Vedic Metre in its Historical Development c17.s2.20

c17.s2.20

(i) The worship of Mitra and Varuṇa reaches its highest developement in the Vasiṣṭha hymns to these deities, which attain an elevation of moral conception which has often recalled to their readers the Hebrew psalms. Of the worship of Varuṇa alone as a supreme deity there is hardly any trace in the Rigveda, but there are hymns addressed to him in which he is appealed to to release his worshipper from the burden of his sins, and apparently from the penalty of dropsy. Several hymns are addressed to Savitar singly, two to Mitra, and one to Bhaga. Aditi, the mother of the Ādityāḥ, is probably, as Professor A. Macdonell suggests, an abstraction from the qualities of the group. In the Vasiṣṭha hymns the daily course of the sun is the chief wonder-deed of Mitra and Varuṇa: and from this time on the worship of Sūrya has a growing importance.