Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

A History of Indian Literature v1.c8: Section I. The Veda or the Vedic Literature

A History of Indian Literature v1.c8

Language
English

Contents

Section I. The Veda or the Vedic Literature

What Is the Veda?

v1.c8.s1.1

As the oldest Indian, and, at the same time, the oldest Indo-European literary monument, a prominent place in the history of world literature is due to the Veda. This is the case too when we remember that throughout at least 3,000 years millions of Hindus have looked on the word of the Veda as the word of God, and that the Veda has given them their standard of thought and feeling. As the Veda, because of its antiquity, stands at the head of Indian literature, no one who has not gained an insight into the Vedic literature can understand the spiritual life and the culture of the Indians. Also Buddhism, whose birth-place is India, will remain for ever incomprehensible to him who does not know the Veda. For the teaching of Buddha is in the same relation to the Veda, as the New Testament is to the Old Testament. No one can understand the new belief without having become acquainted with the old one taught by the Veda.

v1.c8.s1.2

What then, is the Veda?

v1.c8.s1.3

The word "Veda" means "knowledge," then "the knowledge par excellence," *i.e.* "the sacred, the religious knowledge." It does not mean *one* single literary work, as for instance the word "Koran," nor a complete collection of a certain number of books, compiled at some particular time, as the word "Bible" (the "book par excellence"), or as the word "*Tipiṭaka*," the "Bible" of the Buddhists, but a whole great literature, which arose in the course of many centuries, and through centuries has been handed down from generation to generation by verbal transmission, till finally it was declared by a younger generation—but even then at some prehistoric period—to be "sacred knowledge," "divine revelation," as much on account of its great age, as on account of its contents. It is here not a matter of a "Canon" which might have been fixed at some council; the belief in the "sacredness" of this literature arose, as it were, spontaneously, and was seldom seriously disputed.

v1.c8.s1.4

However, what is now called "Veda" or "Vedic literature" consists of three different classes of literary works; and to each of these three classes belongs a greater or a smaller number of separate works, of which some have been preserved, but also many lost.

v1.c8.s1.5

I. Saṁhitās, *i.e.* "Collections," namely collections of hymns, prayers, incantations, benedictions, sacrificial formulas and litanies.

v1.c8.s1.6

II. Brāhmaṇas, voluminous prose texts, which contain theological matter, especially observations on sacrifice and the practical or mystical significance of the separate sacrificial rites and ceremonies.

v1.c8.s1.7

III. Āraṇyakas ("forest texts") and Upaniṣads ("secret doctrines") which are partly included in the Brāhmaṇas themselves, or attached to them, but partly are also reckoned as independent works. They contain the meditations of forest-hermits and ascetics on God, the world, and mankind, and there is contained in them a good deal of the oldest Indian philosophy.

v1.c8.s1.8

There must once have existed a fairly large number of Saṁhitās, which originated in different schools of priests and singers, and which continued to be handed down in the same. However, many of these "collections" were nothing but slightly diverging recensions—Śākhās, "branches," as the Indians say—of one and the same Saṁhitā. Four Saṁhitās, however, are in existence, which differ clearly from each other, and which have been preserved in one or more recensions. These are:—

v1.c8.s1.9

1. The Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā, the collection of the Ṛgveda. "Ṛgveda" is "the Veda or the knowledge of the songs of praise" (ṛc, plur. ṛcas).

v1.c8.s1.10

2. The Atharvaveda-Saṃhitā, the collection of the Atharva-veda, *i.e.* "of the knowledge of the magic formulas" (atharvan).

v1.c8.s1.11

3. The Sāmaveda-Saṃhitā, the collection of the Sāma-veda, *i.e.* "of the knowledge of the melodies" (sāman).

v1.c8.s1.12

4. The Yajurveda-Saṃhitā, the collection of the Yajurveda, *i.e.* "of the knowledge of the sacrificial formulas" (yajus, plur. yajūṃṣi) of which there are two rather strongly diverging texts, namely:—

v1.c8.s1.13

(*a*) The Saṃhitā of the Black Yajurveda, which has been preserved in several recensions, of which the most important are the Taittirīya-Saṃhitā and the Maitrāyaṇī-Saṃhitā; and

v1.c8.s1.14

(*b*) the Saṃhitā of the White Yajur-veda, which has been preserved in the Vājasaneyi-Saṃhitā.

v1.c8.s1.15

On account of these four different Saṃhitās the Indians distinguish between four different Vedas—and therefore one often speaks of the "Vedas" in the plural—namely, Ṛgveda, Atharvaveda, Sāmaveda, and (Black and White) Yajurveda. Every work that belongs to the class of the Brāhmaṇas, of the Āraṇyakas, or of the Upaniṣads, is joined to one of the enumerated Saṃhitās, and "belongs," as we say, to one of the four Vedas. There are, therefore, not only Saṃhitās, but also Brāhmaṇas, Āraṇyakas and Upaniṣads of the Ṛgveda, as well as of the Atharvaveda, of the Sāmaveda, and of the Yajurveda. Thus, for example, the Aitareya-Brāhmaṇa belongs to the Ṛgveda, the Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa to the White Yajurveda, and the Chāndogya-Upaniṣad to the Sāmaveda, and so on.

v1.c8.s1.16

Every work which belongs to one of the three above-mentioned classes, and to one of the four Vedas, must be designated as "Vedic," and the whole Vedic literature is thus presented to us as a long succession of works of religious content—collections of songs, prayer-books, theological and theosophical treatises—which belong to different successive periods of time, but which represent a unity, in so far as they all together form the foundation for the Brahmanical religious system, and have the same significance for Brahmanism as the Old Testament has for Judaism or the New Testament for Christianity. As Jews and Christians look on their "Holy Scripture," so the Brahmanic Indians look on their Veda, in its whole extent, as divine revelation. But it is significant that to the expression "Holy Scripture" there corresponds in the case of the Indians the expression "Śruti," "hearing," because the revealed texts were not written and read, but only spoken and *heard*. The whole history of Indian philosophy bears witness that not only the ancient hymns of the Ṛgveda were looked upon as "breathed out" by the God Brahman, and only "visioned" by the ancient seers, but that also every word in the Upaniṣads, the latest productions of the Vedic literature, was looked upon as indisputable wisdom emanating from the God Brahman himself. However much the different systems of Indian philosophy may vary, yet they are nearly all agreed in considering the Veda as revealed, and in appealing to the Veda, especially the Upaniṣads—although great freedom and arbitrariness prevail in regard to the explanation of these texts, and every philosopher gleans from them just what he wishes to. Most significant it is, that even the Buddhists, who deny the authority of the Veda, yet concede that it was originally given or "created" by God Brahman: only, they add, it has been falsified by the Brahmans, and therefore contains so many errors.

v1.c8.s1.17

The expression "Veda" is justified only for this literature which is regarded as revealed. However, there is another class of works, which has the closest connection with the Vedic literature, but yet cannot be said to belong to the Veda. These are the so-called Kalpasūtras (sometimes also called briefly "Sūtras") or manuals on ritual, which are composed in a peculiar, aphoristic prose style. These include:

v1.c8.s1.18

1. The Śrautasūtras, which contain the rules for the performance of the great sacrifices, which often lasted many days, at which many sacred fires had to burn and a great number of priests had to be employed.

v1.c8.s1.19

2. The Gṛhyasūtras, which contain directions for the simple ceremonies and sacrificial acts of daily life (at birth, marriage, death, and so on).

v1.c8.s1.20

3. The Dharmasūtras, books of instruction on spiritual and secular law—the oldest law-books of the Indians.

v1.c8.s1.21

Like Brāhmaṇas, Āraṇyakas and Upaniṣads, these works, too, are connected with one of the four Vedas; and there are Śrauta, Gṛhya, and Dharmasūtras which belong to the Ṛgveda, others which belong to the Sāmaveda, to the Yajurveda, or the Atharvaveda. As a matter of fact, they originated in certain Vedic schools which set themselves the task of the study of a certain Veda. Yet all these books of instruction are regarded as human work, and no longer as divine revelation; they do not belong to the Veda, but to the "Vedāṅgas," the "limbs," *i.e.* "the auxiliary sciences of the Veda."

v1.c8.s1.22

These Vedāṅgas include, besides the works on ritual, also a number of works on phonetics, grammar, etymology, metrics and astronomy. We shall have to speak of these too at the end of the section.

v1.c8.s1.23

After this general survey of the Vedic literature and the literature connected with it, we turn to the discussion of the most important works belonging to the Veda, above all, of the Saṁhitās.

The Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā

v1.c8.s2.1

Indisputably the oldest and most important of all the works of Vedic literature, is the Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā, usually called simply the "Ṛgveda." Of the different recensions of this Saṃhitā, which once existed, only a single one has come down to us. In the text handed down to us, this ¹) consisted of a collection of 1,028 hymns (Sūktas), which are divided into ten books (Maṇḍalas, "circles").²)

v1.c8.s2.2

That this collection of hymns is the oldest, or at least contains the oldest Indian literature which we possess, is proved indisputably by the *language* of the hymns.³) But the language proves also that the collection is not a single work, but consists of older and later elements. As in the Hebrew Book of Psalms, so here also, songs which had been composed at widely separated periods of time, were united at some time in a collection, and ascribed to famous personages of prehistoric times, preferably to the earliest ancestors of those families in which the songs in question were handed down. The majority of the oldest hymns are to be found in Books II to VII, which are usually called the "Family Books," because each is ascribed by tradition to a particular family of singers. The names of the singers or Ṛṣis (*i.e.* "seers, prophets") who, as the Indians say, visioned these hymns, are mentioned, partly in the Brāhmaṇas, partly in separate lists of authors (Anukramaṇīs) connected with the Vedāṅga literature. They are: Gṛtsamada, Viśvāmitra, Vāmadeva, Atri, Bharadvāja

v1.c8.s2.3

¹): It is the recension of the Śākalaka-School. Regarding editions of the text, see above, pp. 20f. ²): Besides this there is also a purely *external* division, which takes into consideration only the size, namely into eight Aṣṭakas or "eighths," each of which is divided into eight Adhyāyas or "readings" which in their turn are again divided into smaller vargas or "sections," usually of five verses each. ³): See J. Wackernagel, "Altindische Grammatik" I, pp. xiii ff. on the language of the Ṛgveda.

v1.c8.s2.4

and Vasiṣṭha. These and their descendants were regarded by the Indians as Ṛṣis or "seers"—we should say "authors"—of the hymns of Maṇḍalas II to VII. Book VIII contains hymns, which are ascribed to the singer race of the Kaṇvas and that of the Aṅgiras. But the Anukramaṇīs give us also the names of the Ṛṣis or "authors" of every single hymn of the remaining books (I, IX, X), and it is noteworthy that there are also women's names to be found amongst them. Unfortunately all these lists of names have practically no value at all, and in reality the authors of the Vedic hymns are quite unknown to us. For, as it has long since been proved,¹ the tradition which mentions Gṛtsamada, Viśvāmitra, and so on, *and* certain of their descendants, as the Ṛṣis of the hymns, disagrees with the statements of the hymns themselves. In the latter, *only* descendants of those ancient Ṛṣis are mentioned as authors of the hymns; the Ṛṣis, however, Gṛtsamada, Viśvāmitra, Vasiṣṭha, and whatever they may all be called—their names are well-known in the whole of Indian literature as the heroes of countless myths and legends—are already in the hymns of the Ṛgveda the *seers of a long-past prehistoric time*, and are only called the *fathers* of the singer families in which the songs were handed down. Book IX gains a character of unity through the fact that it contains exclusively hymns which glorify the drink of Soma, and are dedicated to the god Soma. Soma is the name of a plant, out of which an intoxicating juice was pressed, which already in the Indo-Iranian time was regarded as a drink pleasing to the gods, and therefore plays a prominent part at the sacrifices of the Indians as well as of the ancient Iranians, who called it Haôma. In ancient Indian mythology, however, the Soma drink is identified with the drink of immortality of the gods, and the seat of this divine drink is the moon, the golden-gleaming "drop"¹ in the sky. Therefore in Book IX of the Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā Soma is celebrated not only as the sacrificial drink dear to the gods, but also as the moon, the king of the sky. As the Soma-cult extends back into the Indo-Iranian period, we can also assume a fairly high age for the songs of Book IX, which are very closely connected with Soma sacrifice. The latest parts of our collection of hymns, however, are to be found in Books I to X, which are composed of very diversified elements.² Yet that does not mean that there are not some very old hymns which have been preserved in these books, while, on the other hand, some later hymns are also scattered in the "Family Books." Altogether, the question as to which hymns are "earlier" and which "later" is not easy to decide: for the language on which this decision chiefly rests, not only varies according to the age of the hymns, but also according to their origin and purpose, according to whether they arose more in connection with the priestly cult or with the popular religion.

v1.c8.s2.5

¹ *Oldenberg*, "Ueber die Liedverfasser des Ṛgveda" in ZDMG, Vol. 42, pp. 199 ff. Already previously *A. Ludwig*, "Der Ṛgveda," Vol. III, pp. xiii and 100 ff.

v1.c8.s2.6

¹ Sanskrit "Indu" means "drop" and "moon." It is to the credit of A. Hillebrandt to have shown in his "Vedische Mythologie" (Breslau 1891 ff.) that already in the Ṛgveda, Soma did not mean only the plant, but also the moon. In the whole of the later literature Soma is the moon.

v1.c8.s2.7

² See A. *Bergaigne*, J. A. 1886-7, on the arrangement of the hymns in Books II-VII, and *A. Barth*, RHR 19, 1889, 134 ff. = Oeuvres II, 8 ff. on those in Books I, VIII-X. See also *Bloomfield*, JAOS, 31, 1910, pp. 49 ff., for criteria for distinguishing between earlier and later hymns in the Ṛgveda.

v1.c8.s2.8

An incantation, for example, can differ by its language from a song in praise of Soma or Indra, but it need not on that account be later.³

v1.c8.s2.9

³ See M. *Bloomfield*, "On the Relative Chronology of the Vedic Hymns" (JAOS, 2₁ 900, pp. 42-4)).

v1.c8.s2.10

The so-called Khilas, which are found in a few manuscripts, represent, on the whole, a later stratum of Ṛgvedic hymn poetry. The word Khila means "supplement," and this name in itself indicates that they are texts which were collected and added to the Saṃhitā only after the latter had already been concluded. This does not exclude the possibility that *some* of these Khilas are of no less antiquity than the hymns of the Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā, but for some reason unknown to us were not included in the collection. The eleven Vālakhilya hymns, which in all manuscripts are found at the end of Book VIII, without being included in it, are probably of this kind. Of comparatively high antiquity are probably also the eleven Suparṇa hymns, as well as the Praiṣasūktāni and the prose·Nividas, small collections of sacrificial litanies.¹

v1.c8.s2.11

¹ The Khilas have been published by I. *Scheftelowitz*, "Die Apokryphen des Ṛgveda" (Indische Forschungen, 1), Breslau 1906. See also Scheftelowitz, ZDMG 73, 1919, 30 ff. ; 74, 1920, 192 ff. ; 75, 1921, 37 ff. ; ZTT, 1, 1922, 50 ff. ; 58 ff. *Oldenberg*, "Die Hymnen des Ṛgveda," I, Berlin, 1888, 504 ff., and GGA, 1907, 210 ff. ; A. B. *Keith*, JRAS, 1907, 224 ff. The Khila Śivasaṃkalpa (edited, translated and explained by Scheftelowitz, ZDMG, 75, 1921, 201 ff.), is a regular Upaniṣad, the first part of which (1-13) is old, the rest late sectarian.

v1.c8.s2.12

However, the question as to what we are to understand by "earlier" or by "later" hymns, can only be treated by us at the end of this section, where we shall have to discuss the question of the age of the Veda in general. It must here suffice that the general view of the great antiquity of the Ṛgveda, even of the "later" parts of it, is fully justified by the fact that, as Alfred Ludwig says:² "The Ṛgveda pre-supposes nothing of that which we know in Indian literature, while, on the other hand, the whole of Indian literature and the whole of Indian life pre-suppose the Veda."

v1.c8.s2.13

² Der Rigveda, III, p. 183. Cf. also *ibid*, p. 3. "The claim to the highest age is proved not only internally by the contents as well as the linguistic form, but externally by the fact that the Veda formed the basis of literature, of the spiritual and religious life, and in the Veda again the poetical pieces are the basis of the rest, but are not based on *anything themselves*."

v1.c8.s2.14

Next to the language, however, the great age of the Vedic hymns is proved chiefly by the metres. For on the one hand, the Vedic metres are separated from those of classical Sanskrit poetry by a gulf, as in Vedic poetry there are numerous metres of which there is no trace to be found in the later poetry, while on the other hand numerous metres in classical Sanskrit poetry have no prototype in the Veda. (Again, some metres of the Vedic poetry do indeed re-appear in the later poetry, but with a much more strongly marked rhythm than in the Ṛgveda.)

v1.c8.s2.15

In the oldest Indian metre only the number of syllables is fixed, while the quantity of syllables is only partially determined. The Vedic verses are composed of lines of 8, 11 or 12, more rarely of 5 syllables. These lines, called Pādas,1) are the units in ancient Indian metrics, and only the four (or five) last syllables are fixed with regard to the rhythm, the last syllable, however, being again a syllaba anceps. The regular form of the Pāda of eight syllables is thus :

v1.c8.s2.16

1) "Pāda" means "foot" but also "fourth part." The latter meaning is to be supposed here, because as a rule four Pādas make one line. The word "pāda" has nothing to do with the "foot" of Greek prosody. A breaking-up into such small units as the Greek "feet" is impossible in the ancient Indian metre.

v1.c8.s2.17

⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏕ ⏑ ⏕ ⏓

v1.c8.s2.18

Three such lines form the Gāyatrī and four such lines form the verse called the Anuṣṭubh. In the older poetry the Anuṣṭubh stands far behind the Gāyatrī in popularity. Later it is the reverse; the Anuṣṭubh becomes the usual verse, and out of it is developed the śloka, the proper metre of epic poetry. Metres of rarer occurrence are the Paṅkti, consisting of five lines of eight syllables, and the Mahāpaṅkti, consisting of six such Pādas.

v1.c8.s2.19

The line of eleven syllables has a caesura after the fourth or fifth syllable, and its regular form is as follows :

v1.c8.s2.20

⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ || ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏕ ⏑ ⏕ ⏓
or ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ || ⏑ ⏑ ⏕ ⏑ ⏕ ⏓

v1.c8.s2.21

Four such Pādas form the verse called Triṣṭubh.

v1.c8.s2.22

The line of twelve syllables differs from that of eleven only in so far as it has one more syllable, for the rest the two metres are formed exactly alike. The regular form of the Pāda of twelve syllables is thus:

v1.c8.s2.23

⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ || ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ — ⏑ — ⏑ ⏓
or ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ ⏑ || ⏑ ⏑ — ⏑ — ⏑ ⏓

v1.c8.s2.24

Four such Pādas of twelve syllables give a verse which is called Jagatī.

v1.c8.s2.25

The regular form of the line of five syllables, four or eight of which together give the verse called Dvipadā-Virāj is thus:

v1.c8.s2.26

⏑ — ⏑ — ⏑

v1.c8.s2.27

By combinations of different kinds of Pādas into *one* verse, a number of more elaborate metres are formed, as the *Uṣṇih* and *Bṛhatī* verses, composed of lines of eight or twelve syllables.

v1.c8.s2.28

How much, in old Indian metres, everything depends on the number of syllables,¹ is proved by the oft-recurring speculations, in the Brāhmaṇas and Upaniṣads, on the mystical significance of the metres, where the mysticism of numbers comes into play, when, for example, it is said, with strange logic: "The words bhūmi (earth), antarikṣa (atmosphere), and dyu (sky) form eight syllables. A Gāyatrī-Pāda consists of eight syllables. Therefore he who knows the Gāyatrī gains the three worlds."² But that the metres play such a highly important part in the mysticism of ritual, that considered as divine beings, they even receive sacrifices,³ that mythology concern itself with them, especially with the Gāyatrī, which in the form of a bird fetches the Soma from heaven, that they are *created* like other beings by Prajāpati,¹—all this indicates the great age of these metres which were thought to have originated in times immemorial. Thus the age of the metres is also a proof of the age of the hymns themselves.²

v1.c8.s2.29

¹ See Weber, Ind. Stud. 8, 178 f., and H. Weller ZTT, 1, 1922, 115 ff.

v1.c8.s2.30

² Bṛhadāraṇyaka-Upaniṣad V, 15. Dyu is to be pronounced as "diu."

v1.c8.s2.31

³ Vāsiṣṭha-Dharmasūtra, XIII, 3 and elsewhere.

v1.c8.s2.32

¹ See for instance, Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa VIII, 1, 1-2. How great a rôle the metres play in the symbolism and mysticism of the ritual, may be seen from numerous passages in the liturgical Saṃhitās and in the Brāhmaṇas: See A. Weber, Ind. Stud. 8, pp. 8 ff., 28 ff.

v1.c8.s2.33

² See E. V. Arnold, "Vedic Metre," Cambridge 1905, and A. B. Keith and Arnold, JRAS, 1906, 484 ff., 716 ff., 997 ff., on the metre of the Ṛgveda as a criterion of its age.

v1.c8.s2.34

The best idea, however, of the great age of these hymns is vouchsafed us by a glance at the geographical and cultural conditions of the time of which they tell us. There we see above all, that the Aryan Indians, at the time when the hymns of the Ṛgveda arose, had not nearly as yet spread over the whole of India. We find them still domiciled in the river-land of the Indus (Sindhu), the present Punjab.³ From the West, over the passes of the Hindukush, Aryan tribes had penetrated into "the land of the five rivers," and in the songs of the Ṛgveda we still hear of the battles which the Aryans⁴ had to fight with the Dasyu, or the "black skin", as the swarthy aboriginal inhabitants were called. Only slowly amidst continuous fighting against the hated "non-Aryans" (anārya)—the Dasyus or Dāsas, who know no gods, no laws, and no sacrifices—do they press forward towards the East up to the Ganges. It is significant that this river, without which we can hardly imagine the India of all later periods, and which up to the present day plays such a prominent part in the poetry as well as in the popular religion of the Indians, is hardly mentioned in the Ṛgveda. Heine's lyric:—

v1.c8.s2.35

³ According to E. W. Hopkins (the Punjab and the Ṛgveda, JAOS., 19, 1898, 19-28) the habitations of the Aryan Indians at the time when the majority of the hymns were composed, should be sought in the neighbourhood of Amballa, between the rivers Sarasoutī and Ghuggar. The rivers of the Punjab are praised in the famous "Praise of the Rivers" (nadīstuti), Ṛv. X, 75. Cf. A. Stein, JRAS. 1917, 91 ff. Hertel has not yet convinced me that the oldest parts of the Ṛgveda were composed in Iran and not in India (Indo-german. Forschungen, 41, 1923, p. 188).

v1.c8.s2.36

⁴ Ssk. ārya = Avestic airya = Old Pers. ariya, "the faithful ones," "the people of the same race." Herodotus (VII, 62) says that the Medes called themselves Ἄριοι. Thus "Aryan" is the common designation of Indians and Iranians. On the close relationship between the language of the Veda with the old Iranian, see above, p. 41.

v1.c8.s2.37

“There are sweet smells and lights by the Ganges,
And giant trees stand there,
And beautiful silent figures
Are kneeling by lotus flowers,”

v1.c8.s2.38

so suggestive of people and scenes from the period of Kālidāsa, does not in the least fit into the times of the Ṛgveda. Even the lotus-flower, which in a manner belongs to the essentials of later Indian poetry, is not yet a subject for metaphors among the Vedic singers. Altogether the animal and plant worlds in the Ṛgveda are essentially different from those of later periods. The Indian fig-tree (Nyagrodha, Ficus indica) is missing in the Ṛgveda. The most dreaded beast of prey of the India of to-day, the tiger, is not yet mentioned in the hymns—his home is Bengal, into which the Aryan Indians at that time had not yet penetrated. Rice—later the chief product of agriculture and the staple food of the Indians—is still quite unknown to the Ṛgveda. Only barley is planted, and at the time of the hymns agriculture as yet played only a small part. The chief source of income was cattle-rearing, and the chief cattle was the bullock. The horse also was greatly valued and, harnessed before the chariot, bore the warrior to the field, and, at the popular chariot-races, gained praise and glory for the victor. Again and again in the songs and invocations to the gods, the prayer for cattle and horses occurs. Also the strife amongst the hostile aboriginal inhabitants turns on the possession of cattle. Therefore, too, the old word for “war” or “battle” is originally “desire for cattle” (gaviṣṭi). In the most extravagant expressions cows and bullocks ¹ are praised as the most precious possessions. The lowing of cows hastening to the calves is looked on by the ancient Indian as the sweetest music. "The singers are shouting to the god Indra," says a poet, "as mother cows low to the calf." Gods are readily compared with bullocks, goddesses with cows. The milk of the cow was not only one of the chief articles of food, but milk and butter formed an essential part of the sacrifices to the gods. The milk was by preference consumed warm as it came from the cow, and Vedic poets marvel at the miracle that the "raw" cow gives cooked milk. As the German nursery rhyme has it:—

v1.c8.s2.39

¹ It is quite similar among the Dinkas and Kaffirs in Africa, whose present form of economics must be fairly in agreement with that of the Vedic Aryans.

v1.c8.s2.40

"How can it be, O tell me now,
The milk is white, but red the cow,"

v1.c8.s2.41

so a Vedic singer praises the god Indra on account of the miracle that he has put the shining white milk into the red or black cows. However, the high esteem in which cattle were held proved no obstacle to the slaughtering of cows, and especially of bullocks, at the sacrifices, and to the eating of their flesh. An absolute prohibition of cow-killing did not exist in the oldest times, although the word "aghnyā," "she who is not to be killed" for "cow" indicates that cows were killed only under exceptional circumstances.² Also the skin of the oxen was used. The tanner worked it up into leather bottles, strings of bows and straps. There were also already different kinds of industries. There was above all the wood worker—at once carpenter, carriage-builder, and cabinet-maker—who made especially the chariot. There were metal-workers, smiths, who used a bird's wings as bellows. Shipping was still in its first beginnings. A canoe provided with oars, probably consisting only of a hollowed-out treetrunk, served for the navigation of the rivers. Although the sea was known to the Vedic Indians, it is, to say the least, highly doubtful¹ whether there was yet an extensive maritime trade. However, it is certain that there were traders, and that an extensive trade was carried on, in which oxen and gold ornaments took the place of money. Besides oxen and horses, the Vedic singers implore the gods chiefly for gold, which they hope to receive as gifts from the rich sacrificers.

v1.c8.s2.42

² See A. A. Macdonell and A. B. Keith, "Vedic Index of Names and Subjects," London 1912, II, 145 ff.

v1.c8.s2.43

¹ It is certainly not a mere accident, that in the songs of the Ṛgveda countless similes and metaphors are drawn from *cattle-rearing*, while only seldom a simile refers to *shipping*. Contrast with this Homer's wealth of figures of speech which refer to shipping.

v1.c8.s2.44

But while we hear in the Ṛgveda of cattle-rearing and agriculture, of trade and industry, as well as of deeds of war and of sacrifices, there is not yet to be found in the hymns that caste-division, which imparts a peculiar stamp to the whole of the social life of the Indians of later times, and which, up to the present day, has remained the curse of India. Only in one single hymn, evidently late, are the four castes—Brāhmaṇa, Kṣatriya, Vaiśya and Śūdra—mentioned. Certainly there were warriors and priests, but of an exclusive warriorcaste there is in the Ṛgveda as little mention as of one or several lower castes of farmers, cattle-traders, merchants, artisans, and labourers. As in later times, so indeed already in the Ṛgveda, it was the custom that, at the king's side there stood a house-priest (Purohita) who offered the sacrifices for him. But we still hear often enough—even in the later Vedic period—of sacrifices and ceremonies, which the pater-familias performs alone without priestly aid. The wife takes part in these sacrifices; indeed, it is reckoned as absolutely essential, that the husband and wife together perform the sacred ceremonies. This participation of the wife in the sacrifices proves at all events that the position of woman in the oldest period of the Ṛgveda was not yet so low as later, when the law-books absolutely *forbid* women to sacrifice, and to repeat sacred texts. In the Ṛgveda (VIII, 31) we read of the married couple (dampatī—"householder and house-wife") who "with minds in harmony press the Soma, rinse and mix it with milk" and offer adoration to the gods. Manu, however, declares in his law-book, that it is displeasing to the gods when women sacrifice (IV, 206), and that women who offer the fire-sacrifice (Agnihotra) sink into hell (XI, 37). When we still hear in the Upaniṣads, that women also took an active share in the disputations of the philosophers, we must not wonder that in the hymns of the Ṛgveda women could without restriction—at feasts, dances, and such like—show themselves publicly. It is by no means necessary, as some scholars do, to think of courtesans, when it is said that beautiful women flock to the festival gathering. It is not to be denied, however, that already at the time of the Ṛgveda, many solitary, unprotected women—"brotherless maidens" as a poet calls them—gave themselves up to prostitution; but Pischel and Geldner,¹ in spite of all the trouble which they have taken to prove it, have not succeeded in proving that at that time already there existed a "grand system of courtesans" as in the time of Buddha in Vesali, or at the time of Perikles in Athens.

v1.c8.s2.45

¹ Vedische Studien, I, p. xxv.

v1.c8.s2.46

However, we must not form too exalted an idea of the moral conditions in ancient India, and not picture these to ourselves in such an idyllic manner, as certainly Max Müller has at times done. We hear in the hymns of the Ṛgveda of incest, seduction, conjugal unfaithfulness, the procuring of abortion, as also of deception, theft and robbery. All this, however, proves nothing against the antiquity of the Ṛgveda. Modern ethnology knows nothing of "unspoiled children of nature" any more than it regards all primitive peoples as rough savages or cannibal monsters. The ethnologist knows that a step-ladder of endless gradations of the most widely differing cultural conditions leads from the primitive peoples to the half-civilised peoples, and right up to the civilised nations. (We need not, therefore, imagine the people of the Ṛgveda either as an innocent shepherd people, or as a horde of rough savages, nor, on the other hand as a people of ultra-refined culture.) The picture of culture which is unfolded in these songs, and which Heinrich Zimmer in his still valuable book "Altindisches Leben"¹ has drawn for us in so masterly a manner, shows us the Aryan Indians as an active, joyful and warlike people, of simple, and still partly savage habits. The Vedic singers implore the gods for help against the enemy, for victory in battle, for glory and rich booty; they pray for wealth, heaps of gold and countless herds of cattle, for rain for their fields, for the blessing of children, and long life. As yet we do not find in the songs of the Ṛgveda that effeminate, ascetic and pessimistic trait of the Indian character with which we shall meet again and again in later Indian literature.

v1.c8.s2.47

¹ Berlin 1879.

v1.c8.s2.48

Now there have been scholars, who considered the hymns of the Ṛgveda to be so enormously old, that they thought to see in them not so much Indian as Aryan or Indo-European mental life; they held, that the epoch of these hymns was still so near to the Indo-European "pre-historic time," that in them we are still dealing rather with "Aryans" than with actual Indians. On the other hand, other scholars have shown that the Ṛgveda is above all a production of the *Indian* mind, and that for its explanation no other principles must be followed than for any other text of Indian literature. This is one of the many points on which the interpreters of the Ṛgveda diverge rather widely.²)

v1.c8.s2.49

² See Barth, Oeuvres II, 237 ff.; H. Oldenberg, Vedaforschung, Stuttgart, 1905; Winternitz, WZKM, 19, 1905, 419 ff.

v1.c8.s2.50

We must here remember the important fact that the Ṛgveda is as yet by no means fully explained. There are, indeed, a large number of hymns, the explanation of which is as certain as that of any other Indian text. But on the other hand, there are many hymns and very many verses and isolated passages of the Ṛgveda whose right meaning is still in the highest degree doubtful. This is also of great importance for the just appreciation of these old writings. The outsider who takes a translation of the Ṛgveda in his hand often wonders that so much in these hymns is unpoetical, indeed unintelligible and senseless. But the reason is frequently only that the translators do not content themselves with translating that which is intelligible, but that they think they *must* translate *everything*, even that which has up till now not been rightly interpreted.

v1.c8.s2.51

However it is not entirely our fault, that we as yet do not rightly understand the Ṛgveda, and that a *complete* translation of it *must* of necessity contain much that is incorrect. The reason lies in the great age of these hymns which *to the Indians themselves*, already in very early times, had become unintelligible. Within the Vedic literature we find already some verses of the Ṛgveda misunderstood and wrongly interpreted. Already in early times Indian scholars busied themselves with the interpretation of the Ṛgveda. So-called Nighaṇṭus or "Glossaries," collections of rare and obscure words which occur in the hymns, were prepared. The first commentator of the Ṛgveda, whose work is preserved to us, was Yāska, who on the basis of the Nighaṇṭus, explains a great number of Vedic verses in his work Nirukta (*i.e.* "Etymology"). This Yāska, who doubtless is older than Pāṇini,¹ already quotes no less than seventeen predecessors, whose opinions frequently contradict each other. Indeed, one of the scholars quoted by Yāska declares outright that the whole Veda-exegesis is worth nothing, as the hymns are obscure, senseless, and contradictory to each other—to which Yāska, however, observes that it is not the fault of the beam if the blind man does not see it. Yāska himself, in the explanation of difficult words, often relies on the etymology (which of course does not fulfil the scientific requirements of modern philology) and frequently gives two or more different interpretations of one and the same word. It follows from this, that already in Yāska's time the sense of many words and passages of the Ṛgveda was no longer established by an uninterrupted tradition. Of the work of the many successors whom Yāska has had, there is nothing preserved to us, any more than of that of his predecessors. Only from the 14th century after the birth of Christ do we possess a comprehensive commentary, which explains the Ṛgveda word by word. This is the famous commentary of Sāyaṇa. Some of the older European interpreters of the Ṛgveda—thus the English scholar H. H. Wilson, who has published a complete English translation of the Ṛgveda, which entirely follows the Indian commentary—depended entirely upon Sāyaṇa's commentary, taking it for granted that the latter rested on reliable tradition. On the other hand, other Veda investigators did not trouble themselves at all about the native interpretation. They denied that a commentator, who lived more than two thousand years after the composition of the book explained by him, could know anything which we Europeans, with our philological criticism and rendered invaluable services to the clearing-up of many obscure passages of the Ṛgveda. They have also clung most firmly—certainly not without exaggeration—to the principle that the Ṛgveda must, above all, be interpreted as a production of the *Indian* mind, to the right understanding of which the Indian literature of later periods provides the best key.

v1.c8.s2.52

¹ The great age of the Nirukta is proved by its language, which is more archaic than that of the remaining non-Vedic Sanskrit literature. s. *Bhandarkar*, JBRAS 16, 1885. 265 f. *Lakshman Sarup*, "The Nighaṇṭu and the Nirukta the oldest Indian Treatise on Etymology, Philosophy and Semantics," Introduction, Oxford 1920, p. 54, merely reflects the universal opinion (without offering any new proofs) that Yāska lived between 700 and 500 B.C. Yāska was acquainted with all the Vedic Saṃhitās and the most important Brāhmaṇas, including the latest Gopatha-Brāhmaṇa, the Prātiśākhyas and a few of the Upaniṣads; s. Sarup, *loc. cit.*, pp. 54 f., and P.D. Gune, in Bhandarkar Com. Vol , pp. 43 ff. Yāska already considered the Veda as revealed; but even in his time there were men who doubted the sanctity of the Veda (s. Sarup, *loc. cit.*, pp. 71 ff.). Satyavrata Sāmasrami in an appendix to his edition of the Nirukta has an interesting treatise in Sanskrit on the age of Yāska (about 1900 B.C. !) and the purpose of the Nirukta s. *Barth*, RHR. 27, 1893, 184 ff., = Oeuvres II, 94 ff. On Yāska, s. also *Liebich*, "Zur Einführung in die indische einheim. Sprachwiss, II, 22 ff. N.F, Vol. XI, No. 5, and Vol. XIII, No. 3, 1909 and 1912 : *Geldner*, “Der Ṛgveda in Auswahl ” I. Glossar, II Kommentar, Stuttgart 1907-1909, and ZDMG 71, 1917, 315 ff. M. Bloomfield, JAOS 27, 1906, 72 ff. : E. W. Fay, *ibid*, 403 ff. : A. B. Keith, JRAS 1910, 921 ff.

v1.c8.s2.53

Added to all this is yet another much-debated question, which is of no little importance for the interpretation of the Vedic hymns, namely the question whether these hymns arose independently of all sacrificial ritual as the naive expressions of a pious faith in the gods, as the outpouring of the hearts of divinely inspired singers, or whether they were, in a workmanlike manner, composed by priests, merely with the intention of using them for certain sacrifices and ceremonies.

v1.c8.s2.54

But how differently these songs may be judged according to the line of interpretation taken by a scholar may be shown by contrasting the opinions of two eminent scholars. In his beautiful book, which is still worth reading, “Der Ṛgveda, die älteste Litteratur der Inder,”¹ Ad. Kaegi says of the hymns of the Ṛgveda: “The great majority of the songs are invocations and glorifications of the deities addressed at the time; their key-note is throughout a simple outpouring of the heart, a prayer to the Eternal Ones, an invitation to accept favourably the piously dedicated gift…… To that which a god placed in his soul and caused him to feel: to the impulse of his heart the singer wishes to give eloquent expression.” He admits that also portions of inferior quality are to be found in the collection, “but there is in them all a fresh breath of vigorous primeval poetry. Whoever takes the trouble to transfer himself to the religious and moral thought and action, the poetry and the working of a people and age, in which the first spiritual development of our own race is placed before our eyes at its best, will feel himself attracted in various ways by many of these songs, here through the childlike simplicity, there through the freshness or delicacy of feeling and in other parts by the boldness of metaphor, by the flight of the imagination." Now let us hear what H. Oldenberg, the ingenious and judicious expert on Indian literature, says about these songs in his " Religion des Veda." ¹ He sees already in this " oldest document of Indian literature and religion " "the clear trace of an ever-increasing intellectual enervation." He speaks of the "sacrificial songs and litanies, with which the priests of the Vedic Aryans on a temple-less place of sacrifice, at the sacrificial fires strewn around with grass, invoked their gods—barbarian priests—the barbarian gods, who with horses and chariots came driving through the sky and air in order to feast on the sacrificial cake, butter, and meat, and to imbibe, with the intoxicating soma juice, courage and divine strength. The singers of the Ṛgveda, in a manner inherited of old, composing for the great and pompous .... Soma-sacrifice, do not want to tell of the god whom they are honouring, but they want to praise this god.... So they heap upon him all the glorifying epithets which are at the disposal of the grossly flattering garrulousness of an imagination which loves the bright and the garish." "Such poetry," Oldenberg thinks, "could have arisen only in the exclusive circles of the priestly sacrificial experts."

v1.c8.s2.55

¹ Second edition, Leipzig, 1881. An English translation (The Rig-Veda, the Oldest Literature of the Indians) with additions, by R. *Arrowsmith*, appeared 1886.

v1.c8.s2.56

¹ Berlin 1894, p. 3.

v1.c8.s2.57

To me both these opinions seem exaggerated, and the truth, in my opinion, here as in all the debateable questions regarding the interpretation of the Ṛgveda, lies midway. Let us remember that the hymn-collection of the Ṛgveda is composed of earlier and later portions. Just as there are hymns in the Saṃhitā, which belong to different periods of time, so also in contents the hymns are of greatly varying value and of different origin. There is no doubt that a great number of these hymns arose independently of all sacrificial ritual, and that in them the breath of genuine primeval religious poetry is felt.¹ Even if many of these hymns were used later on for sacrificial purposes, that does not in the least prove that they were originally written for this purpose. On the other hand it is equally certain that very many portions of the Ṛgveda-Saṃhitā were from the first intended for nothing but sacrificial songs and litanies, and were glued together in a rather workmanlike fashion by priestly singers. It is also certainly exaggerated when W. D. Whitney² once said: "The Vedas appear rather like an Indo-European than an Indian record." But just as certainly is it an exaggeration when Pischel and Geldner (with H. H. Wilson) state that the Indians at the time of the Ṛgveda, had already attained a degree of culture, which was little different from that which Alexander the Great found in existence at the time of his invasion of India.³

v1.c8.s2.58

¹ Enthusiasm should not, however, be allowed to obscure calm criticism, as is the case with *H. Brunnhofer*, who (in his essay "Ueber den Geist der indischen Lyrik," Leipzig 1882) makes the author of one of the later philosophical hymns of the Ṛgveda "A prince of poets towering up out of the mists of primitive times" (p. 15) and is carried away into saying that "the Veda is like the lark's morning trill, of humanity awakening to the consciousness of its greatness" (p. 41). That the Veda certainly is not!

v1.c8.s2.59

² Language and its Study, London 1876, p. 227.

v1.c8.s2.60

³ Vedische Studien, I, pp. xxii, xxvi.

v1.c8.s2.61

Although the gulf which divides the hymns of the Ṛgveda from the rest of Indian literature may perhaps not be so wide as many older investigators have supposed, a gulf still exists.⁴ This is proved by the language, by the cultural conditions indicated above, and most particularly by the stage of religious development, which we meet with in the hymns. So much is certain, that, whatever the poetical value of the songs of the Ṛgveda may be, there exists no more important source for the investigation of the earliest stages in the development of Indian religion, no more important literary source for the investigation of the mythology of the Indo-European peoples, indeed, of peoples in general, than these songs of the Ṛgveda.

v1.c8.s2.62

⁴ See also *A. Hillebrandt*, "Vedische Mythologie," II, 8.

v1.c8.s2.63.1

To say it in a word: what renders these hymns so valuable for us is that we see before us in them a mythology in the making.¹) We see gods, as it were, arising before our eyes. Many of the hymns are not addressed to a sun-god, nor to a moon-god, nor to a fire-god, nor to a god of the heavens, nor to storm-gods and water-deities, nor to a goddess of the dawn and an earth-goddess, but the shining sun itself, the gleaming moon in the nocturnal sky, the fire blazing on the hearth or on the altar or even the lightning shooting forth from the cloud, the bright sky of day, or the starry sky of night, the roaring storms, the flowing waters of clouds and of rivers, the glowing dawn and the spread-out fruitful earth—all these natural phenomena are, as such, glorified, worshipped, and invoked. Only gradually is accomplished in the songs of the Ṛgveda itself, the transformation of these natural phenomena into mythological figures, into gods and goddesses such as Sūrya (Sun), Soma (Moon), Agni (Fire), Dyaus (Sky), Maruts (Storms), Vāyu (Wind), Āpas (Waters), Uṣas (Dawn), and Pṛthivī (Earth), whose names still indubitably indicate what they originally were. So the songs of the Ṛgveda prove indisputably that the most prominent figures of mythology have proceeded from personifications of the most striking natural phenomena.

v1.c8.s2.63.2

Mythological investigation has succeeded, also in the cases of the deities whose names are no longer so transparent, in proving that they originally were nothing but just natural phenomena similar to sun, moon, and so on. Among such mythological figures, whose original nature is soon partly forgotten in the hymns, and who are honoured more as mighty, lofty beings, distinguished through all kinds of miraculous deeds, are Indra, Varuṇa, Mitra, Aditi, Viṣṇu, Pūṣan, the two Aśvins, Rudra and Parjanya. These gods' names, too, originally indicated natural phenomena, and natural beings. Epithets, which at first emphasized a particularly important side of a natural being, became gods' names and new gods. Thus Savitar, the “inspirer,” “the life-giver,” and Vivasvat, “the shining,” were at first epithets, then names of the sun, and finally they became independent sun-gods beside Sūrya. Also the gods of different tribes and different periods are in many ways represented in the polytheism of the Vedic Indians.¹) Hence it is that Mitra, Viṣṇu and Pūṣan also appear in the Ṛgveda as sun-gods. Pūṣan was probably the sun-god of a small shepherd-tribe, before he was received into the Vedic pantheon as the “Lord of the ways,” the protector of travellers, the god who knows all the paths and also brings back to the right path the cattle which have strayed.

v1.c8.s2.63.3

Mitra, who is identical with the Mithra of the Avesta, is through this fact already distinguishable as an ancient Aryan sun-god, who still hails from the time when Indians and Iranians formed one people. It is not so easy with all gods to discover to which natural phenomenon they owe their origin. Still the opinions of investigators differ widely in the explanation of gods like Indra, Varuṇa, Rudra, Aditi, and the Aśvins—to mention only the most important ones. Thus, to one, Indra is the god of the storm, to the other an old sun-god. Varuṇa is to some a god of the heavens, while others see in him a moon-god. Rudra, who is usually held to be a storm-god, because he is the father of the storm-gods (the Maruts), would be, according to Oldenberg, a mountain and forest god, according to Hillebrandt "a god of the horrors of the tropical climate."¹ Aditi is, according to one view, the expanse of the sky, according to another the endless, widespreading earth: The two Asvins, a pair of gods who are doubtless related to the Greek Dioskuri, and also reappear in Germanic and Lettic mythology, were already before Yāska a puzzle to the ancient Indian commentators.

v1.c8.s2.63.4

Some held them to be heaven and earth, others day and night, and still to-day some scholars see in them the two twilights, others sun and moon, yet others the morning and evening star, and again others the constellation of Gemini.² But what is the most important is that most mythologists to-day agree that by far the greatest majority of the Vedic gods has proceeded from natural phenomena or natural beings.³ There were, indeed, some deities that have become divine beings out of abstractions, but they nearly all appear only in the latest hymns of the tenth book; thus Viśvakarman = "the world master-builder," Prajāpati = "the lord of creatures," or Śraddhā = "faith," Manyu = "anger," and some similar personifications. More important are certain gods of the so-called "lower" mythology, who also appear in the Ṛgveda: the Ṛbhus, who correspond with the elves, the Apsaras, who correspond with the nymphs, and the Gandharvas, who are a kind of forest and field spirits. Numerous demons and evil spirits too appear in the hymns as enemies of the gods, who are hated and fought against by the Devas or gods. The name Asura, however, by which in the later Vedic works these enemies of the gods are designated, appears in the Ṛgveda still with the old meaning "possessed of wonderful power" or "god,"¹ which the corresponding word "Ahura" has in the Avesta, and only in a few places also with the meaning of demons.

v1.c8.s2.63.5

In the Ṛgveda Dāsa or Dasyu—thus the non-Aryan aboriginal inhabitants also are called—is the usual name for the evil demons, besides also Rakṣas or Rākṣasas, by which, in the Ṛgveda, as well as in the whole of the later Indian literature, all kinds of mischievous, ghostly beings are designated. Also the Pitaras, the "fathers" or ancestral spirits, already in the Ṛgveda received divine worship. The king of these ancestral spirits, who rules in the kingdom of the deceased, high up in the highest heaven, is Yama, a god who belongs already to the Indo-Iranian prehistoric period; for he is identical with Yima who, in the Avesta, is the first human being, the primeval ancestor of the human race. As the first departed one—perhaps originally the daily setting sun or the monthly dying moon—he became the king in the realm of the dead. This kingdom of the dead is in the heavens, and the dying man is comforted by the belief that after death he will abide with King Yama in the highest heaven. Of the dismal belief in the transmigration of the soul and eternal rebirth—the belief which controls the whole philosophical thought of Indians in later centuries—there is, in the Ṛgveda, as yet no trace to be found. So we see here too, that in these hymns there breathes an entirely different spirit from that which pervades the whole of the later Indian literature.

First 90 of 1,114 passages. Read on

Linked texts (29)