The History of Indian Literature c7.12

c7.12

And while the claims of the written records of Indian literature to a high antiquity—its beginnings may perhaps be traced back even to the time when the Indo-Aryans still dwelt together with the Persa-Aryans—are thus indisputably proved by external, geographical testimony, the internal evidence in the same direction which may be gathered from their contents, is no less conclusive. In the songs of the Rik, the robust spirit of the people gives expression to the feeling of its relation to nature, with a spontaneous freshness and simplicity; the powers of nature are worshipped as superior beings, and their kindly aid besought within their several spheres. Beginning with this nature-worship, which everywhere recognises only the individual phenomena of nature, and these in the first instance as superhuman, we trace in Indian literature the progress of the Hindú people through almost all the phases of religious development through which the human mind generally has passed. The individual phenomena of nature, which at first impress the imagination as being superhuman, are gradually classified within their different spheres; and a certain unity is discovered among them. Thus we arrive at a number of divine beings, each exercising supreme sway within its particular province, whose influence is in course of time further extended to the corresponding events of human life, while at the same time they are endowed with human attributes and organs. The number—already considerable—of these natural deities, these regents of the powers of nature, is further increased by the addition of abstractions, taken from ethical relations; and to these as to the other deities divine powers, personal existence, and activity are ascribed. Into this multitude of divine figures, the spirit of inquiry seeks at a later stage to introduce order, by classifying and co-ordinating them according to their principal bearings. The principle followed in this distribution is, like the conception of the deities themselves, entirely borrowed from the contemplation of nature. We have the gods who act in the heavens, in the air, upon the earth; and of these the sun, the wind, and fire are recognised as the main representatives and rulers respectively. These three gradually obtain precedence over all the other gods, who are only looked upon as their creatures and servants. Strengthened by these classifications, speculation presses on and seeks to establish the relative position of these three deities, and to arrive at unity for the supreme Being. This is accomplished either speculatively, by actually assuming such a supreme and purely absolute Being, viz., "Brahman" (neut.), to whom these three in their turn stand in the relation of creatures, of servants only; or arbitrarily, according as one or other of the three is worshipped as the supreme god. The sun-god seems in the first instance to have been promoted to this honour; the Persa-Aryans at all events retained this standpoint, of course extending it still further; and in the older parts of the Bráhmaṇas also—to which rather than to the Saṃhitás the Avesta is related in respect of age and contents—we find the sun-god here and there exalted far above the other deities (*prasavitá devánám*). We also find ample traces of this in the forms of worship, which so often preserve relics of antiquity.⁵ Nay, as "Brahman" (masc.), he has in theory retained this position, down even to the latest times, although in a very colourless manner. His colleagues, the air and fire gods, in consequence of their much more direct and sensible influence, by degrees obtained complete possession of the supreme power, though constantly in conflict with each other. Their worship has passed through a long series of different phases, and it is evidently the same which Megasthenes found in Hindustán,∗ and which at the time of the Periplus had penetrated, though in a form already very corrupt, as far as the southernmost point of the Dekhan.