king the gift of his yet unborn son.

* Muir, v. 66.

** Rig. Veda, vii. 33, 2.

*** See Custom, and Myth, "A Far-Travelled Tale," and our chapter postea, on "Romantic Myths".

Harischandra is childless, and is instructed to pray to Varuna, promising to offer the babe as a human sacrifice. When the boy is born, Harischandra tries to evade the fulfilment of his promise. Finally a young Brahman is purchased, and is to be sacrificed to Varuna as a subst.i.tute for the king's son. The young Brahman is supernaturally released.

Thus even in Vedic, still more in Brahmanic myth, the vague and spiritual form of Varuna is brought to shame, or confused with some demon of lower earlier legends.

There are believed on somewhat shadowy evidence to be traces of a conflict between Varuna and Indra (the fourth Aditya sometimes added to the triad), a conflict a.n.a.logous to that between Ura.n.u.s and Cronos.*

The hymn, as M. Bergaigne holds, proves that Indra was victorious over Varuna, and thereby obtained possession of fire and of the soma juice.

But these births and battles of G.o.ds, who sometimes are progenitors of their own fathers, and who seem to change shapes with demons, are no more to be fixed and scientifically examined than the torn plumes and standards of the mist as they roll up a pa.s.s among the mountain pines.**

* Rig- Veda, x. 124.

** Bergaigne, iii. 147.

We next approach a somewhat better defined and more personal figure, that of the famous G.o.d Indra, who is the nearest Vedic a.n.a.logue of the Greek Zeus. Before dealing with the subject more systematically, it may be interesting to give one singular example of the parallelisms between Aryan and savage mythology.

In his disquisition on the Indian G.o.ds, Dr. Muir has been observing*

that some pa.s.sages of the _Rig- Veda_ imply that the reigning deities were successors of others who had previously existed. He quotes, in proof of this, a pa.s.sage from _Rig- Veda_, iv. 18, 12: "Who, O Indra, made thy mother a widow? Who sought to kill thee, lying or moving? What G.o.d was present in the fray when thou didst slay thy father, seizing him by the foot?" According to M. Bergaigne,** Indra slew his father, Tvashtri, for the purpose of stealing and drinking the soma, to which he was very partial. This is rather a damaging pa.s.sage, as it appears that the Vedic poet looked on Indra as a parricide and a drunkard. To explain this hint, however, Sayana the ancient commentator, quotes a pa.s.sage from the _Black Yajur Veda_ which is no explanation at all. But it has some interest for us, as showing how the myths of Aryans and Hottentots coincide, even in very strange details. Yajna (sacrifice) desired Daks.h.i.+na (largesse). He consorted with her. Indra was apprehensive of this. He reflected, "Whoever is born of her will be this". He entered into her. Indra himself was born of her. He reflected, "Whoever is born of her besides me will be this". Having considered, he cut open her womb. She produced a cow. Here we have a high Aryan G.o.d pa.s.sing into and being born from the womb of a being who also bore a cow. The Hottentot legend of the birth of their G.o.d, Heitsi Eibib, is scarcely so repulsive.***

* _Sanskrit Texts_, v. 16,17.

** _Religion Vedique_, iii. 99.

*** _Tsuni Goam_, Hahn, p.

"There was gra.s.s growing, and a cow came and ate of that gra.s.s, and she became pregnant" (as Hera of Ares in Greek myth), "and she brought forth a young bull. And this bull became a very large bull." And the people came together one day in order to slaughter him. But he ran away down hill, and they followed him to turn him back and catch him. But when they came to the spot where he had disappeared, they found a man making milk tubs. They asked this man, "Where is the bull that pa.s.sed down here?" He said, "I do not know; has he then pa.s.sed here?" And all the while it was he himself, who had again become Heitsi Eibib. Thus the birth of Heitsi Eibib resembled that of Indra as described in _Rig-Veda_, iv. 18, 10. "His mother, a cow, bore Indra, an unlicked calf."* Whatever view we may take of this myth, and of the explanation in the Brahmana, which has rather the air of being an invention to account for the Vedic cow-mother of Indra, it is certain that the G.o.d is not regarded as an uncreated being.**

* Ludwig, _Die fa.r.s.e hat den groszen, starken, nicht zu venoundenden stier, den tosenden Indra, geboren_.

** As to the etymological derivation and original significance of the name of Indra, the greatest differences exist among philologists. Yaska gives thirteen guesses of old, and there are nearly as many modern conjectures. In 1846 Roth described Indra as the G.o.d of "the bright clear vault of heaven" (Zeller's _Theologisches Jahrbuch_, 1846, p.

352). Compare for this and the following conjectures, E. D. Perry, _Journal of American Oriental Society_, vol. i. p. 118. Roth derived the "radiance" from _idh, indh_, to kindle. Roth afterwards changed his mind, and selected _in_ or _inv_, to have power over. La.s.sen (_Indisclie Allerthumskunde_, 2nd ed., i. p. 893) adopted a different derivation.

Benfey (Or. und Occ, 1862, p. 48) made Indra G.o.d, not of the radiant, but of the rainy sky. Mr. Max Muller (lectures on Science of Language, ii. 470) made Indra "another conception of the bright blue sky," but (p.

473, note 35) he derives Indra from the same root as in Sanskrit gives indu, drop or sap, that is, apparently, rainy sky, the reverse of blue.

It means originally "the giver of rain," and Beufey is quoted ut supra.

In Chips, ii. 91, Indra becomes "the chief solar deity of India ". Muir (Texts, v. 77) identifies the character of Indra with that of Jupiter Pluvius, the Rainy Jove of Rome. Gra.s.sman (Dictionary, s. v.) calls Indra "the G.o.d of the bright firmament". Mr. Perry takes a distinction, and regards Indra as a G.o.d, not of sky, but of air, a midgarth between earth and sky, who inherited the skyey functions of Dyu. In the Veda Mr.

Perry finds him "the personification of the thunderstorm". And so on! It seems incontestable that in Vedic mythology Tvashtri is regarded as the father of Indra.* Thus (ii. 17, 6) Indra's thunderbolts are said to have been fas.h.i.+oned by his father. Other proofs are found in the account of the combat between father and son. Thus (iii. 48, 4) we read, "Powerful, victorious, _he gives his body what shape he pleases_. Thus Indra, having vanquished Tvashtri even at his birth, stole and drank the soma."** These anecdotes do not quite correspond with the version of Indra's guilt given in the Brahmanas. There it is stated*** that Tvashtri had a three-headed son akin to the Asuras, named Vairupa. This Vairupa was suspected of betraying to the Asuras the secret of soma.

Indra therefore cut off his three heads.

* On the parentage of Indra, Bergaigne writes, iii. 58.

** iii. 61. Bergaigne identifies Tvashtri and Vritra.

Cf. Aitareya Brahmana, ii. 483, note 5.

*** Aitareya Brahmana, it 483, note 6.

Now Vairupa was a Brahman, and Indra was only purified of his awful guilt, Brahmanicide, when earth, trees and women accepted each their share of the iniquity. Tvashtri, the father of Vairupa, still excluded Indra from a share of the soma, which, however, Indra seized by force.

Tvashtri threw what remained of Indra's share into the fire with imprecations, and from the fire sprang Vritra, the enemy of Indra. Indra is represented at various times and in various texts as having sprung from the mouth of Purusha, or as being a child of heaven and earth, whom he thrust asunder, as Tutenganahau thrust asunder Rangi and Papa in the New Zealand myth. In a pa.s.sage of the _Black Yajur Veda_, once already quoted, Indra, sheep and the Kshattriya caste were said to have sprung from the breast and arms of Praj.a.pati.* In yet another hymn in the _Rig- Veda_ he is said to have conquered heaven by magical austerity. Leaving the Brahmanas aside, Mr. Perry** distinguishes four sorts of Vedic texts on the origin of Indra:--

1. Purely physical.

2. Anthropomorphic.

3. Vague references to Indra's parents.

4. Philosophical speculations.

Of the first cla.s.s,*** it does not appear to us that the purely physical element is so very pure after all. Heaven, earth, Indra, "the cow," are all thought of as _personal_ ent.i.ties, however gigantic and vague.

In the second or anthropomorphic myths we have**** the dialogue already referred to, in which Indra, like Set in Egypt and Malsumis or Chokanipok in America, insists on breaking his way through his mother's side.*****

* Muir, i. 16.

** Op. cit., p. 124.

*** Rig- Veda, iv. 17, 4, 2, 12; iv. 22, 4; i. 63, 1; viii.

59, 4; viii. 6, 28-30.