A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature c5.1361

c5.1361

PITRIS. Patres; the fathers; the Manes. This name is applied to three different classes of beings:—1. The Manes of departed forefathers, to whom pindas (balls of rice and flour) and water are offered at stated periods. 2. The ten Prajāpatis or mythical progenitors of the human race. 3. “According to a legend in the Hari-vansa and in the Vāyu Purāna, the first Pitris were the sons of the gods. The gods having offended Brahmā by neglecting to worship him, were cursed by him to become fools; but, upon their repentance, he directed them to apply to their sons for instruction. Being taught accordingly the rites of expiation and penance by their sons, they addressed them as fathers; whence the sons of the gods were the first Pitris.” The account given of the Pitris is much the same in all the Purāṇas. “They agree in distinguishing them into seven classes, three of which are without form, or composed of intellectual, not elementary substance, and assuming what forms they please; and four are corporeal. When the Purāṇas come to the enumeration of the particular classes, they somewhat differ, and the accounts in all the works are singularly imperfect.” The incorporeal Pitris, according to one enumeration, are the Vairājas, Agnishwāttas, and Barhishads. The first of these seem also to be called Subhāswaras, Somasads, and Saumyas. The corporeal are the Su-kālas or Su-kālins, Āngirasas, Su-swadhas, and Somapas. The Sukālas are also called Mānasas; the Somapas are also called Ushmapas; the Āngirasas seem also to be called Havishmats, Havirbhūjas, and Upahutas; and the Su-swadhas are apparently the same as the Ājyapas and Kāvyas or Kavyas. The Vairājas are the Manes of great ascetics and anchorites, the Agnishwāttas are the Pitris of the gods, the Barhishads of demons, the Somapas of Brāhmans, the Havishmats of Kshatriyas, the Ājyapas of Vaisyas, and the Su-kālins of the Sūdras; but one authority, the Hari-vansa, makes the Somapas belong to the Sūdras, and the Su-kālins to the Brāhmans, and there appears to be good reason for this. Other names are given by Dr. F. Hall from various authorities (Vishnu Purāṇa, iii. 339): Rasmipas, Phenapas, Sudhāvats, Gārhapatyas, Ekasringas, Chaturvedas, and Kālas. Besides these there are the Vyāmas, ‘fumes,’ the Pitris of the barbarians. The Rig-veda and Manu make two independent classes, the Agni-dagdhas and the An-agni-dagdhas, those ‘who when alive kept up (or did not keep up) the household flame,’ and presented (or did not present) oblations with fire. The Vishnu Purāṇa makes the Barhishads identical with the former, and the Agnishwāttas with the latter. Yama, god of the dead, is king of the Pitris, and Swadhā, ‘oblation,’ is sometimes said to be their mother, at others their wife.—Wilson, Vishnu Purāṇa, iii. 157, 339. See Manu, iii. 192.