Wendy Doniger Rig Veda on Sacrifice

Table Of Contents

CREATION
DEATH
THE ELEMENTS OF SACRIFICE
THE HORSE SACRIFICE
GODS OF THE SACRIFICE: AGNI AND SOMA
SOMA
INDRA
GODS OF THE STORM
SOLAR GODS
SKY AND EARTH
VARUNA
RUDRA AND VISNU
REALIA
WOMEN
INCANTATIONS AND SPELLS

THE ELEMENTS OF SACRIFICE

ALL the hymns of the Rig Veda are ritual hymns in some sense, since all were sung as part of the Vedic ceremony, but some are self-consciously devoted to the meaning of the ritual.¹ Even here, pride of place is given to the verbal rather than to the physical aspect of the sacrifice, the origins of sacred speech (10.71) and the powers of sacred speech (10.125). The personal concerns of the priests also inspire considerable interest in the authors of the hymns (priests themselves): the priest whose patron is the king (10.173) laments the loss of his royal friend (10.33) and praises faith and generosity (10.151 and (10.117), while other priests, more securely employed, express their happiness in a hymn that is lively to the point of bawdiness (10.101; cf. 7.103 and 9.112). The meaning of the sacrifice is explored in a hymn that unites all of these themes and expresses them in the form of a series of riddles about the meaning of life (1.164).

NOTES

1. Cf. especially 10.90, 10.130, 9.112, and the hymns to Agni and Soma.

10.71   The Origins of Sacred Speech

This hymn speaks of the origins of the sacred word, speech or language (goddess), and of its ritual recreation through the verbal contests of the Vedic sacrifice.

The social nature of speech is emphasized, the birth of speech in friendship and its use by all of the assembly (v. 10) and by the four priests with their individual functions (v. 11). The enemy of true speech is represented as the rival of the author of this hymn (vv. 4-6, 9).

1. Brhaspati¹ When they² set in motion the beginning of speech, giving names, their most pure and perfectly guarded secret was revealed through love.
2. When the wise ones² fashioned speech with their thought, sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve³ then friends recognized their friendships. A good sign was placed on their speech.
3. Through the sacrifice they traced the path of speech and found it inside the sages. They held it and portioned it out to many; together the seven singers² praised it.
4. One who looked did not see speech, and another who listens does not hear it. It reveals itself to someone as a loving wife, beautifully dressed, reveals her body to her husband.
5. One person, they said, has grown awkward and heavy in this friendship; they no longer urge him forward in the contests. He lives with falsehood like a milkless cow, for the speech that he has heard has no fruit no flower.
6. A man that abandons a friend who has learned with him no longer has a share in speech. What he does hear he hears in vain, for he does not know the path of good action.
7. Friends have eyes and ears, but their ashes of insight are not equal. Some are like ponds that reach only to the mouth or shoulder; others are like ponds that one could bathe in.
8. When the intuitions of the mind are shaped in the heart, when Brahmins perform sacrifices together as friends, some are left behind for lack of knowledge, while others surpass them with the power to praise.
9. Those who move neither near nor far, who are not real Brahmins nor pressers of the Soma; using speech in a bad way, they weave on a weft of rags, without understanding.
10. All his friends rejoice in the friend who emerges with fame and victory in the contest. He saves them from error and gives them food. He is worthy to be pushed forward to win the prize.
11. One sits bringing to blossom the flower of the verses. Another sings a song in the Sakvari metre. One, the Brahmin, proclaims the knowledge of the ancient ways. Another lays out the measure of the sacrifice.

NOTES

1. This epithet, that literally means ‘lord of sacred speech’, is particularly appropriate here as Brihaspati is the patron of speakers and inspired poets.
2. The first poets and seers.
3. The Soma juice is purified by being filtered through a sieve.
4. The Hotha priest sits motionless and invokes the gods; the Udgätr sings; the Brahmin must make sure that no mistakes are committed, and the Adhvaryu is responsible for ritual activities like pressing the Soma (as in v. 9) and measuring the sacrificial area.

10.125   Speech

A paean of self-praise to and by Speech, in a more personified form than in 10.71 but implicit in various forms of speech: sacri cial (vv. 2-3, 5), agonistic (v. 6), and cosmic (v.

the latter enabling Speech to become identified with the creator (v. 7) and the absolute godhead, encompassing all gods (vv. 1, 8). Speech is never mentioned by name in the hymn, never actually spoken herself.

1 I move with the Rudras, with the Vasus, with the Adityas and all the gods. I carry both Mitra and Varuna, both Indra and Agni, and both of the Asvins.

2 I carry the swelling Soma, and Tvastr, and Pusan and Bhaga. I bestow wealth on the pious sacrificer who presses the Soma and offers the oblation.

3 I am the queen, the confluence of riches, the skilful one who is first among those worthy of sacrifice. The gods divided me up into various parts, for I dwell in many places and enter into many forms.

4 The one who eats food, who truly sees, who breathes, who hears what is said, does so through me. Though they do not realize it, they dwell in me. Listen, you whom they have heard¹: what I tell you should be heeded.

5 I am the one who says, by myself, what gives joy to gods and men. Whom I love I make awesome; I make him a sage, a wise man, a Brahmin.

6. I stretch the bow for Rudra so that his arrow will strike down the hater of prayer. I incite the contest² among the people. I have pervaded sky and earth.

7. I gave birth to the father on the head of this world. My womb is in the waters, within the ocean. From there I spread out over all creatures and touch the very sky with the crown of my head.

8. I am the one who blows like the wind, embracing all creatures. Beyond the sky, beyond this earth, so much have I become in my greatness.

NOTES

1. Literally, one who is heard or who is famous; a triple pun on the root ‘hear’ in ‘listen’, ‘they have heard’, and ‘heeded’. Cf. the Greek kluein, akluein.

2. Perhaps a verbal contest rather than an actual battle, though the first part of the verse makes the second meaning possible also.

10.173   Royal Consecration

This hymn establishes the king upon his throne and makes his future reign secure, playing upon the word dhruvam (‘firm’ or ‘steadfast’), which recurs like the refrain in a magic spell. The hymn, part of an elaborate royal consecration ritual (rajasuya), would be accompanied by an oblation of Soma and perhaps by certain magic rituals. The same verses in the Atharva Veda are used as an imprecation against earthquakes.

1 I have brought you here; remain among us. Stay stead fast and unwavering. Let all the people want you, and let the kingship never fall away from you.

2 Stay right here – do not slip away, but stay unwavering, like a mountain. Stand steadfast here, like Indra, and here uphold the kingdom.

3 Indra has supported him firmly with a firm oblation. Let Soma – and Brahmanaspati also – speak up for him.

4 Firm is the sky and firm the earth, and firm are these mountains. Firm is all this world, and firm is this king of all the people.

5 Steadfast let King Varuna, steadfast the god Brihaspati, steadfast let Indra and Agni maintain your steadfast kingship.

6 With a firm oblation we touch the firm Soma. Thus let Indra make all the people who bring tribute yours alone.

10.33   Lament of the Aged Priest

A bard has lost his patron, King Kurusravana, whose son, Upamasravas, has succeeded to the throne and no longer employs the old man. The bard invokes Indra (the quintessential generous patron), tries to arouse the young king’s pity, and even employs veiled threats to avenge the (perhaps untimely?) death of the old king (vv. I, 8). Finally, he is resigned to his fate (v. 9).

1 The harnessers of the people¹ have harnessed me; I carry Pusan along the way². All the gods protected me. Then a cry arose: ‘An evil taskmaster is coming!’

2 My ribs encircle me with pain like rival wives; poverty, nakedness, weakness bind me. My mind utters here and there like a bird.

3 As rats gnaw at their tails, cares gnaw at me, your singer of praises, O lord of a hundred powers³. Have mercy on us once more, generous Indra, and be like a father to us.

4 As a sage I chose as my king Kurusravana the descendant of Trasadasyu, most generous to those who offer prayer,

5 whose three bays carry me in this chariot toward better times⁴. I will praise him who gave a thousand cows to the priests⁵,

6. Upamasravas’s father, whose words were sweet as a field is a delight to the one who lives on it.

7 Upamasravas, his son, and grandson of Miträtithi⁶ – remember I am the one who sang the praises of your father.

8 If I had power over the immortals or over mortals, my generous patron would be alive.

9 No one lives beyond the decree of the gods, not even if he has a hundred souls⁷. So I am parted from my companion.

NOTES

1. Perhaps the gods are meant, as they are said to have protected the singer.

2. The singer, who imagines himself as the horse harnessed to the king’s chariot, further

imagines Pusan, the charioteer of the gods, riding in it.

3. An epithet of Indra.

4. Now that the tables are turned (the old king being dead), the singer is himself in the chariot, pulled by he king’s horses that are all he has left of his patronage.

5. Perhaps a subtle hint to Upamasravas to do the same.

6. Perhaps another name for Trasadasyu, the ancestor of Kurusravana. The name, meaning ‘guest of a friend’, has significance for the poet.

7. Atman is the soul or the breath of life, as we might say that a cat has nine lives.

10.101   The Sacrificial Priests

This hymn is a kind of work-song for priests, likening their ritual work to the work of the farmers in the field, as well as to other occupations (such as weaving, v. 2, and chariot racing, v. 7) and pastimes (such as sexual play, vv. 11-12).

1 Wake up with one mind, my friends, and kindle the fire, you many who share the same nest.¹ I call Dadhikra and Agni and the goddess Dawn, all joined with Indra, to help you.

2 Make your thoughts harmonious; stretch them on the loom; make a ship² whose oars will carry us across; make the weapons ready and set them in place³; drive the sacrifice forward⁴, my friends.

3 Harness the plough and stretch the yoke on it; sow the seed in the prepared womb. And if the hearing of our song is weighty enough⁵, then the ripe crop will come nearer to the scythes.

4 The inspired poets who know how harness the plough and stretch the yokes on either side to win favour among the gods.

5 Make the buckets ready and fasten the straps well. We want to draw water from the fountain that is easy to draw water from, owing freely, inexhaustible⁶.

6 I draw water from the fountain whose buckets are in place, with good straps, easy to draw water from, freely flowing and inexhaustible.

7 Keep the horses happy and you will win the stake. Make your chariot into the vehicle of good fortune. Drink at the fountain that has Soma-vats for buckets, a pressing- stone for its wheel, a consecrated goblet for its casing; this is the fountain where men drink.

8 Make an enclosure⁷, for this is a drink for men. Stitch the breast-plates thick and broad. Make iron forts that cannot be breached; make your goblet strong so that nothing will flow out.

9 I turn toward our cause here your sacrificial attention, gods, your divine thought that is disposed toward sacrifice and worthy of sacrifice. Let the great cow ⁸ give us milk in thousands of streams of milk, as if she were walking in a meadow.

10 Pour the tawny one⁹ into the lap of wood; carve it with knives made of stone. Embrace it all around with ten girths; yoke the draught animal to the two shafts¹⁰.

11 The draught animal is pressed tight between the two shafts, like a man in bed with two women. Stand the tree up in the wood; sink the well deep without digging¹¹.

12 The penis, men, take the penis and move it and stick it in to win the prize¹². Inspire Indra, Nistigri’s son¹³, to come here to help us, to come eagerly to drink Soma.

NOTES

1. This term denotes companions in general, but here may literally indicate a group of priests who live together. Cf. 10.5.2.

2. The ship that carries the worshipper ‘to the other shore’ is a common metaphor; here there may be a pun between ship and shuttle (‘little ship’, in Sanskrit), from the first part of the verse.

3. The weapons are the instruments of the ritual; here the priest’s work is likened to that of a warrior, as in verse 8.

4. The sacrifice as a chariot, as in verse 7; cf. .1.164, 10.135, etc.

5. That is, if the patrons pay well enough for it, the sacrifice will yield a harvest as rich as a grain harvest in which the plants bend to the scythe.

6. The fountain of inspiration and the well of Soma.

7. That is, a walled fortress or a cow-pen, to protect Soma the bull. A series of martial metaphors follows in this verse.

8. The cow as a symbol of the inspiration implicit in the thought of the gods.

9. Soma, here imagined as a sacrificial animal. The knives of stone are the pressing stones. Cf. 10.94.3.

10. The two shafts are the two hands that hold the Soma; the ten girths are the ten fingers.

11. A triple entendre: the tree in the wood (forest) is the Soma plant in the wooden bowl and the penis in the womb, the latter simile extended in the last quarter of the verse, that further echoes the imagery of verses 3, 5, 6, and the final verse.

12 A sexual metaphor for Soma pressed in the mortar and pestle.

13. Indra is the son of Aditi, who may be called Nistigri (‘swal- lower of the rival wife’) as she overcomes her rival, Diti. Cf. 10.145.

10.117   In Praise of Generosity

This hymn, which seems constructed at least in part out of aphorisms, exhorts the worshipper to be generous, both to the gods (through sacrifice) and to the poet (through patronage), as well as to mankind in general. There is also a self-serving level to the

advice: fortune is sickle, and the man to whom you give now may have given to you in the past, and may do so again.

1 The gods surely did not ordain hunger alone for slaughter¹; various deaths reach the man who is well-fed. The riches of the man who gives fully do not run out, but the miser finds no one with sympathy.

2 The man with food who hardens his heart against the poor man who comes to him suffering and searching for nourishment – though in the past he had made use of him ²– he surely finds no one with sympathy.

3 The man who is truly generous gives to the beggar who approaches him thin and in search of food. He puts himself at the service of the man who calls to him from the road, and makes him a friend for times to come.

4 That man is no friend who does not give of his own nourishment to his friend, the companion at his side. Let the friend turn away from him; this is not his dwelling-place. Let him find another man who gives freely, even if he be a stranger.

5 Let the stronger man give to the man whose need is greater; let him gaze upon the lengthening path³. For riches roll like the wheels of a chariot, turning from one to another.

6 The man without foresight gets food in vain; I speak the truth: it will be his death⁴. He cultivates neither a patron nor a friend. The man who eats alone brings troubles upon himself alone⁵.

7 The plough that works the soil makes a man well-fed; the legs that walk put the road behind them. The priest who speaks is better than the one who does not speak. The friend who gives freely surpasses the one who does not.

8 One-foot surpasses Two-foot; and Two-foot leaves Three-foot behind. Four-foot comes at the call of Two-foot, watching over his herds and serving him⁶.

9 The two hands, though the same, do not do the same thing. Two cows from the same mother do not give the same amount of milk. The powers of two twins are not the same. Two kinsmen do not give with the same generosity.

NOTES

1. The meaning is that hunger does not always kill, and that there are other ways to die ; that though the poor are hungry, the rich man should not forget that he too will die, and so he should share his food with the poor and with the gods.

2. The implication is that the man who is now poor was once powerful, and was flattered and used by the man now rich; the next verse emphasizes the need to foresee future reversals of this kind.

3. The path of life still to come, in which many upsets are possible.

4. A return to the theme of the first verse : by hoarding food one not only does not avoid death, but brings upon oneself the loss of one’s future happiness.

5. By committing the sin of greed, he brings upon himself evils such as poverty and hunger.

6. In the Greek riddle of the sphinx, man walks first on four feet (the crawling baby), then on two feet (the mature man), and nally on three feet (the old man with a cane). In this Indian variant of the riddle, One-foot is the sun (an enigmatic but widespread Vedic theme), Two-foot the human, Three-foot the old man with a cane and Four-foot a dog. In later tradition, the four Ages of man are characterized by the fact that Dharma walks on four, three, two feet, and one foot, as time degenerates.

10.151   Faith

1 With faith the fire is kindled; with faith the oblation is offered up. With speech I testify to faith upon the head of happiness.

2 Faith, make this that I have said dear to the man who gives, dear to the man who wishes to give, dear, O faith, among lavish sacrificers.

3 As the gods established faith among the formidable Asuras,¹ so establish what we have said among lavish sacrificers.

4 The gods who sacrifice and are guarded by Vayu honour faith; with heartfelt intent they honour faith. And with faith they find wealth.

5 We call to faith at morning, to faith near midday, to faith when the sun sinks down. Faith, establish faith in us.²

NOTES

1. The Asuras are the enemies of the gods, the ancient gods, though perhaps not yet the demons they are in later parts of the Vedas. For the way in which the gods establish faith (in the gods) in the demons, see 10.124.

2. An almost certainly intended ambiguity: make us have faith, and make others (the generous worshippers) have faith in us (in the priests).

1.164   The Riddle of the Sacrifice (Asya Vamasyd)

This long and complex hymn has inspired many elaborate, detailed glosses and still remains largely obscure. The language, however, is not particularly difficult, and certain major themes emerge with sufficient clarity to encourage the translator to present the hymn in a relatively raw state of exegesis, rather than burden the reader with a critical apparatus out of proportion to the poem itself. Those who seek enlightenment on the

many points left unglossed are encouraged to pursue the books and articles listed in the bibliography.

One reason for the great scholarly attention paid to this hymn is that it is traditionally regarded as a riddle – a tradition that waves a red flag before the eyes of Vedic .exegetes. And there are solid grounds for this tradition, for many questions are asked outright in the hymn, and others are hidden in a symbolism that seems deliberately labyrinthine. Yet it seems that the poet thought he knew the answers to some of his questions and posed others merely rhetorically, as questions no one would dream of trying to answer. The reader is thus encouraged to solve those that can be solved and to leave the others unanswered.

The hymn demonstrates a unity on two distinct but intersecting levels, explicit and implicit. That is, certain tropes emerge repeatedly to express different ideas, and certain ideas emerge repeatedly to be expressed by different tropes. For example, the hymn mentions cows and birds in several verses; the cow may stand for the Dawn (who is not explicitly named) or the goddess of Speech (who is), and the birds for the sun or the mortal (both explicitly named), while the Dawn may also be represented in verses ostensibly about a woman, and the sun in verses about a horse. I will here try to summarize the recurrent tropes and ideas, and devote the notes to particular idiosyncrasies of the individual verses.

A central theme on the explicit level is the poet’s uncertainty about his knowledge and his joy in experiencing an enlightening vision (v. 37; cf. 6.9). Several verses are questions, some never explicitly answered (vv. 4, 6, 17, 18, 48) and perhaps regarded as unanswerable, an expression of the ine ability of the mystic vision; others are posed and answered immediately, almost as a catechism (vv. 34-5). The poet speaks often of the contrast between those who know and those who do not know the answers (4-7, 10, 16, 20-23, 39) or those who say one thing and those who say another (12, 16, 19, 38, 46); elsewhere he merely expresses his scepticism or grateful acceptance of what ‘they say’ (15, 25). The hymn refers often to things that are hidden or secret (3, 5, 7, 14, 32, 37-8, 45).

Another aspect of the riddle content on the explicit level is the use of deliberate circumlocutions, particularly in association with numbers. Many things come in threes: brothers (1), naves of the wheel (2, 48), stages of the journey (9), mothers and fathers (10), metres (23-5), kindling-sticks (25), longhaired ones (44), hidden parts of speech (45). Closely related to these are the pairs of threes, or sixes : realms of space (6), spokes of the wheel (12), sets of twins (15); and these in turn are doubled to produce twelves : spokes of the wheel (11), shapes of the father (12), twins (15), fellies (48). By further multiplication, we obtain 360 (48) and 720 as a doublet of 360 (11). Other things come in fives – feet (12) and spokes (13) – or tens – horses (14). Seven is a great favourite: sons (1), horses and horses’ names (2-3), wheels (3, 12), riders, sisters, and names of cows (3), threads (5), half-embryos (36). A few other numbers occur once: eight, nine, and a thousand (41). Four appears only once (as an addition to three, rather than a doublet of

two, in verse 45), a remarkably rare occurrence in a hymn about four-footed animals and four-footed verses. Sometimes several different numbers are applied to the same things (spokes being five or six or twelve, horses being seven or ten, and so forth). This should warn us that it is not possible to make a direct connection between a number and what it symbolizes, though a certain amount of speculation along these lines is possible, as we will see when we consider implicit levels of symbolism in the hymn.

Most important of all the numbers are one and two. The One as the Absolute appears several times (6, 10, 15, 46), and both it, explicitly, (46) and other things, implicitly, are said to be many as well as one: the horse (2), the wheel (14, 48), and the foot of the cow (41). Twos form basic oppositions on the explicit level. We have noted the contrast between the wise and the foolish; another, related to this, is the contrast between the mortal and the immortal (30, 38), supported by recurrent references to one or the other side of the pair: that which is ageless or undying or unbreaking (2, 10-11, 13-15) and that which ages and dies (29, 32). Further contrasts between that with bones and that without bones (4), the near and far sides of the sky (12, 17), up and down (17, 43), two bowls (33), male and female (16), and past and future (19) enrich the dialectic structure of the hymn.

The most explicit and developed contrast is between the two birds (20-22), who occur in other forms as well, as an individual bird (7, 46, 52) and a group of birds (21, 47). Related to the birds, as we shall see, are horses (2, 3, 34, 35), which are in turn related to the chariot (2-3, 9, 12-14, 31, 48); the ‘naves’ of the chariot pun on the ‘navel’ of the universe (33-5, nabhi referring to both terms). By far the most important animal in the hymn is the cow (7, 9, 17, 26-9, 40-44) with her calf (5, 7, 17, 27-8) and bull (43). The cow is closely related to the images of human procreation: father (12, 18, 22), mother and father (8, 10, 33) (referred to as earth and sky explicitly in 33 and implicitly in others such as 51), mother and son (4, 9), father and son (16), brothers (1), sisters (3), and twins (15, 36). Two Vedic myths lie behind several verses: the mother bears her son and then abandons him (9, 17, 32) and the father incestuously procreates with his own daughter (8).

A final explicit image is closely related to the problem of the inspired solution of the riddle; this is the image of the sacrfice. The hymn begins with a priest (1) and poets who are inspired priests (5, 6); it speaks of the priest’s cow (9). There are several references to the goddess of sacred speech (10, 37, 45, 49), to hymns (23-5) and syllables (24, 39, 41- 2), ritual laws (43) and the Order which underlies them (11, 37, 47), and nally to the sacrifice itself (15, 35, 50).

How do these interwoven images express meaning in the hymn? On one level, it is clear that the hymn is about the things it is talking about – about riddles and numbers and wisdom and immortality and birds and chariots and horses and cows and speech and the sacrifice, all of which are described in vividly naturalistic detail. But they are also described in terms that make no sense on a naturalistic level (what chariot could have a single wheel, or five spokes at the same time as seven spokes?), and it appears that these

distortions arise through the identification of several of the images with abstract ideas, particularly the chariot and birds identified with the sun or year or yearly sacrifice or immortal soul, and the cow or the mother identified with Dawn or Speech. Qualities appropriate to these ‘signified’ concepts are then redirected back upon the ‘signifiers’ to stretch the naturalistic image into the realm of pure imagination.

That the bird in the hymn is the sun or fire is a conjecture supported by many explicit references to the sun-bird in the Rig Veda (cf. 10.123, 10.177) and by references to the sun in this hymn (14, 26). Many of the verses seem to refer to the birth of the sun/year/sacrifice/sacrificial fire as a calf begotten by his father, the sky, in his mother, the earth (in the form of a cow), or by the sky in his daughter the dawn cow. So, too, the verses about the mortal and immortal may refer to the death and rebirth of the sun at the end of each day or year. The dead one who ‘wanders with the sacrificial drink’ (30, 38; cf. 10.16.5) or ‘enters Destruction’ when he is within the womb (32) is the soul of the mortal (or of the mortal sun) whose wandering and rebirth are dependent on the enduring qualities of his nature.

Since the cow that represents the earth or Dawn also stands for the priest’s fee (9) or for the goddess of Speech, she serves as a pivot for several symbolic layers; moreover, there is an extended pun throughout the hymn based on the ‘feet’ of the cow (7, 12, 17, 41) and of the sacred verses (23-4), as well as the ‘footprints’ or sacrificial traces of the gods (5) – all designated by the term pada. Similarly, the word akshara which means both ‘syllable’ and ‘undying’ serves as a link between the sacrifice and the immortal sun/ soul (24, 39, 42).

Working with these implicit and explicit patterns, it is possible to explain more of the hymn. The sun is often identified with Agni, who is mentioned in the hymn at several points: he is explicitly identified with the One (46); he appears in three forms (1) ; and he has flames that are like long hair (44). Agni lurks behind other images: he is, like the sun, the first-born child of Order (11, 37, 47) or Truth (cf. 10.5.7) and is born of the waters (52). The interaction of the sun and the waters makes sense of a number of obscure references to a Vedic theory of the rain cycle: the rays of the sun (cows) drink up earthly waters with the lowest point of the ray (the foot) and then give back rain (milk) from their top (head) after they carry the moisture back up to the sun (7, 47, 51, 52). The sun is thus clothed in the waters (7, 31). The relationship between the sun and the sacrifice (through the concept of the yearly solar renewal and yearly sacrifice) is present in the number symbolism linking the chariot (of the sun) with the sacrifice (as in the extended metaphor of 10.135, the opening verse of which is echoed in verse 22 of the present hymn). The seven horses or sons or embryos are seven priests or offerings, the three or six or five naves or spokes are seasons (variously enumerated in different sacrificial reckonings), the twelve are the months, the 360 the days of the years (the 720 the days and nights in pairs), and so forth.

Many particular obscurities remain, of course, and many verses mean several things at once, but when viewed in this overarching framework the hymn reveals a number of

consistent questions and answers expressed through a careful network of highly charged symbols.

1 This beloved grey priest has a middle brother who is hungry and a third brother with butter on his back.¹ In him I saw the Lord of All Tribes with his seven sons.

2 Seven yoke the one-wheeled chariot drawn by one horse’ with seven names. All these creatures rest on the age less and unstoppable wheel with three naves.²

3 Seven horses draw the seven who ride on this seven-wheeled chariot. Seven sisters call out to the place where the seven names of the cows are hidden.

4 Who saw the newborn one, the one with bones who was brought forth by the boneless one?³ Where was the breath and blood and soul of the earth? Who can go to ask this from someone who knows?

5 An ignorant fool, I ask in my mind about the hidden footprints⁴ of the gods. Over the young calf the poets stretched out seven threads to weave.

6 Unknowing, ignorant, I ask for knowledge about it from the poets who know: What is the One who in the form of the unborn propped apart these six realms of space?

7 Let him who really knows proclaim here the hidden place of that beloved bird. The cows give milk from his head; wearing a cloak, they drank water with their feet.

8 The mother⁵ gave the father a share in accordance with the Order, for at the beginning she embraced him with mind and heart. Recoiling, she was pierced and owed with the seed of the embryo. The reverent came to praise.

9 The mother was harnessed to the chariot pole of the priest’s cow; the embryo remained within the cow-pens. The calf lowed and looked for the many-coloured cow on the three stages of the journey.⁶ 10 The One has risen up, holding up three mothers⁷ and three fathers, who never wear him down. On the back of the distant sky they speak of Speech, who knows all but does not move all.

11 The twelve-spoked wheel of Order rolls around and around the sky and never ages. Seven hundred and twenty sons in pairs rest on it, O Agni.

12 Some say that the father with his five feet and twelve shapes dwells in his fullness in the farther half of the sky. But others here say that the far-seeing one in the seven- wheeled, six-spoked chariot moves in he near half.⁸

13 All the worlds rest on this five-spoked wheel that rolls around and around. Though heavy-laden, its axle does not get hot, nor has it ever broken in its naves.

14 The unageing wheel rolls out on its rim; the ten yoked horses draw it up the outstretched path. All the worlds are kept in motion on the eye of the sun, that moves on though shrouded in dark space.

15 They say that besides those born in pairs there is a seventh born alone,⁹ while the six’ sets of twins are the sages born from the gods. The sacrifices for them are firmly set, but they change their forms and waver as he stands firm.

16 They are female, but people tell me they are male.¹⁰ He who has eyes sees this, but the blind one does not understand. The poet who is his son has understood this well; the one who knows it would be his father’s father.

17 Beneath what is above, and above what is beneath, the cow went upward, holding her calf by the foot.¹¹ In what direction and to what half of the sky has she gone away? Where did she give birth? Not within the herd.

18 Whoever here knows his father¹² beneath what is above and above what is beneath – who with such mystical insight can here proclaim the source from which the mind of god was born?

19 Those that are in the future they say are in the past; those that are in the past they say are in the future.¹³ The things that you and Indra did, Soma, still pull the axle pole of space as though yoked to it.

20 Two birds, friends joined together, clutch the same tree. One of them eats the sweet fruit; the other looks on without eating.¹⁴

21 Where the birds sing unblinkingly about their share of immortality among the wise, there the mighty herdsman¹⁵ of the whole world, the wise one, entered me, the fool.

22 The birds that eat honey nest and brood on that tree on whose tip, they say, is the sweet fruit. No one who does not know the father¹² eats that.

23 Only those gain immortality who know that the Gayatrï foot is based on the Gayatri hymn, or that the Tristubh foot is made from the Tristubh hymn, or that the Jagat foot is based on the Jagat hymn.

24 With the Gayatrï foot they fashion a hymn; with the hymn, a chant; with the Tristubh foot a strophe; with the strophe of two feet or four feet they fashion a speech. With the syllable they fashion the seven tones.

25 With the Jagat he fixed the stream in the sky.16 In the Rathantara chant he discovered the sun. They say the Gayatrï has three kindling-sticks, and so its power and magnificence excels.

26 I call to the cow who is easy to milk, so that the milker with clever hands may milk her. Let Savitr¹⁷ inspire us with the finest vigour. The pot of milk is set on the fire – this is what I would happily proclaim.

27 The mistress of riches has come, snuffling and longing in her heart for her calf. Let this cow give milk for the Asvins and grow greater for good fortune.

28 The cow has lowed at her blinking calf, snuffling at his head to make him low. Longing for his warm mouth, she lows and swells with milk.

29 The one that encloses the cow hums; she that is set over the spluttering flame lows. With her hissing she has put down the mortal; becoming lightning, she has thrown off the cloak.

30 Life that breathes now lies still and yet moves fast, rushing but firmly fixed in the midst of the resting places.¹⁸ The life of the dead one wanders as his nature wills. The immortal comes from the same womb as the mortal.

31 I have seen the cowherd who never tires, moving to and fro along the paths. Clothing himself in those that move toward the same centre but spread apart, he rolls on and on inside the worlds.

32 He who made him knows nothing of him.¹⁹ He who saw him – he vanishes from him. Enclosed within the mother’s womb, yet full of progeny, he entered Destruction.

33 The sky is my father; here is the navel that gave me birth. This great earth is my mother, my close kin. The womb for me was between the two bowls²⁰ stretched apart; here the father placed the embryo in the daughter.

34 I ask you about the farthest end of the earth; I ask you about the navel of the universe. I ask you about the semen of the stallion bursting with seed; I ask you about the final abode of Speech.

35 This altar is the farthest end of the earth; this sacrifice is the navel of the universe. This Soma is the semen of the stallion bursting with seed; this Brahmin priest is the final abode of Speech.

36 The seven half-embryos portion out the semen of the world at Visnu’s command. Wise in their thoughts and their heart, themselves surrounded, they surround it on all sides.²¹

37 I do not know just what it is that I am like. I wander about concealed and wrapped in (th)ought. When the first born of Order came to me, I won a share of this Speech.

38 The one who is compelled as his own nature wills goes away and comes back; the immortal came from the same womb as the mortal.²² The two constantly move in opposite directions ; when people perceive the one, they do not perceive the other.

39 The undying syllable of the song is the final abode where all the gods have taken their seat. What can one who does not know this do with the song? Only those who know it sit together here.

40 Be happy eating good fodder, and then we will be happy too.²³ O inviolable cow, eat grass and drink pure water as you graze for ever.

41 The buffalo-cow lowed as she fashioned the flowing waters; she who has a thousand syllables in the final abode became one-footed, two-footed, eight-footed, nine-footed.

42 The quarters of the sky live on the oceans that flow out of her in all directions. The whole universe exists through the undying syllable that flows from her.

43 In the distance I saw the cowdung smoke midway between what is above and what is below. The heroes roasted the dappled bull.²⁴ These were the first ritual laws.

44 The three long-haired ones²⁵ reveal themselves at the right moment. During the year, one of them shaves; one looks upon everything with his powers; of one the onrush is visible, but the form is not.

45 Speech was divided into four parts that the inspired priests know. Three parts, hidden in deep secret, humans do not stir into action; the fourth part of Speech is what men speak.²⁶

46 They call it Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Agni, and it is the heavenly bird that flies. The wise speak of what is One in many ways ; they call it Agni, Yama, Matarisvan.

47 The yellow birds clothed in waters fly up to the sky on the dark path. They have now returned from the home of Order, and at once the earth was drenched with butter.

48 Twelve fellies, one wheel, three naves – who has under stood this? Three hundred and sixty are set on it like poles that do not loosen.

49 Your inexhaustible breast, Sarasvati,²⁷ that flows with the food of life, that you use to nourish all that one could wish for, freely giving treasure and wealth and beautiful gifts – bring that here for us to suck.

50 The gods sacrificed to the sacrifice with the sacrifice. These became the first ritual laws. These great powers went to the dome of heaven where dwell the Sadhyas, the ancient gods.²⁸

51 The same water travels up and down day after day. While the rain-clouds enliven the earth, the flames enliven the sky.²⁹

52 The great heavenly bird with wonderful wings, the beautiful embryo of the waters and the plants, that delights us with rains over flowing – I call to him for help.

NOTES

1. The first brother is the oblation fire with his grey beard of smoke; the second is the southern fire, hungry because it seldom receives the oblation; the third is the domestic fire that is ‘fed’ the butter oblation. Agni is the Lord of All Tribes, and his sons are the priests.

2. For the magic powers of the three naves, cf. the curing of Apala (8.91.7).

3. The newborn sun or fire has bones (the male element) though it is born from the boneless one (the female, who gives soft things – blood, breath, spirit), the earth.

4. The footprints of the gods may be the sacrificial laws, which are ‘woven’ when the gods as poet-priests perform the sacrifice, by weaving their words.

5. The mother of the sun is Dawn, who is pierced by her father as well as the sun’s father, the Sky; recoiling from incest, she nevertheless does what must be done (the

‘Order’) and is praised for this.

6. The calf searches for the mother who has abandoned him, as the mothers of Indra and Vivasvan (another form of the sun) abandon them in Vedic mythology. The three stages of the journey are one-tenth of the thirty-stage journey that the sun traverses every twenty-four hours; or they are the three-day journey of the dead man (cf. 10.14.16).

7. The three mothers and fathers are the three earths and three skies as parents of the sun, here identified with the Absolute. Speech does not inspire every priest, though she is present in them all.

8. The sun is imagined either as supreme in heaven, or as ruling only the lower half, the upper being the abode of Speech.

9. In Vedic mythology, Aditi gives birth to the immortal Adityas in pairs, while she rejects the sun, Vivasvan, born alone (cf. 10.72.8-9). In the ritual, there are twelve paired months and one odd one, the intercalary month which interrupts the sequence and causes the others to ‘change and waver’.

10. The androgyny of the creators appears, on the ritual level, in the fact that the months (a masculine term in Sanskrit) are procreative. The second half of the verse puns upon the father of the sun (the sky) and the father of the poet who competes with and surpasses his own father. Cf. 6.9.2.

11. The dawn cow, between sky (above) and earth (below), has her calf at her heels as she kicks him away; she is alone because she has abandoned him.

12. ‘His’ father refers both to the poet who knows his own father and the one who knows the sun’s father.

13. The rituals of the past become the rituals of the future; the deeds of the gods still remain effective for us now.

14. On the tree of knowledge and immortality, some eat and some cannot.

15. Agni is the herdsman or the cowherd.

16. These deeds are attributed to Indra or the creator in other hymns. The Gayatri has three feet, here identified with the kindling-sticks of fire.

17. Savitar, the divine obstetrician and embodiment of twilight (cf. 2.38, 1.35), is called to assist the Pravargya ritual in giving birth to the sun. The milk hissing in the pot is the dawn cow snuffling at her calf, the sun; the milk that swells in her udder is the milk that boils; the pot sings a chant, and the cow (the milk) throws off her cover (the lid), as the milk boils over.

18. The death and rebirth of the mortal, or of the mortal sun. The resting-places of the sun or fire are sky, earth, and the waters, or just the waters.

19. The sun who disappears from the sky (his father), or the breath of life that disappears from the dead body (of the mortal or the mortal sun).

20. The two bowls, literally wooden bowls for Soma, are sky and earth. Cf. 1.160.1.

21. The seven creators or priests fashion the sun from the seed split by the father when he incestuously embraces his daughter. Or the Adityas fashion the sun from the misformed embryo; while they themselves are still embryos ‘surrounded’ in the womb, they ‘surround’, i.e. form into a ball, the semen.

22. The soul that is reborn according to its nature, or the sun. The immortal soul/sun and the mortal body/dead sun or night are on opposite sides of the earth/mind at any given time.

23. Here and in the next two verses the cow is Speech.

24. Soma (explicitly mentioned in verse 35) is the bull. The final phrase also appears as 10.90.16.

25. Three forms of Agni with flames for hair, or three ecstatic sages (cf. 10.136.1). The former interpretation is supported by the second half of the verse: Fire shaves the earth; the sun watches; the wind’s path is perceived, but the wind itself is invisible. Cf. 10.168.4.

26. This verse closely resembles 10.90.4.

27. Sarasvati as goddess of Speech and as the river in the sky (cf. v. 25) and on earth.

28. This verse appears also as 10.90.16.

29. Rain falls from the sun in the sky in return for flame from the sacrifice on earth.

Wendy Doniger on Horse Sacrifice

Table Of Contents

CREATION
DEATH
THE ELEMENTS OF SACRIFICE
THE HORSE SACRIFICE
GODS OF THE SACRIFICE: AGNI AND SOMA
SOMA
INDRA
GODS OF THE STORM
SOLAR GODS
SKY AND EARTH
VARUNA
RUDRA AND VISNU
REALIA
WOMEN
INCANTATIONS AND SPELLS

THE HORSE SACRIFICE

As the supreme symbol of the victorious Indo-Europeans, the horse looms large in the Rig Veda, and many gods are called horses – Indra, Dadhikra, Surya, Agni, Soma, the Dawn, and others. In addition to its role as signifier, however, the horse also appears as signified in a group of hymns about the sacrifice of the consecrated stallion, a ceremony that was to become the subject of far more detailed and lengthy discussion in the texts of the Brahmanas a few centuries later.

The horse in the Rig Veda is at least three things at once: a real, material creature whose domestication enabled the Indo-Aryans to conquer the Indo-European world; a racehorse that ran in profane and sacred contests; and a precious sacrificial victim. In these three hymns, the horse – in all three of these aspects – is praised, killed, and lamented.

1.163   Hymn to the Horse

The sacrificial horse is identified with the sun and fire; here he is also identified with several other gods, as well as with the earthly racehorse (who is himself a figure with whom many gods are identified).

1 When you whinnied for the first time, as you were born coming forth from the ocean or from the celestial source,¹ with the wings of an eagle and the forelegs of an antelope – that, Swift Runner, was your great and awesome birth.

2 Yama gave him and Trita harnessed him; Indra was the first to mount him, and the Gandharva grasped his reins. You gods² fashioned the horse out of the sun.

3 Swift Runner, you are Yama; you are Aditya; you are Trita, through the hidden design.³ You are like and not like Soma.⁴ They say you have three bonds in the sky.⁵

4 They say you have three bonds in the sky, three in the waters, and three within the ocean.^{6 And to me you appear, Swift Runner, like Varuna, that is said to be your highest birth.}

5 These are the places where they rubbed you down when you were victorious; here are the marks where you put down your hooves. Here I saw your lucky reins, which the Guardians of the Order keep safely.

6 From afar, in my heart I recognized your soul, the bird⁷ f;ying below the sky. I saw your winged head snorting on the dustless paths easy to travel.⁸

7 Here I saw your highest form eager for nourishment in the place of the cow.⁹ As soon as a mortal gets the food that you enjoy, the great devourer of plants awakens him.¹⁰

8 The chariot follows you, Swift Runner; the young man follows, the cow follows, the love of young girls follows. The troops follow your friendship.¹¹ The gods entrusted

virile power to you.

9 His mane is golden;¹² his feet are bronze. He is swift as thought, faster than Indra. The gods have come to eat the oblation of the one who was the rst to mount the swift runner.¹³

10 The celestial coursers, revelling in their strength, fly in a line like wild geese, the ends held back while the middle surges forward, when the horses reach the racecourse of the sky.

11 Your body flies, Swift Runner; your spirit rushes like wind. Your mane,¹² spread in many directions, flickers and jumps about in the forests.¹⁴

12 The racehorse has come to the slaughter, pondering with his heart turned to the gods. The goat, his kin,¹⁵ is led in front; behind come the poets, the singers.

13 The swift runner has come to the highest dwelling-place, to his father and mother. May he go to the gods today and be most welcome, and then ask for the things that the worshipper wishes for.

NOTES

1. A possible reference to the sun born in the ocean and also born from the waters in the sky.

2. The Vasus are a group of gods associated with the sun.

3. Perhaps the magic power of the sacrifice, or the secret power associated with the mysterious Trita, or simply the “Vedic power of secret equivalences.

4. As Agni, he is both likened to and contrasted with Soma through the mechanism of parallel oppositions and the Vedic concept of liquid fire or the fiery liquid; as a sacrificial animal, he is joined with Soma in the ritual dimension.

5. The bonds are the three gods named in the first sentence of this verse.

6. The three bonds are multiples of the bond in. each of three places named: the sky (v. 3, and the ‘highest birth’ in Varuna), the waters (v. 1, and perhaps also v. 5, where the gods bathed the celestial horse), and the ocean (v. 1, and also implicit in the birth from Varuna, god of the ocean).

7. The sun as a bird.

8. The paths that lead to the sun.

9. the cows won by the victorious racehorse ; and as the cattle won in raids on horseback.

10. A mysterious sentence. Agni, who devours plants (in forest fires), awakens man every morning (as the sun); the herbivorous horse also devours plants, and is awakened every morning to be fed. The worshipper who ‘feeds’ the sacrificial fire (or offers

oblations to the sun) is ‘awakened’ when he arrives in heaven. All of these are possible (as the final ‘him’ must be supplied and has no clear referent).

11. A martial procession behind the war-horse; a sacrificial procession behind the consecrated stallion; a triumphant procession behind the racehorse.

12. The mane (literally, the ‘horns’) of the horse as a metaphor for the rays of the sun.

13. ‘The one’ would be Indra, rider of the solar horse according to verse 2, but here it would seem to designate the earthly king, the owner of the earthly horse.

14. Here the rays are scattered by the foliage.

15. Either a scapegoat for the sacrificial horse (cf. 1.162.2-3), or just a companion for the racehorse (as racehorses often have goats, to this day).

1.162   The Sacrifice of the Horse

Strikingly concrete in its detail, this hymn describes the ancient Indian horse sacrifice, beginning with the ceremonial procession of the horse with the scapegoat, leading to the actual slaughter (vv. 1-7). It then dwells upon the material instruments of the sacrifice which are to accompany the horse to heaven.

1 Mitra, Varuna, Aryaman the Active,¹ Indra the ruler of the Rbhus,² and the Maruts³- let them not fail to heed us when we proclaim in the assembly the heroic deeds of the racehorse who was born of the gods.⁴

2 When they lead the firmly grasped offering⁵ in front of the horse that is covered with cloths and heirlooms, the dappled goat goes bleating straight to the dear dwelling of Indra and Pusan.

3 This goat for all the gods is leds forward with the racehorseas the share for Pusan. When they lead forth the welcome offering⁵ with the charger, Tvastr urges him on to great fame.

4 When, as the ritual law ordains, the men circle three times, leading the horse that is to be the oblation on the path to the gods, the goat who is the share for Pusan goes first, announcing the sacrifice to the gods.

5 The Invoker,⁶ the officiating priest, the atoner,⁷ the re-kindler, the holder of the pressing-stones, the reciter, the priest who prays – fill your bellies with this well- prepared, well-sacrificed sacrifice.

6 The hewers of the sacrificial stake and those who carry it, and those who carve the knob ⁸ for the horse’s sacrificial stake, and those who gather together the things⁹ to cook the charger – let their approval encourage us.

7 The horse with his smooth back went forth into the elds of the gods, just when I made my prayer. The inspired sages exult in him. We have made him a welcome companion at the banquet of the gods.

8 The charger’s rope and halter, the reins and bridle on his head, and even the grass that has been brought up to his mouth – let all of that stay with you¹⁰ even among the gods.

9 Whatever of the horse’s flesh the fly has eaten, or whatever stays stuck to the stake or the axe, or to the hands or nails of the slaughterer¹¹ – let all of that stay with you¹⁰ even among the gods.

10 Whatever food remains in his stomach, sending forth gas, or whatever smell there is from his raw flesh¹¹ – let the slaughterers make that well done; let them cook the sacrificial animal until he is perfectly cooked.

11 Whatever runs off your body when it has been placed on the spit and roasted by the fire, let it not lie here in the earth or on the grass, but let it be given to the gods who long for it.

12 Those¹² who see that the racehorse is cooked, who say, ‘It smells good! Take it away!’, and who wait or the doling out of the flesh of the charger – let their approval encourage us.

13 The testing fork for the cauldron that cooks the flesh, the pots for pouring the broth, the cover of the bowls to keep it warm, the hooks, the dishes – all these attend the horse.

14 The place where he walks, where he rests, where he rolls, and the fetters on the horse’s feet, and what he has drunk and the fodder he has eaten – let all of that stay with you¹⁰ even among the gods.

15 Let not the fire that reeks of smoke darken you, nor the red-hot cauldron split into pieces. The gods receive the horse who has been sacrificed, worshipped, consecrated, and sanctified with the cry of ‘Vasat!’¹³

16 The cloth that they spread beneath the horse, the upper covering, the golden trappings on him, the halter and the fetters on his feet – let these things that are his own bind the horse among the gods.

17 If someone riding you has struck you too hard with heel or whip when you shied, I make all these things well again for you with prayer,¹¹ as they do¹⁴ with the oblation’s ladle in sacrifices.

18 The axe cuts through the thirty-four ribs¹⁵ of the race horse who is the companion of the gods. Keep the limbs undamaged and place them in the proper pattern. Cut them apart, calling out piece by piece.¹⁶

19 One is the slaughterer of the horse of Tvastr; two restrain him. This is the rule. As many of your limbs as I set out, according to the rules, so many balls I offer into the fire.¹⁷

20 Let not your dear soul burn you¹⁸ as you go away. Let not the axe do lasting harm to your body. Let no greedy, clumsy slaughterer hack in the wrong place and damage your limbs with his knife.

21 You do not really die through this, nor are you harmed. You go to the gods on paths pleasant to go on. The two bay stallions, the two roan mares¹⁹ are now your chariot mates. The racehorse has been set in the donkey’s yoke.

22 Let this racehorse bring us good cattle and good horses, male children and all- nourishing wealth. Let Aditi make us free from sin.²⁰ Let the horse with our offerings achieve sovereign power for us.

NOTES

1. This may be an epithet of Vayu or Agni, or the name of a distinct god, or an epithet of Aryaman.

2. The Rbhus are the craftsmen of the gods.

3. This may be a list of five gods or of seven, depending upon whether one takes the adjectival terms as epithets or separate names.

4. Sayana says the horse was born from the essential forms of many gods, a common form of mythological creation.

5. This almost certainly refers to the goat, though the commentary suggests that it might be the remains of the burnt offering made the night before.

6. The Invoker is the Hotr priest, often identified with Agni. Cf. 1.1.1.

7. This term may designate the priest who portions out the offerings or the one who performs expiations for ritual errors or personal misdeeds (cf. v. 17). Here, as in verse 1, there may be five or seven terms, depending upon whether one takes the adjectival terms (here the third and seventh) as descriptions or separate titles.

8. A piece of wood attached crosswise at the top of the stake.

9. These utensils would be the pot, the wood, etc.

10. Here the horse is directly addressed.

11. Cf. the hope that the human corpse will be made whole (10.16.6) and properly cooked (10.16.1-2).

12. These are the priests who eat the horse (cf. v. 5).

13. The cry that is made when the offering is presented to the gods. Cf. 10.14.3 for the use of Svaha !, a similar call.

14. The Brahmins who repair the errors committed in the course of the sacrifice.

15. Thirty-four of the horse’s ribs (he has thirty-six) are distributed, one to the sun, one to the moon, five to the planets, and twenty-seven to the constellations.

16. The priest names each part as he cuts it, and declares the divinity to whom it is dedicated.

17. These are probably balls of rice that the wives of the king give to the stallion ; they may also be balls of meat.

18. That is, do not be sad.

19. The two bay stallions are the horses of Indra, the two roan mares the horses of the Maruts, and the donkey belongs to the Asvins.

20. This is both a general wish for expiation and a specific wish to be cleansed of the sin of killing the horse.

10.56   Requiem for a Horse

This hymn is a funerary farewell to a beloved horse. Against this interpretation, later Indian commentarial tradition suggested that the subject of the hymn was the poet’s dead son, called ‘Victorious Racehorse’ (Vajin); and it is worthy of note that the horse is said to travel to heaven, put on a new body, and dwell happily there afterwards, just as the dead man does in another hymn (10.14). But the equine character of the verses is unmistakable. The hymn may refer to a particular ritual, possibly even to the immolation of a sacred horse; verse 3 opens with the exact phrase used at the beginning of the horse sacrifice. It may also be based upon the deification of a great racehorse, as is suggested by the hymn’s recurring use of the metaphor of winning heaven as one wins a race (though here it must be noted that the Rig Veda often refers to other goals – wealth, sons, long life – won as one wins a race).¹ The idea of a hymn to a horse is not in itself un-Vedic; the Rig Veda knows other divine horses, such as Dadhikra, Tarksya, and Etasa. The horses of heaven are obliquely alluded to in verse 4, where they are said to have more powers than the Fathers and to have been given special mental power by the gods before taking on their heavenly bodies; verse 5 may even imply that all living creatures are somehow bound to or encompassed by the powers of these celestial equines, who gallop around a racecourse made of the space between sky and earth.

Versa 1-5a describe the horse’s translation heaven, where he is given a new body, gathering into it the qualities that it had on earth (verse 4). He changes into this body as the sun changes its form (verse 2); the sun is also alluded to as the ‘light beyond’ (verse 1), mediating between the light here ( fire, probably the funeral pyre) and the third light (the light in the world of the dead). The ‘god who finds the light’ (verse 6) may also be the sun; it may, however, be the spirit who leads the horse to the world of the dead, the third light; in general, the term often refers to Agni, Soma, or the Fathers, any of whom would be appropriate here. The final verses speak of the body in more general terms, contrasting the body put on in heaven with the body left on earth in the form of o spring.

1 This is your one light, and there beyond is your other; merge with the third light. By merging with a body, grow lovely, dear to the gods in the highest birthplace.

2 Victorious racehorse, let your body, carrying a body,² bring blessings to us and safety to you. Staying straight,³ so that you may carry the great gods, change your own light

as one does in heaven.

3 You are a victorious racehorse with the power to win victory; go happily to the mares who long for you. Go happily to fame and heaven; go happily to the first orders and truths, go happily to the gods, go happily to your flight.

4 Even the Fathers have no control over their⁴ majesty; the gods have placed the power of understanding in the gods.⁵ They⁴ have gathered together all things that shine, and these have entered their⁴ bodies again.

5 With their great powers they have circled all the middle realm of space, measuring out ancient domains never measured before. All creatures are bound to their bodies.⁶ They shower down their off spring in many ways.

6 By the third action, and in two ways,⁷ the sons have set in place the god ⁸ who finds the light. The fathers have established their own o spring as paternal power, like a thread stretched out among those who are to follow.

7 As if on a ship sailing through high water to all horizons of the earth, crossing over all dangers with ease, Brhaduktha⁹ has through his great power established his own off spring among those who are to follow and those who have come before.

NOTES

1. Cf. especially the racehorses of Dawn, 1.92.7.

2. The image of the horse carrying a rider (a body carrying a body) suggests the re carrying the dead body to heaven and going on (v. 3) to carry the oblation to the gods. Cf. Agni, the horse, as the conveyer, in 1.26.1, 5.2.1 and 10.51.6.

3. Both straight on the path and with a straight (i.e. uncollapsed) back under the weight.

4. ‘They’ are the horses; the shining things enter the horses’ bodies, as the god-inspired powers enter their minds.

5. The gods in heaven give inspiration to the ‘gods’ newly made, the horses who succeed in reaching heaven.

6. This may refer to the heavenly horses of verses 4-5 or imply that each creature is bound to his own body.

7. The third action is the begetting of children, the ‘debt’ each Hindu must pay to the Fathers (the first two debts being Vedic study, paid to the sages, and sacrifice, paid to the gods). The ‘two ways ‘ may refer to sons and fathers, achieving their ends on earth

(by children) and in heaven (by ritual). 8. The sun is here called an Asura, an ancient god.

9. Name of the sage to whom the hymn is attributed.

Wendy Doniger Rig Veda on God of Sacrifice

Table Of Contents

CREATION
DEATH
THE ELEMENTS OF SACRIFICE
THE HORSE SACRIFICE
GODS OF THE SACRIFICE: AGNI AND SOMA
SOMA
INDRA
GODS OF THE STORM
SOLAR GODS
SKY AND EARTH
VARUNA
RUDRA AND VISNU
REALIA
WOMEN
INCANTATIONS AND SPELLS

GODS OF THE SACRIFICE: AGNI AND SOMA

AGNI and Soma are linked in many ways. As fire and liquid, they are complementary oppositions that unite in the Indo-European concept of the fiery liquid, the elixir of immortality (the ambrosia). As ritual elements, they are invoked more often than any other gods of the Rig Veda, as the embodiments of the sacrificial fire and the sacrificial drink. As metaphorical symbols, they are the centre of a complex set of speculations about the nature of the cosmos, taking the form of riddles about something that is lost and then found. The mythologies differ in that the mystery of Agni is the mystery of his birth as well as of his rebirth when he leaves the gods and must be brought back, while the mystery of Soma is the mystery of his descent from heaven. These mythologies join in the image of the sun-bird, a form of Agni (the Indo-European fire-bird), who brings the Soma to earth (cf. 10.123 and 10.177)’

The mysteries are questions posed and answered, for Agni and Soma are the two sources of the inspiration that enabels the Vedic poet to find and understand the meaning of the sacrifice and of his life. They are different sorts of inspiration: Agni is Apollonian, explaining the sacrifice; he represents the cultivated, cooked, cultured aspects of ritual. Soma is Dionysian, explaining the vision of life; he represents the wild, raw, disruptive aspects of ritual. The Vedic sacrifice embraces them both. Agni Agni is the subject of many straightforward hymns about the kindling of and o ering into the re; he is invoked to bring all the gods to the sacrifice (1.1) and to mediate between gods and men (1.26). But several of the hymns to Agni are more enigmatic than paradigmatic. His birth (5.2) is described in purposely elliptic references similar to those used to refer to Agni in the Riddle of the Sacrifice (1.164; cf. also 3.31.1-3). This rst appearance of Agni is then linked to subsequent appearances after he has been lost, occasions when he hides (10.5), usually in the waters (10.51), the place of his birth (2.35), or in the body of the arch-enemy of the gods (10.124). The birth and recovery of Agni are two aspects of a great mystery (4.5) that Agni himself inspires the poet to solve(6-9). 1.1   I Pray to Agni Appropriately placed at the very beginning of the Rig Veda, this hymn invites Agni, the divine priest, to come to the sacrifice. 1 I pray to Agni, the household priest who is the god of the sacrifice, the one who chants and invokes and brings most treasure. 2 Agni earned the prayers of the ancient sages, and of those of the present, too; he will bring the gods here.

3 Through Agni one may win wealth, and growth from day to day, glorious and most abounding in heroic sons.

4 Agni, the sacrificial ritual that you encompass on all sides – only that one goes to the gods.

5 Agni, the priest with the sharp sight of a poet, the true and most brilliant, the god will come with the gods.

6 Whatever good you wish to do for the one who worships you, Agni, through you, O Angiras,¹ that comes true.

7 To you, Agni, who shine upon darkness, we come day after day, bringing our thoughts and homage

8 to you, the king over sacrifices, the shining guardian of the Order, growing in your own house.

9 Be easy for us to reach, like a father to his son. Abide with us, Agni, for our happiness.

NOTES

1. The Angirases were an ancient family of priests, often identified with Vedic gods such as Agni and India.

1.26   Agni and the Gods

^{This hymn emphasizes the close symbiosis between the sacrificer and Agni, on the one hand, and the sacrificer and the gods, on the other. Agni is asked to intercede as a father would sacrifice for his son, implying a cooperation among worshippers as well as between worshippers and gods. When Agni is pleased, the sacrificer has a ‘good fire’, and when the sacrificer has a good fire, the gods have a good fire (i.e. they rejoice in a good sacrifice), and so they become generous. The mortal praises Agni and hopes that he will praise (i.e. speak on behalf of) the mortal in turn, even as the mortal praises the gods and hopes that they will praise (i.e. approve of) him (v. 9).}

1 Now get dressed in your robes,¹ lord of powers and master of the sacrificial food, and offer this sacrifice for us.

2 Young Agni, take your place as our favourite priest with inspirations and shining speech.

3 The father sacrifices for his son, the comrade for his comrade, the favourite friend for his friend.²

4 May Varuna, Mitra and Aryaman, proud of their powers, sit upon our sacred grass, as upon Manu’s.³

5 You who were the first to invoke, rejoice in our friendship and hear only these songs.

6 When we o er sacrifice to this god or that god, in the full line of order, it is to you alone that the oblation is offered.

7 Let him be a beloved lord of tribes for us, a favourite, kindly invoker; let us have a good fire and be beloved.

8 For when the gods have a good fire, they bring us what we wish for. Let us pray with a good fire.

9 So let praises flow back and forth between the two, between us who are mortals and you, the immortal.⁴

10 Agni, young spawn of strength, with all the fires take pleasure in this sacrifice and in this speech.

NOTES

1. When Agni becomes the priest, his robes are both the flames and the prayers.

2. Many gods are asked to behave like friends or fathers ; here, it is also suggested that one person might sacrifice on behalf of another, and Agni is asked to do this on behalf of the worshipper.

3. A reference to the primeval sacrifice offered by Manu, ancestor of mankind.

4. The verse, which is elliptic, implies both that Agni and the worshipper should enjoy a mutuality of praise and that, through that link, the other gods and the worshippers should enjoy such a mutuality.

5.2   The Birth of Agni

The hymn begins with obscure references to unknown myths, the gist of which seems to be that Agni has vanished. The sacrificial fire or the domestic fire has suddenly been extinguished. This crisis is then generalized into a vague danger from which Agni is implored to rescue the worshipper, as well as specific dangers such as emotional conflict between parents and children (centring upon the vanishing mother) and the theological problem of the vanishing or otiose god (identified with Varuna in v. 8). The appearance of Agni in the first place is the occasion for speculation on the mystery of creation ex nihilo, the kindling of the spark of fire out of thin air (cf. 1.164), and the ‘setting fire’ of Agni (vv. 5-6) becomes a metaphor for the release of the worshipper from constricting anguish.

Indian tradition supplies a specific story to account for the vanishing of Agni in the early verses of this hymn.¹ The priest (who also served as a charioteer – even as Agni is the ‘conveyor’ of the oblation) of a certain king quarrelled with him over the murder of a male child. Feeling himself falsely accused, the priest left the kingdom in anger, and with him the heat of all the fires in the kingdom went out.² The priest was finally called back, and on his return he declared that the king’s wife had concealed the heat of the fire. When the priest swore an oath of truth, the fire reappeared and burnt the queen. This story, as

obscure in its own way as the hymn it purports to gloss, and most probably a late afterthought, does at least indicate some ways in which the imagery of the birth of a concealed child and the kindling of an extinguished sacrificial fire are intertwined in the hymn.

1 The young mother secretly keeps the boy tightly swathed and does not give him to the father.³ The people no longer see before them his altered face, hidden by the charioteer.⁴

2 Who is the boy that you are carrying, young woman? The chief queen, not the stepmother, gave him birth, for the embryo grew for many autumns. I saw him born when his mother bore him.⁵

3 I saw him with his golden teeth and pure colour, testing his weapons far from his field, and I gave him the ambrosia that sets one free. What can those who have no Indra, no hymns, do to me?⁶

4 I saw him moving far away from his field, and his fine herd no longer shining brightly.⁷ They could not grasp him, for he had been born; the young women became grey with age.⁸

5 Who are they⁹ who separate my young man from the cows? They have never had a cowherd, not even a stranger.¹⁰ Let those who have seized him set him free. The man of foresight should drive the cattle back to us.

6 The enemy powers¹¹ have hidden among mortals¹² the one who is the king of dwellings,¹³ himself the dwelling-place of men. Let the magic formulas of Atri¹⁴ set him free; let those who revile be themselves reviled.

7 When Sunahsepha was bound for a thousand,¹⁵ you set him free from the stake, for he sacrificed with fervour. In the same way, Agni, set us free from our bonds when you have settled down here, O wise priest of the oblation.

8 For when you grew angry you went away from me; the guardian of the laws¹⁶ told me this. Indra discovered you, for he knows; he taught me, and so I have come, Agni.

9 Agni shines forth with a high light; by his power he makes all things manifest. He overpowers the godless forces of evil magic; he sharpens his two horns to gore¹⁷ the demons.

10 Let Agni’s bellowings reach to heaven as piercing weapons to destroy the demons. His angry glare breaks forth in ecstasy of Soma. The obstacles of the godless cannot hold him back.

11 Inspired with poetry I have fashioned this hymn of praise for you whose very nature is power, as the skilled artist fashions a chariot. If you receive it with pleasure, Agni, let us win waters and sunlight with it.

12 ‘The bull with the powerful neck, increasing in size and strength, will drive together the possessions of the enemy without opposition.’ This is what the immortals said to

Agni. Let him grant shelter to the man who spreads the sacred grass; let him grant shelter to the man who o ers oblation.

NOTES

1. Cf. 10.51 and 10.124.

2. In the same way, all fires die out when Siva is wrongly accused and departs from the Fine Forests.

3. In the sacrificial simile, the lower fire-stick is the mother, that holds back the fire (the child) from the father (the upper stick, or the sacrifice!). On the human or anthropomorphic level, the verse describes a common familial conflict.

4. In terms of the traditional gloss (the tale of the king and the priest), the charioteer who hides the fire is the priest ; as a cosmic metaphor, the charioteer is the sun’s charioteer, or the god Agni himself, and the meaning is that the sacrificial fire is reabsorbed into its celestial form.

5. This verse plays upon the concept of the two mothers of Agni, who is elsewhere explicitly referred to as ‘having two mothers’ (3.31.2). The first is the official queen who bore him; the second is the despised queen or stepmother, the young woman mentioned in v. i, who carries the child away; she is the one whom the priest accuses of concealing the fire.

6. The poet argues that since he has performed the pious act of offering the oblation, and has had a vision of Agni, he is protected. Cf. 8.48.3.

7. The herd is the mass of flames, and the priest is the herder who has left them. Cf. the cow who has left her calf and the herd, 1.164.17.

8. The most likely interpretation of this verse is that ‘they’ are the flames that cannot hold on to the vanishing Agni and therefore become grey ashes.

9. ‘They’ in the first phrase seems to refer to men who take the young man (Agni) away from the cows (the flames, his mothers) ; in the second phrase, ‘they’ are the flames that lack even a foreign priest (the priest in exile).

10. The departed priest.

11. The men who stole the fire, or the demons who threaten the worshipper.

12. Priests, who are the mortal guardians of Agni.

13. Agni, the domestic hearth.

14. A Vedic priest.

15.A reference to the myth in which Sunahsepha was to be sacrificed in place of a thousand cattle but was rescued by a priest (a form of Agni). Cf. the scapegoat for the corpse-(10.16.4) and for the horse (1.162.2-4).

16.Varuna, when angered, abandons his devotee (7.86); he is the otiose god, who betrays Agni (10.124).

17. Agni appears as a bull, in this and the next verse, as well as in v. 12. The demons, human enemies of the Aryans, rival priests, and godless people are all lumped together as suitable victims for the wrath of Agni in vv. 6-10.

2.35   The Child of the Waters (Apam Napat)

The Child of the Waters is often identified with Agni, as the form of fire that appears as the lightning born of the clouds. But he is a deity in his own right, who appears in the Avesta as a spirit who lives deep in the waters, surrounded by females, driving swift horses. As the embodiment of the dialectic conjunction of fire and water, the child of the waters is a symbol central to Vedic and later Hindu cosmology. Sayana remarks that his name designates the grandson rather than the son of the waters (cf. Greek nepos) : the herbs and trees are born from the waters, and Agni is born from the herbs and trees (cf. v. 8). This hymn, the only one dedicated entirely to him, plays upon the simultaneous unity and non-unity of the earthly and celestial forms of Agni and the Child of the Waters.

1 Striving for the victory prize, I have set free my eloquence; let the god of rivers gladly accept my songs. Surely the child of the waters, urging on his swift horses, will adorn my songs,¹ for he enjoys them.

2 We would sing to him this prayer well-fashioned from the heart; surely he will recognize it. With his divine² energy, the child of the waters has created all noble creatures.

3 Some flow together, while others flow toward the sea, but the rivers fill the same hollow cavern.³ The pure waters surrounded this pure, radiant child of the waters.

4 The young women, the waters, flow around the young god, making him shine and gazing solemnly upon him. With his clear, strong flames he shines riches upon us, wearing his garment of butter, blazing without fuel in the waters.

5 Three women, goddesses,⁴ wish to give food ⁵ to the god so that he will not weaken. He has stretched forth in the waters; he sucks the new milk of those who have given birth for the first time.⁶

6 The birth of the horse is here⁷ and in the sun. Guard our patrons from falling prey to malice or injury. When far away in fortresses of unbaked bricks,⁸ hatred and false hoods shall not reach him.

7 In his own house he keeps the cow who yields good milk; he makes his vital force swell as he eats the nourishing food. Gathering strength in the waters, the child of the waters shines forth to give riches to his worshipper.

8 True and inexhaustible, he shines forth in the waters with pure divinity.⁹ Other creatures and plants, his branches, are reborn with their progeny.¹⁰

9 Clothed in lightning, the upright child of the waters has climbed into the lap of the waters as they lie down. The golden-hued young women¹¹ flow around him, bear ing with them his supreme energy.

10 Golden is his form, like gold to look upon; and gold in colour is this child of the waters. Seated away from his golden womb,¹² the givers of gold give him food.

11 His face and the lovely secret name of the child of the waters grow when the young women¹³ kindle him thus. Golden-hued butter is his food.

12 To him, the closest friend among many,¹⁴ we would offer worship with sacrifices, obeisance, and oblations. I rub his back;¹⁵ I bring him shavings; I give him food; I praise him with verses.

13 Being a bull, he engendered that embryo in the females ;¹⁶ being a child, he sucks them, and they lick him. The child of the waters, whose colour never fades, seems to enter the body of another here.¹⁷

14 He shines for ever, with undarkened flames, remaining in this highest place. The young waters, bringing butter as food to their child, themselves enfold him with robes.

15 O Agni, I have given a good dwelling-place to the people ; I have given a good hymn to the generous patron. All this is blessed, that the gods love. Let us speak great words as men of power in the sacrificial gathering.

NOTES

1. Either he will make them beautiful, or he will reward them.

2. As a form of Agni, the child of the waters is an Asura, a high divinity.

3. That is, the ocean.

4. The three mothers of Agni, the waters of the three worlds.

5. Soma or butter.

6. The waters are primaparas or primagravitas, as the child of the waters is their first child; they themselves are first-born from Brahma, says Sayana.

7. Agni is often depicted as a horse, who is in turn identified with the sun; the micro- macrocosmic parallel is enriched by Agni’s simultaneous terrestrial and celestial forms, and those of the waters (‘here’). Moreover, the sun, like the child of the waters, is born in the waters.

8. The sacrificer asks to be protected by Agni, who is safe even when among enemies who do not control fire and so do not fire their bricks, or who (as the sun) is safe from his enemies when he is in his own ‘natural’ citadels not made of baked bricks, i.e. the clouds.

9. Here the Child of the Waters is a god (deva), not an Asura.

10. Other fires on earth are regarded as branches of Agni, who also appears in plants; on another level, Agni causes all creatures and plants to be reborn.

11. The waters of heaven or earth.

12. The construction is loose, and may imply either that it is Agni who is seated away from his golden womb (cf. 10.121.1) or that the sacrificers are seated around him.

13. Here the young women are the ten fingers, not the waters. The fingers kindle the earthly fire, that grows in the waters (the clouds) secretly and then is fed with butter at the sacrifice.

14. Literally, the lowest, that is the most intimate friend of men among the many gods, and therefore enjoying intimate services as described in the rest of this verse.

15. That is, the re-altar. Cf. 1.164.1 for the re-altar as the back of fire.

16. The child of the waters engenders himself. He is father and son, pervading a body that belongs to someone who merely seems to be other. For the use of bull/calf imagery to express this paradox, cf. 7.101, the hymn to Parjanya. The father becomes an embryo, the middle form of Agni, the lightning that sucks the waters in the clouds as if they were cows; then they lick him as a cow licks a calf.

17. That is, on earth. This is an explicit statement of the identity of the Child of the Waters with Agni as the sacrificial fire: the former enters the body of the latter.

10.51   The Gods Coax Agni out of the Waters

This hymn is based upon the myth of the finding of the lost Agni. In this particular episode, it appears that Agni’s three brothers have perished in the service of the gods (mediating, serving as priests, carrying the oblation to the gods, as is the task of the sacred fire); in fear of being destroyed in the same way, Agni fled and hid in the waters, the place of his birth,¹ but the gods found him there again. The myth is thus both a conversation between the gods, asking him to return to them, and a dialogue on the dangers of being born at all, since life involves old age and death. The myth of the finding of the lost Agni is an analogue to the myth of the finding of the stolen Soma,² and is, in fact, a variant of it, for it is the golden liquid of fire that is the basis of the Indo-European myth of Agni and Soma together.

1 [A god:] ‘Great was that membrane,³ and firm, which enveloped you when you entered the waters. One god, O Agni, knower of creatures, saw all your various bodies.’

2 [Agni:] ‘Who saw me? Who among the gods perceived my various bodies?⁴ O Mitra and Varuna, where are all the fuel-sticks of Agni that lead to the gods?’⁵

3 [Varuna:] ‘We searched for you in various places, O Agni, knower of creatures, when you had entered into the waters and the plants. It was Yama⁶ who discovered you with your many-coloured light which shines beyond the distance of ten days’ journey.’

4 [Agni :] ‘ I fled because I feared the role of oblation-giver, so that the gods would not harness me to it, O Varuna. My bodies entered various places; I, Agni, have ceased to consider this task.’⁷

5 [Varuna:] ‘Come here. Man,⁸ who loves the gods, wishes to sacrifice. When you have completed the ritual, Agni, you dwell in darkness.⁹ Make smooth the paths which lead to the gods; carry the offerings with a good heart’

6 [Agni:] ‘The brothers of Agni long ago ran back and forth on this task like a chariot- horse¹⁰ upon a road. Fearing this, Varuna, I went far away. I fled like a buffalo before the bowstring of a hunter.’

7 [The gods:] ‘We will make your life-span free of old age, O Agni, knower of creatures, so that you will not be harmed when you have been harnessed. Then you will carry the portion of the offering to the gods with a willing heart, O well-born one.’

8 [Agni:] ‘Give me alone the pre-sacrifices and the post-sacrifices, the nourishing part of the offering; and the clarified butter out of the waters and the Man out of the plants.¹¹ And let the life-span of Agni be long, O gods.’

9 [The gods:] ‘The pre-sacrifices and the post-sacrifices will be for you alone, the nourishing parts of the offering. This whole sacrifice will be for you, Agni; the four quarters of the sky will bow to you.’

NOTES

1. For Agni as child of the waters, see 2.35.

2. Cf. notes on 4.26-7.

3. The word denotes the covering of the embryo in the womb. Agni is the embryo of the waters and so returns to the womb when he hides. The gods point out that even there he was not safe from them.

4. Agni has many forms in different places (lightning, sacrificial fire, the human body, etc.). Cf. 10.16, 6.9, and 1.164.1.

5. Mitra and Varuna lead the gods in the search. Agni argues that he cannot be seen in the water, because there are no fuel-sticks there to kindle him. These are the sticks which bring Agni to the gods through the oblation, and the sticks by which he carries the oblation from man to the gods.

6. In one retelling of the myth the gods bribe Agni by allowing him to change places with Yama, sending Yama to the world of the dead and bringing Agni to the world of the gods.

7. That is, he flatly refuses to become their invoker or priest of the oblation (Hot?).

8. Here, as elsewhere, the word (Manu) may designate either mankind in general or Manu the eponymous ancestor of mankind. I think the former is the primary meaning,

but since Manu is the brother of Yama who has just been mentioned, there may be resonances with the latter meaning too.

9. That is, you may rest after serving us. Cf. 6.9.1 and 6.9.7, and 10.124.1.

10. Agni is often called a horse, and the expression ‘harnessing’him to the task of priest (vv. 4 and 7) thus takes on more specific relevance.

11. The clarified butter is the essence of the waters, the most precious of fluids, and also something that is placed in the waters (in ritual and in cosmogonies, the golden seed – another form of Agni himself- in the waters). The Man of the plants may be the personified god who is the best of the plants (Soma) or the corpse that is given to Agni in the funeral (cf. 10.16) or that is dispersed among the plants (10.16.3). Finally, Man is the ‘best’ of the plants (SB 7.2.4.26) as butter is the best of the fluids.

10.124   Indra Lures Agni from Vrtra

Indra speaks on behalf of the gods to lure Agni back when he has fled (cf. 10.51). Agni is hiding inside a father (perhaps Indra’s father; cf. 4.18) who is called an Asura, an enemy of the gods though not yet properly a demon; this Asura is eventually identified with the demon Vrtra. Thus the hymn combines the myth of finding Agni (10.51) with the myth of killing Vrtra (1.32). Varuna and Soma are also said to have been with the Asura and to abandon him when Agni is persuaded to do so. Indra invites Agni to return (v. 1), and Agni accepts (v. 2); Varuna and Soma follow (vv. 3-4), and are further encouraged by Indra’s promises (vv. 6-7). The poet then praises Indra for winning these allies (vv. 8-9).

1 [Indra:] ‘Agni! Come to this sacrifice of ours, that has five roads, three layers, and seven threads.¹ Be our oblation-bearer and go before us. For far too long you have lain in darkness.’

2 [Agni:] ‘Secretly going away from the non-god,² being a god and seeing ahead I go to immortality. Unkindly I desert him who was kind to me, as I go from my own friends to a foreign tribe.’

3 [Varuna:] ‘When I see the guest of the other branch,³ I measure out the many forms of the Law. I give a friendly warning to the Asura father: I am going from the place where there is no sacrifice to the portion that has the sacrifice.’

4 [Soma:] ‘I have spent many years within him. Now I choose Indra and desert the father. Agni, Soma, Varuna -they fall away. The power of kingship has turned around; therefore I have come to help.’⁴

5 [Indra:] ‘Varuna, these Asuras have lost their magic powers,⁵ since you love me. O king who separates false from true, come and rule my kingdom.

6 ‘This was the sunlight, this the blessing, this the light and the broad middle realm of space.⁶ Come out, Soma, and let us two kill Vrtra. With the oblation we sacrifice to you who are the oblation.’⁷

7 The poet through his vision fixed his form in the sky; Varuna let the waters flow out without using force. Like his 8 wives, the shining rivers make him comfortable; they swirl his colour⁹ along their current.

8 They¹⁰ follow his supreme Indra-power;¹¹ he dwells in those who rejoice in their own nature. Choosing him as all the people choose a king, they have deserted Vrtra whom they loathe.

9 They say that the yoke-mate of those full of loathing¹² is a swan who glides in friendship with the divine waters. The poets through their meditation have seen Indra dancing to the Anustubh.

NOTES

1. For the number mysticism of the sacrifice, cf. 1.164.

2. That is the Asura, Vrtra. Cf. 10.51.7, where Agni demands immortality.

3. That is, when Varuna sees that Agni is the guest of the Asuras (his ‘own friends’; cf.

2.35.2) rather than the gods (the ‘foreign tribe’), and that therefore the Asuras have the sacrifice, Varuna measures out (i.e. formulates and creates) the ritual laws for the gods.

4. That is, realizing that the gods are getting the upper hand again, Soma the king returns to assist at their sacrifice.

5. The power of illusion particularly associated with Asuras such as Vrtra; cf. 1.32.4.

6. Apparently Indra is telling Varuna and Soma that all the powers of light that belong to the gods are once again theirs, now that the dark power of the Asuras has been overcome.

7. Cf. sacrificing the sacrifice to the sacrifice, 10.90.16.

8. Indra’s wives, the waters that he frees when he kills Vrtra.

9. Indra, the poet, places his stamp upon his dominion again, both in form and in

colour. His colour (varna) is both the sign that typifies his species (gods in contrast with Asuras) and, perhaps, the bright colour of the gods and Aryans in contrast with the darkness of the Asuras and Däsas.

10. The waters.

11. Indra’s power consists in the forces of his nature (kingship, fertility, sacrifice, etc.) ; he rejoices in these and in people who, in their turn, rejoice in their own particular powers and nature.

12. That is, those who loathe Vrtra have as their helper (yoke mate) Indra, here visualized by the poet as a swan dancing in the waters. Those who loathe Vrtra are primarily those who desert him (Agni, Soma, Varuna), as well as the waters whom Indra has released and the worshippers who rejoice in Indra’s victory.

4.5   The Mystery of Agni

This obscure hymn may be an indirect description of an oral contest about Agni. The poet or poets tantalize us with oblique references to a secret revealed by Agni and revealing Agni; this secret is alluded to with expressions such as ‘the gift’ (v. 2), ‘the inner meaning’ (v. 3), ‘this thought so high and deep’ (v. 6), ‘the vision that illuminates’ (v. 7), ‘this speech of mine’ (v. 8). The opponents of the poet appear in various pejorative forms (‘those who break the commandments’, ‘those without Order or truth’, ‘those whose speech is empty and contrary’, who ‘follow a false path’, etc.). There is also an extended pun upon the word padam, which designates a footprint (v. 3), a ‘deep place’ (hell? -in v. 5), perhaps with a double meaning of ‘this riddle’ (i.e. ‘this mysterious verse’), the place of the sun-bird (v. 8), the Order (v. 9) and the cow (v. 10), and a path (v. 12). These meanings are linked: to know the verse (padam) is to know how to follow the footprint (padam) along the path (padam) to the sacred place (padam) of the sun-bird, who is the symbol of the Order and is in turn symbolized by the cow.

The actual content of the secret concerns the identity of Agni with a bull, with the substance inside the leather-skin of food (a metaphor for an udder or the clouds or the earth or the human stomach, the latter being the site, in later Hinduism, of the digestive fire ‘Of-all-men’), with the calf of the dappled cow Prsni (the earth) or of the cows of dawn, and with the disc of the sun or the sun-bird, the round ‘face of the gods’. Agni’s parents are sky and earth, or the fire-sticks (v. 10); in the latter case, he hungers for the offering of butter as a calf hungers for milk, the ‘precious substance’ in the udder of Prsni; as the sun, the calf of the dawn, Agni is followed by her. Thus the solar, sacrificial, and bovine images intertwine. The gift that Agni gives the poet is the ‘clarifying vision’ that sees that Agni is always present in all of these forms. To find the secret is to find the cows, or their milk, or to find the hidden sun – to fond Agni, the sacred fore.

1 How shall we with one accord give homage to the benevolent Agni Of-all-men? Great light, by his great and full growth he has propped up the sky as a buttress props a rampart.

2 Do not reproach the self-ruled god who gave this gift to me, for I am a simple mortal, while he is the clever immortal, the insightful, most manly and impetuous Agni Of-all- men.

3 The strong bull with sharp horns and seed a thousand-fold has a mighty and double tone.¹ As one reveals the hidden footprint of a cow, Agni has declared to me the inner meaning.

4 Let the generous Agni, sharp-toothed with white-hot flame, devour those who break the dear, firm commandments of Varuna and the watchful Mitra.²

5 Wilful as women without brothers, wicked as wives who deceive their husbands, those who are evil, without Order or truth, have engendered this deep place.³

6 O Agni, who makes things clear, who am I, that upon me when I have broken no commandments you have boldly placed like a heavy burden this thought so high and deep, this fresh question with seven meanings for the offering?

7 Let our vision that clarifies through sacrificial power reach him who is the same everywhere; the precious substance of the dappled cow is in the leather-skin of food, and the disc of the sun has mounted to the head of the earth-cow.

8 What of this speech of mine should I proclaim? They murmur about the secret hidden in the depths: when they have opened the mystery of the cows of dawn, like a door upon a food, he⁴ protects the beloved head of the earth-cow, the place of the bird.

9 This is that great face of the great gods, that the cow of dawn followed as it went in front. I found it shining in the place of the Order, moving swiftly, swiftly.

10 As he blazed beside his parents with his open mouth, he thought of the precious hidden substance of the dappled cow. In the farthest place of the mother, facing the cow, the tongue of the bull, of the flame, stretches forth.

11 When questioned I speak reverently of the Order, if I may, trusting in you who know all creatures. You rule over all this, over all the riches in heaven and all the riches on earth.

12 What is ours of this, what riches, what treasure? Tell us, for you understand, you who know all creatures.⁵ Hidden is the farthest end of our road, where we have gone as those who fail follow a false path.

13 What are the limits? What are the rules? What is the goal? We wish to go there as racehorses speed towards the victory prize. When will the Dawns, goddesses and wives of immortality, spread over us their light with the colour of the sun?

14 Those whose speech is empty and contrary, insipid and petty, who leave one unsatisfied, what can they say here, Agni? Unarmed, let them fall defeated.

15 The face of the bull, of this deity kindled for beauty, shone forth in the house. Clothed in white, beautiful in form and rich in gifts, he glowed like a home full of riches.

NOTES

1. The bellow of the bull is likened to the two tones of the Vedic hymn (the high and middle pitch).

2. Varuna and Mitra are the keepers of the moral law. Cf. 5.85.7.

3. A possible reference to Hell (cf. 7.104.3). But here the meaning is more positive (as both ‘deep’ and ‘place’ are positive terms in this and in other hymns of the Rig Veda), and the phrase more likely refers to the world of light under the earth, where the sun moves from West to East at night.

4. Agni.

5. Jatavedas. Cf. 10.16.

6.9   Agni and the Young Poet

A young poet, doubting his powers in the ritual competition (v. 2), seeks inspiration from Agni himself in solving the riddle of Agni, as usual a riddle of origins. The first and last verses (and v. 5) speak of the cosmic Agni, the sun that disappears at night (v. 1) or when he flees¹ or is simply not present before light is created (v. 7). He appears among mortals as the ritual fire (v. 4) and as the power of inspiration (5b-d), that teaches the poet how to surpass his own father (vv. 2-3); this inspiration transfigures the poet, but also makes him even more aware of the impossibility of describing Agni (v.6).

1 The dark day and the bright day, the two realms of space,² turn by their own wisdom. As Agni Of-all-men was born, like a king he drove back the darkness with light.

2 I do not know how to stretch the thread, nor weave the cloth, nor what they³ weave as they enter the contest. Whose son could speak here such words that he would be above and his father below?

3 He⁴ is the one who knows how to stretch the thread and weave the cloth; he will speak the right words. He who understands this⁵ is the guardian of immortality; though he moves below another, he sees above him.

4 This is the first priest of the oblation;⁶ look at him. This is the immortal light among mortals. This is the one who was born and firmly fixed,⁷ the immortal growing great in his body.

5 He is light firmly fixed for everyone to see,⁸ the thought swiftest among all who fly. All the gods, with one mind and one will, rightly come to the one source of thought.⁹

6 My ears fly open, my eye opens, as does this light that is fixed in my heart. My mind flies up, straining into the distance. What shall I say? What shall I think?

7 All the gods bowed to you in fear, Agni, when you hid yourself in darkness.¹⁰ May Agni Of-all-men save us with his help; may the immortal save us with his help.

NOTES

1. Cf. 10.51 and 10.124.

2. Night and day, the dark and light sides of the sun, become part of the dark and light halves of the universe.

3. The other sages in the contest. For the image of weaving the sacrifice, cf. 10.130.1-2.

4. Agni himself, or the inspired poet.

5. The thread that stretches from earth to heaven, as well as the thread of inspiration that enables him to weave his poem; a form of the axis mundi as well as the spiritual

link between gods and men.

6. The Hotr of whom Agni is the archetype. The invoker of the gods.

7. The ritual fire established in the tradition; also the sun fixed in the sky.

8. The sun, who sees all, is seen by all, and allows everyone to see.

9. Agni as the source of inspiration, or the man who knows Agni.

10. Cf. 10.51.5 and 10.124.1.

10.5   The Hidden Agni

Riddles and speculations about the nature of Agni make use of various tropes and metaphors familiar from other hymns, not only the Agni hymns but the cosmological and cosmogonic corpus and the meditations on the sacrifice. The image of the hidden and concealed Agni predominates and links the other images.

1. The one sea with many births,¹ support of treasures, he sees out of our heart. He clings to the udder in the lap of the two who are concealed;² the path of the bird is hidden in the midst of the fountain.

2 The buffaloes bursting with seed, veiling themselves have united with the mares in the same stable.³ The poets hide the path of the Truth;⁴ they keep secret their highest names.

3 The two who are made of Truth yet made of magic have come together; they have made a child and given birth to him and made him grow. He is the navel of all that moves and is firm, who with his mind stretches the thread of the poet.

4 For the waves of truth, the refreshing foods, have always clung to the well-born child for reward.⁵ Wearing a cloak, the two world-halves made him grow on butter and food and honey.

5 Full of desire, the wise one brought the seven red sisters out of the honey to see.⁶ Born long ago, he was yoked in mid-air; seeking a robe to hide him, he found Püsan’s.⁷

6 The poets fashioned seven boundaries; he who was trapped⁸ went to only one of them. The pillar of life’s vigour, he stands in the nest of the Highest, among the supports at the end of the paths.

7 Non-existence and existence are in the highest heaven, in the lap of Aditi and the birth of Daksa.⁹ Agni is for us the first-born of Truth in the ancient vigour of life: the bull – and also the cow.¹⁰

NOTES

1. A double meaning: Agni himself is born many times, and he is responsible for many births.

2. Heaven and earth are the parents of Agni, but so are the two fire-sticks.

3. The flames of Agni are often feminine, but they are also called male buffaloes, bulls, or stallions full of seed; their ‘stable’ (literally, their nest, as in v. 6) is the wood in which they rest together with the females of the breed, also the flames. Or the male and female animals may be the male and female sticks.

4. Rta, often translated as ‘Order’ (cf. 1.164.11, 1.164.37, 1.164.47), in this late hymn, seems better translated as ‘truth’.

5. The magic nourishment is part of the realm of Order or truth, embodied in Agni; these powers nurse him for pay, for the reward of maintaining their own prosperity and that of the world.

6. The seven sisters are the mares who are Agni’s flames, here said to break out of the sweet butter poured on the fire. They come forth both to see and to be seen, a double meaning often attributed to the sun.

7. Symbolism relating to the birth of the sun, as well as to the concealment of Agni. 8. Literally, suffering from the feeling of being unable to move freely, a word often translated as ‘in anguish’ but here perhaps more literally hemmed in.

9. For existence and non-existence, cf. 10.129.1; for Daksa and Aditi, cf. 10.72.4.

10. The androgyny of Agni, already present in a veiled form in verse 2, here becomes explicit. For Parjanya as the bull and cow, see 5.83 and 7.101.