The Arctic Home in the Vedas c12.27

c12.27

These are not, however, the only points, in which the Storm theory fails to explain the legend of Indra and Vṛitra. It has been pointed out above that Vṛitra was killed in distant regions, in which ghastly darkness reigned, and which abounded in waters; while in X, 73, 7, Indra by killing Namuchi, alias Vṛitra, is said to have cleared the gates of the Devayâna path, evidently meaning that Vṛitra was killed at the gates of the path leading to the region of the gods. Even in the Avesta, the fight between Apaosha and Tishtrya is said to have taken place in the sea of Vouru-Kasha, and Tishtrya is described as moving along the path made by Mazda after his fight with Apaosha. Vṛitra’s abode is similarly described as ‘hidden’ and ‘enveloped by waters’ at the bottom of *rajas* (I, 52, 6). None of these conditions is satisfied by making the storm-cloud, the scene of the battle between Indra and Vṛitra; for a cloud cannot be said to be the ocean of waters, nor can it be described as lying in a distant (*parâvat*) region, or at the threshold of the Devayâna or the path of the gods. In the Rig-Veda *parâvat* is usually contrasted with *arvâvat*, and it means a distant region on the other side, as contrasted with the region on this or the nearer side. The Devayâna is similarly constrasted with the Pitṛiyâna, and means the northern celestial hemisphere. The clouds over the head of the observer cannot be said to be either in the distant region, or at the gate of the Devayâna; nor can we speak of them as enveloped by sun-less darkness. It is, therefore, highly improbable that the rain-clouds could have been the scene of battle between Indra and Vṛitra. It was the sea on the other side, the dark ocean as contrasted with the bright ocean (*shukram arṇaḥ*) which the sun mounts in the morning, where the battle was fought according to the passages referred to above; and the description is appropriate only in the case of the nether world, the celestial hemisphere that lies underneath, and not in the case of clouds moving in the sky above. I do not mean to say that Indra may not have been the god of rain or thunderstorm, but as Vṛitrahan, or the killer of Vṛitra, it is impossible to identify him with the god of rain, if the description of the fight found in the Vedic passages is not to be ignored or set aside.