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The Religion of the Veda: The Ancient Religion of India (from Rig-Veda to Upanishads) c9.s1: Religious Conceptions and Religious Feeling in the Veda

The Religion of the Veda: The Ancient Religion of India (from Rig-Veda to Upanishads) c9.s1

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English

Religious Conceptions and Religious Feeling in the Veda

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The religion of the Rig-Veda, as we have seen, is in its most superficial aspect a priestly religion of works designed to propitiate and to barter with personal gods. The outer form in which it presents itself is as poetry of the sacrifice. The sacrifice with its ceremonial formalities is, as I have ventured to say, the epidermis of Vedic religion. In its next layer the religion of the Veda is expressed in hymnal worship of the same personal gods who get the offerings. Whatever we may say about the origin of these gods, one by one, they are to the Hindu conception for the most part related to the visible and audible forces of nature. Nature in its larger aspect, cosmic nature, is the prime source of inspiration of the Vedic religious bard, just as it was the inspiration of his prehistoric Aryan and Indo-European ancestors. The conception of nature and the nature gods, notwithstanding many crudities, is singularly poetic. I shall show later that the religious consciousness, in so far as it concentrates itself upon their admiration and praise, marks in fact the highest point in the Vedic Rishis’ mental and spiritual possibilities. In the end it will be found to be something more than religious poetry; it is rather religion or religious sense expressing itself as poetic inspiration. Anyhow we must not believe that the ritual has swamped everything. The delight in the gods, especially the half-personalised nature forces which are treated as gods, is too unstinted and generous to allow us to doubt its genuineness. I am sure that many, if not all, of these poets addressed their beautiful hymns to the goddess Dawn, or to the sun-god Sūrya with the full swing of creative poets, delighting in their theme for the theme’s sake, and chiseling their poems for the poems’ sake. We may believe that these priest-poets at times, when in their best vein, asked the favor of the gods not as greedy beggars, but as joyously unconscious beneficiaries of divinities whose power to reward is incidental to their inherent generous nature, and who, therefore present themselves as a brilliant and worthy theme of song.

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But the every-day existence of these men is something different. It is loaded down with those dreadful practicalities. They must live by this very trade of theirs, namely, praise of the gods and purveyance of the sacrifice. When they turn their minds away, as they constantly do and must do, from those well-conceived personifications they tend downward. As middle-men between the gods and men they must, above all, take care of men, their own selves not least of all. Men can subsist and prosper only if the gods return in kind. The gods, on the whole, are good; they do not beat down the requests of him that comes with prayer and cup of *soma*. Reciprocity, frank unconditional reciprocity, thus becomes an accepted motive: “Give thou to me, I give to thee,” is the formula.¹ The sacrificing king, or rich householder, is thereby placed between the upper and the nether mill-stone: he must satisfy both gods and priests, each of whom show a surprising habit of becoming more and more exacting as time goes by. In this way the high poetic quality of Vedic religion is crowded and choked by many conceptions mean from the start, or bent by these circumstances into a mean shape. The gods themselves, notwithstanding their luminous origin, are brought down to the plane of human weakness. Open to adulation, they become vain; eager for advantage, they become shifty; reflecting human desires, they become sordid, and in some cases even indecent.

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¹ *dehi me dadāmi te*. *Cf.* the Roman *do ut des*.

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In the first place, Vedic poets engage in a sort of scramble for the gods. The gods cannot be in one and the same place at the same time, and cannot grant all the conflicting wishes of their numerous suppliants. I have dealt with this theme which may interest the broader students of the history of religions, in a recent paper presented to the XIVth International Congress of Orientalists, held at Algiers in 1905.¹ The title of the paper, *On Conflicting Prayers and Sacrifices*, tells a good deal of the story. The notion which comes out quite persistently is that it requires art to "hog" the gods, and it is not a very delectable notion either from the æsthetic or the ethical point of view. Yet not less so perhaps than the *Te Deum laudamus* over the slaughter of enemies, which has been known to be chanted by both sides at the same time when each side claimed victory.²

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¹ See *Johns Hopkins University Circulars* of 1906, Nr. 10, p. 1 *ff*.

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² Or consider :

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"Gieb regen und gieb sonnenschein
Für Reuss und Schleuss und Lobenstein ;
Und wollen andre auch was ha'n
So mögen sie's dir selber sa'n."

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My colleague, Professor Gildersleeve, proposes the following English transfusion :

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"Give rain and sunshine we implo'
For us upon the Eastern sho' ;
If any others want a share
Themselves may offer up the prayer."

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So, for instance, poets of the ancient family of bards, the Vasishthas, on a certain occasion brag that they made Indra prefer their own *soma* libations to those of Pāçadyumna Vāyata, though the latter had gone to the trouble of fetching Indra from a great distance. Frantically emphatic prayer; imprecation of the man who is praying at the same time; and naughty tricks of various sorts show us under this aspect the whole world of praying and sacrificing men engaged in a sort of universal game of tag: the hindmost is "it." The Vedic Hindus have made a sad botch of this matter. I am glad to say that this particular crudity passes out at the end of the Vedic period with the slow "twilight of the gods" which shifts the interest from polytheism, myth, and sacrifice to the theosophic speculations of the Upanishads. When the personal gods emerge again in later Hinduism, they are much clarified; at least the risky question about their presence in many places at one and the same time, and the equitable distribution of their favors is, as far as I know, never asked again.

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There is scarcely any idea which has suffered so much from the utilitarian aspects of Vedic religion as the Vedic idea of faith. To begin with, the word itself is of interest; it is *çraddhā*, the sound for sound equivalent of Latin and our own *credo*. The etymological meaning of this word is absolutely transparent. It means "to set one's heart upon." This etymology, which is still quite clear to the Vedic poets, shows it full of ethical possibilities. The word starts well in the Rig-Veda. It means first of all belief in the existence and godhead of the gods. So, a poet is anxious to make certain the position of the god Indra, that blustering, pinchbeck, braggart, Herculean god whose shortcomings have gone far to establish a certain position for the Vedic freethinker. The poets say of him:

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"The terrible one of whom they ask, where is he? Nay verily they say of him, he is not at all. He makes shrink the goods of his enemy like a gambler the stakes of his opponent: Put your faith in him—He, O folks, is Indra."
(Rig-Veda 2. 12. 5.)

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"As a strong warrior, he verily fights with might great battles in behalf of the people. Aye, then they have faith in strong Indra, as he hurls down his weapon."
(Rig-Veda 1. 55, 5.)

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"Who, what mortal, can overcome him whose treasure thou art, O Indra? Through faith in thee, O liberal God, on the decisive day, does he that strives obtain booty."
(Rig-Veda 7. 32. 14.)

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So there is no doubt that faith means the belief in the existence of the gods, and their interference in the life of man. It would be doing injustice to those early believers to say that they did not develop the idea beyond this stage of mere primary utility. A later text of the Yajur-Veda says: Faith is truth, and unfaith is lies:

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"The creator (Prajāpati) having beheld two qualities separated truth and lie from one another. He put unfaith into lie, faith he placed into truth."
(Vājasaneyi Saṁhitā 19. 77.)

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Next, faith is wisdom; faith is the sister of wisdom: The fool saith in his heart, "there is no god." In order to disprove his folly it becomes needful to couple the ideas of Faith and Wisdom. From a later time we have very interesting accounts of the initiation of disciples, and their instruction in the Vedas. Teacher and pupil in a kind of dramatic dialogue carry on the solemn action: "Teach me the revealed books (of the Veda), my Lord!" saith the pupil. "I teach thee the revealed books," replieth the teacher. "Teach me the Vedic tradition, my Lord!" saith the pupil. "I teach thee the Vedic tradition," replieth the teacher. "Teach me Faith and Wisdom, my Lord!" saith the pupil. "I teach thee Faith and Wisdom."¹ In another text, as the pupil puts on the sacred girdle which he wears during disciplehood, he addresses it:

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¹ See Çāṅkhāyana Grihyasūtra 2. 7, and compare Āçvalāyana Grihyasūtra 3. 9. 1.

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“Daughter of Faith, born of Zeal, sister was she of the Seers that did create the beings. Do thou, O girdle, assign to us Thought and Wisdom; also assign to us Zeal and Strength.”

(*Atharva-Veda* 6. 133. 4.)

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Faith kindles the sacrifice-fire and, by way of return, the sacred fire, this chief emblem of Brahmanical religion, is in charge of both Faith and Wisdom:

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“Through Faith the fire is kindled,
Through Faith the oblation is offered.
Faith, that stands at the head of fortune,
Her do we with our song proclaim.”

(*Rig-Veda* 10. 151. 1.)

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On the other hand, the Brahmanical disciple appeals to Agni Jātavedas (the holy fire) to preserve for him faith and wisdom, to keep intact his memory, so that he may not forget the sacred texts, and to secure him in well-being.¹

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¹ Çānkhāyana Grihyasūtra 2. 10. 6.

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Next, Faith becomes a person, a goddess. That would not be bad but for the mechanical character which she then assumes. Imagine—and in order to imagine this one must be pretty well steeped in Hinduism—the frame of mind of a poet who skilfully exalts the goddess Faith, but finally asks her to accept oblations:

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“Through Faith the gods obtain their divine quality;
Faith, the goddess, is the foundation of the world.
May she pleased come to our sacrifice,
Bring our wish as her child, and grant us immortality!

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“Faith, the goddess, is the first-born of divine order,
Upholder of all, foundation of the world,
That Faith do we revere with our oblations;
May she create for us an immortal world.”
(Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa 3. 12. 3. 1, 2.)

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“Faith dwells within the gods,
Faith dwells upon this world,
Faith, the mother of wishes—
With oblations do we prosper her.”
(Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa 2. 8. 8).

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So far so good. All that is still a development of the idea of faith in harmony with a decent belief in personal gods. Unfortunately, the Vedic conception of faith, at least the prominent or average conception sinks to a much lower plane. In the main and in the end, faith expresses itself in works, and the Brahmans who are anything but mealy-mouthed have seen to it that they shall be benefited by these works. In other words, he who gives baksheesh (*dakshinā*) to the Brahmans, he has faith (*çraddhā*). In a hymn that is otherwise not badly pitched the poet requests the personified goddess Faith to make his poetic work take well with the liberal sacrificer, and to make him persona grata "with him that giveth, and him that shall give."¹ An exceedingly interesting hymn of the Atharva-Veda, not at all wanting in poetic inspiration, is addressed to the demoness "Grudge," or "Avarice." The name of the lady is Arāti. Of course she is primarily an abstraction. Yet she appears as a full-fledged person: she has a golden complexion, is lovely, rests upon golden cushions; is in fact quite an Apsaras, or "schoene Teufelinne," as the old German poetry has it in for Venus. With all her charms she is coaxed to go away:

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¹ Rig-Veda 10. 151. 2, 3.

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"Bring (wealth) to us, do not stand in our way, O Arāti; do not keep from us the sacrificial fee when it is being taken to us! Homage be to the power of grudge, to the power of baffling! Adoration to Arāti!
"Him whom I implore with holy word (Vāc Sarasvatī), the yoke-fellow of thought, may Faith enter him to-day, aroused by the burnished *soma* drink!"
(Atharva-Veda 5. 7. 1, 5.)

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That is to say, when the burnished *soma* drink sparkles in the cup, when the pious emotion that comes from the skilful hymn stirs the heart of the rich sacrificer, then enters into him Faith. But what kind? The kind that drives out niggardliness. Then he gives to the Brahmans. How the Brahmans do long for baksheesh, especially when they are poor!

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There is the record of one who plaintively ejaculates: "What gentleman, desirous of more possessions will get us out of this wretched misery? Who desireth to sacrifice, and who is willing to give presents? Who desireth long life from the gods?"¹

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¹ Atharva-Veda 7. 103. 1. *Cf.* Ludwig, *Der Rig-Veda*, vol. iii., p. 283 *ff*; the author, *American Journal of Philology*, vol. xvii, p. 408 *ff.*

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Even this mean and selfish construction of Faith, on one famous occasion at least turns forth a better side. A zealous young Brahman, Naciketas by name, observes that baksheesh is by way of being freely given. In fact his father Vājaçravasa has performed a desperately pious sacrifice, the "All-his-property-sacrifice"—luscious morsel for the Brahmans. He has given away in sacrifice and attendant fees all that he possesses. Then Faith enters into the boy Naciketas. He wishes, so to say, "to get into the band-wagon." He startles his father by asking: "To whom wilt thou give me?" The father replies: "To death"—we can imagine the formula that would come from the lips of a modern fond father, if his son were to ask him a question so very awkward. Naciketas takes him literally and goes down to Yama, the God of Death. He manages, however, to get the better of Yama, not only enjoying his hospitality, but also extracting from him certain profound information concerning the riddle of existence.¹

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¹ See the first book of the Katha Upanishad.

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Now I shall not claim that this important concept was unmixedly mean and unspiritual. Indeed we have seen that it is not wholly so. This much, however, is clear that the anxious mind of the ritual is almost entirely fastened upon Faith as the promoter of the sacrifice and its attendant gifts to the Brahmans. In the end *açraddha*, "devoid of faith," is the typical epithet of the demons of avarice, the Panis, who withhold the cows from the gods and the Brahmans. One or two writers have the hardihood to put up a chain of four links: Faith, Consecration, Sacrifice, Baksheesh.² Since consecration (*dīkshā*) in this connection means really nothing but ancient hocus-pocus preliminary to the sacrifice, where, we may ask, is there a franker avowal of shady motives that ordinarily present themselves elsewhere with a thick coat of whitewash?

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² Atharva-Veda 15. 16. 4. *ff.*; Gopatha Brāhmana 1. 1.39.

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But what is there in it for the sacrificer, we may ask? It is all very well for him to silence those raucous voices of demand, and keep giving—for a while. He must in the long run get something in return, or he will balk. Our texts, explicit if nothing else, leave no doubt in our minds as to the way in which the sacrificer was rewarded, or thought he was rewarded, under this otherwise monotonously one-sided arrangement. We have seen that Faith, Çraddhā, is personified. Now the sacrifice, called *ishṭa*, and the baksheesh, called (by another name) *pūrta*, enter into a close compound, the *ishṭāpūrta*. They, in their turn, get to have a kind of personal reality, and turn into a kind of beneficent genius, or perhaps better a kind of solid asset which becomes useful with the gods during life, and, mark you, after death as well. During life, the god helps him who sacrifices and gives baksheesh; he adds to, does not rob his property.¹ But it is for the most part a question of future reward. In a well-known funeral hymn of the Rig-Veda the corpse is addressed most realistically:

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¹ Rig-Veda 6. 28. 2.

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"Do thou join the Fathers, do thou join Yama, join thy *ishṭāpūrta* (that which thou hast sacrificed and given to the priests) in the highest heaven!"
(Rig-Veda 10. 14. 8.)

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And the following is a particularly realistic treatment of the same ideas. Again a dead man is blessed as he goes to heaven:

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"Know him (the pious dead), O ye associated gods in the highest heaven, recognise his form! When he shall have arrived by the paths that lead to the gods, disclose

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to him his *ishṭāpūrta* (that is, the merit which he has accumulated through sacrifice and liberality to the priests)!”

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(Taittirīya Samhitā 5. 7. 7. 1.)

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And so another poet, in a better vein, says in a verse that has become famous in India:

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“The highest step of Vishnu (that is the solar paradise) is ever seen by the liberal giver: it is fixed like an eye in the heavens.”
(Rig-Veda 1. 22. 20.)

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At a later time when the Hindus in their highest mood turn the ordinary gods into supernumeraries, when metempsychosis takes the place of a journey to heaven, when they have sloughed off priests, sacrifice fire, spoon, and ghee, all that is changed. The degraded Çraddhā or Faith is replaced by Bhakti, “Devotion,” that is, devotion to the Eternal True, Only Being that is at the root of all things. The *ishṭāpūrta*, piled up in the savings-bank of heaven, where Yama and the Fathers are engaged in everlasting feasts, is replaced by *karma*, the accumulated deeds of a given lifetime and the attendant evolution which these deeds have worked upon the spirit. This so definitely shapes character as to determine the nature of the next rebirth, until a perfect life shall free the mortal from the toils of all existence, and replace him in the bosom of the One True Being. Of all this later on.

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However, even these saccharine promises about the accumulated credit given in heaven for sacrifice and baksheesh seem not to have been regarded by the poet priests as a sufficient guarantee that they might securely count upon that faith which meant works useful to them. They employ another device. Being skilled verse-smiths, they begin to use their craft to forge chains of poetry which shall hold rich patrons willing captives. They compose the so-called *dāna-stutis*, “gift-praises,” or *gāthā nārāçaṅsyaḥ*, “stanzas singing the praise of men.”¹ In dithyrambic language exorbitant gifts on the part of generous givers of old, mythic kings and patrons, are narrated, so as to stimulate the potential patron of the present day. They sing these praises so stridently that the Vedic texts themselves, in their soberer moments, decry the “gift-praises” as lies and pollution. The poet of a “stanza singing the praise of men” and the brandy-drunkard are likened unto one another: they are polluted, their gifts must not be accepted. I question whether the religious literature of any other people contains anything that resembles either in character or extent the “giftpraises" of the Veda; the type is thoroughly Hindu in its naïveté and its boundlessness.

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¹ *Cf.* Ludwig, *Der Rig-Veda*, vol. iii., p. 274 *ff.*; Bloomfield, *The Atharva-Veda* (*Indo-Aryan Encyclopædia*), p. 100.

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To begin with, there is in the Rig-Veda a doubtless late hymn consecrated to Dakshinā, or "Baksheesh." It is only a poetaster who undertakes, as he says, to unfold "the broad road of Baksheesh," *i. e.* to show how important it is to keep giving. Then, with refreshing obviousness he claims:

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"Those that give *dakshinā* dwell on high in the heavens; they that give horses dwell with the sun. They that give gold partake of immortality; and they that give garments, O Soma, prolong their lives."
(Rig-Veda 10. 107. 2.)

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There are forty or more "gift-praises" in the Rig-Veda alone; they continue throughout the rest of the Veda. I do not mean to dwell upon them beyond a single example. We may remark, however, that some of this baksheesh must have proved a veritable elephant on the hands of the receiver, except for the fact that it was as a rule imaginary baksheesh:

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"Listen, ye folks, to this: (a song) in praise of a hero shall be sung! Six thousand and ninety cows did we get (when we were) with Kauruma among the Ruçamas!
"Kauruma presented the Seer with a hundred jewels, ten chaplets, three hundred steeds, and ten thousand cattle."

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Operations on such a scale are calculated to show the magnates of the present day meat-packing trust that they have yet to learn from these arch-flatterers a trick or two in the way of collecting cattle.

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If my hearers shall ask now what, after all this, is the essence of Rig-Vedic religion, I am for my part not unready to answer in accordance with hints thrown out before. It is poetry, or rather, more precisely, poetic exaltation, or the pride and joy of poetic creativeness. This is at first conceived to be favored and promoted by the gods, because they get the fruit of it in the form of praise and flattery. The finer the frenzy of the poet and the more finished the product of his art, the better pleased are the gods. Therefore the gods, next, co-operate with the poets, promoting their devotion and its expression. Finally, these twin factors of devoted fervor and its successful utterance in hymns and stanzas create sensations of satisfaction which are easily taken for sanctification. At first the article is not very genuine. But it goes on being the receptacle of better thoughts until it grows into what we may consider real religious feeling.

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To some extent we can test this statement by showing what the religious feeling of the Veda is not, rather than what it is. The frank system of barter of the sacrificer's *soma* and ghee for the god's good gift and protection, with considerably more than one-eighth of one per cent. brokerage for the priest—that, surely, is *not* the religious feeling in the souls of the composers of the Rig-Veda hymns. I have taken pains to show how constantly present is this external side of their religion: may the religion that is free from all external considerations, the religion from which is absent every form of safe-guarding self, throw the first stone.

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The contemplation of the glory of the gods as a matter of intellectual wonder is expressed times without end. It does not seem to me to have quite the true ring. It is perfunctory; it is told by rote. God after god steps into line and gets it. They each in turn establish the heavens and the earth; they start the sun on his course, almost indifferently well. Perhaps, as I have hinted before, their rotation in the ritual, rather than forgetfulness of the virtues of the preceding god, is the truth at the bottom of this kathenotheism or henotheism, as Max Müller called it. It is polytheism grown cold in service, and unnice in its distinctions, leading to an opportunist monotheism in which every god takes hold of the sceptre and none keeps it. Anyhow it is very mechanical. No one who reads in the hymns the endless accounts of the wonderful performances of the gods will deny that the poets at times grow truly warm and feel their theme. Sometimes they are really carried away by it. But I do not believe that either the greatness and majesty, or the incomprehensibleness of the gods, have produced a permanent impression of their superiority and perfection which should permit us to speak of settled intellectual religious consciousness in the Rig-Veda.

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Most conspicuously there is no sentimental relation of any great depth between gods and men, and therefore no piety in the higher sense of the word. I mean piety that is not mere emotional self-excitement, but reasonable and settled reverence of tried and true gods. As a matter of fact the gods are good, and, at least in a general way, they are just also. In India, as we have seen, the gods have in charge especially the order of the world, and that is at the proper time, to the advantage of the suppliant mortal. Conversely, and especially, god Varuna stands ready to punish the wrong-doer. The poets sometimes describe Varuna's power, and the sense of their own unworthiness or sinfulness in language that reminds us of the Psalmist. Varuna, however, is no longer pre-eminent even in the Rig-Veda: he has left no really lasting impression on India's religions. If Varuna had prevailed India would have become monotheistic and theocratic, which it never did.

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Occasionally a start is made towards a warmly glowing relation of love and confidence; the singer in need of help trusts that the god will help him. But there is no permanent, clarified, unselfish love of the gods such as overrides the experience of their instability, such as lives down the melancholy fact that they do not always help. And we have seen what faith is in the Veda: it is the faith that manifests itself in works. The Vedic poets are trained "master-singers." Such poets are not likely to penetrate far into the soul of man. There is no real warmth or depth, no passionate indistinct feeling, no unsatisfied longing which can be made hopefully endurable, or even pleasurable and exalting, through the mystery of a relationship with perfect beings, understood by each individual soul in its own way. Anything like a contemplative, trustful joy in the perfection of the gods comes much later: it is of the Bhagavadgītā, rather than the Rig-Veda.

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But these master-singers do believe in their own art; in their wonderful poetry, and in the exaltation of mind which goes with its composition. The gods accept both the poetry and the devout mind at the value put upon them by the poets; the poets are serenely certain that the gods are well satisfied.¹ This then is the state of mind that approaches genuine and lasting religious feeling in the Rig-Veda: belief in the beauty and fitness of those glittering, rhythmical, and assonant stanzas; genuine rapture over the excited, throbbing mind, while the glow of composition is upon the poet. The poet calls himself *vipra*, "inspired"; calls his compositions *vipaḥ*, "inspirations"; and when he composes, *vepate matī*, "he is inspired in his mind." In the poet's pride of exquisite workmanship and the gods' unresisting admiration, the Rig-Veda makes us forget at times that unpleasant economic foundation of the performance, namely flattery and cajolery of the gods—for what there is in it.¹ Soon both gods and men are engaged fraternally in promoting devotion and its best possible expression in hymns, as things of intrinsic worth, as beautiful elevated cosmic potencies. And so we finally find at the summit of this thought, the captivating and important prayer of the poet of the Sāvitrī stanza,² that the god himself shall inspire his devotion.

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¹ "Like (a cow) her calf so do the poets lick (the gods) with their prayers," says Rig-Veda 10. 123. 1.

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¹ Rig-Veda 8. 21. 6 puts this baldly to god Indra: "We cite you hither with this prayer; don't bethink yourself a minute. We have wishes, you have gifts. Here we are with our songs."

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² See above p 86.

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I have used the word "master-singers." We may take this word quite stringently and seriously. The hymns often allude to the songs of old that were composed by the Rishis of the past. The very first hymn in the Rig-Veda strikes this note in its second stanza: “Agni, worthy to be adored by the ancient Rishis and the present ones—may he conduct the gods hither!” Another time a poet of the family of Kanva sings¹: “In the spirit of the olden times do I dress out my songs like (the poet) Kanva, through which (god) Indra gets his fiery strength.” Or again: “(Hear), O Indra, him that hath produced for thee a new and lovely song, with comprehending mind a pious song such as of yore has strengthened the divine order of the universe.”² In more confident or ecstatic temper, the poets often declare that they have produced new songs of praise, and that, in their opinion, these are first-rate songs. One poet recommends his “new, beautiful song of praise, that comes from the heart;” another exclaims: “I bring forward my word, the new, the fresh-born.” With all due respect to their predecessors this pretty nearly amounts to saying that the new hymns are just as good as the old, in addition to having the charm of novelty. One thing is certain: we have nothing like beginnings before us. The Rig-Veda is pretty nearly the final expression of its own type of composition. What comes later in the way of sacred poetry is distinctly epigonal, or after-born. We are face to face with the finished product of this past age.

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¹ Rig-Veda 8. 6. 11; *cf.* 8. 44. 12; 8. 76. 6.

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² Rig-Veda 8. 95. 5.

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If we consider that the theme is the worship of unclarified polytheistic gods, but little advanced beyond the point where they originated somewhere in nature, or in a tolerably primitive consciousness, we may say, taking the fat with the lean, that the pride of these poets in their work is justified. Of course we must not apply the chaster standards of a later time, nor can we expect perfectly even results. Anyhow, in the poet's own eyes the Rig-Vedic hymn is a thing of blameless, finished beauty. He has fashioned it as a skilled artisan a war chariot. He has filed it until it is free from all blemish, "as grain is winnowed in the winnowing-basket," "as ghee is clarified for the sacrifice." The heart of the poets is in their work, they are unquestionably giving the best they have. The poems are their inspirations. In so far as they rise above their all too human interests, in so far as they are something higher than blarneying beggars, they lift themselves up through their own art rather than the intrinsic qualities of the gods upon whom they spend their efforts.

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In the end the gods themselves take a hand in these valuable and delectable poetic performances. Although they cannot directly furnish the metres, alliterations, beautiful words, and bold figures of speech, they can perform another service. They may furnish the devout mind, the inspiration that is behind the hymn. In fact the gods themselves perform prayers, and fashion hymns: “May the gods who perform *brahma* (that is, prayer) furnish us their thrice-covering protection from evil!”¹ “Sing ye a *brahma* given by the gods!” exhorts a poet of the house of Kanva.² Prayer, or devotion, is so beautiful as to be imagined dressed out in glowing colors and bright garments: “May God Agni lift up our devotion that hath glowing color!” or: “May God Agni place on high our brightly adorned devotion!”³ Heaven and Earth, stable and orderly, guide the sacrifice, aglow with shining hymns.⁴ Prayers, personified, go by the path of the divine order to the gods Indra and Agni; they are the messengers between the two worlds.⁵ Hymnal beatification of prayer can scarcely reach higher than the following:

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¹ Rig-Veda 10.66. 5.

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² *Ibid.*, 1. 37. 4; 8. 32. 7.

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³ *Ibid.*, 1. 143. 7; 144. 1.

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⁴ *Ibid.*, 4. 56. 2.

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⁵ *Ibid.*, 3. 12. 7 and 1. 173. 3.

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“Prayer born of yore in heaven,
Eagerly chanted in the holy assembly,
Delightfully dressed out in bright array,
Ours is that father-inherited prayer of old!”
(Rig-Veda 3. 39. 2.)

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The last step, namely that Prayer or Devotion itself becomes divine and assumes a tolerably distinct personality, deserves to hold our attention. The epithet "Goddess" is freely given to numerous designations of prayer and devotion. There is the "Goddess Devotion" (Dhī); the goddess "Lovely Praise" (Sushtuti); the goddess "Holy Thought" (Manīshā), and others.¹ And by an almost comical *tour de force*, such as is possible only in India, Devotion, having become divine, turns into a real personage who might in the company of the other gods call out a second layer of the same article: "Drink the soma, O ye Açvins, in the company of Agni and Indra, of Varuna and Vishnu . . . in the company of all pious Devotions."²

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¹ See Rig-Veda 3. 18. 3; 4. 43. 1; 7. 34. 1 and 9; 8. 27. 13.

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² *Ibid* 8. 35. 1 *ff.*

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For the history of the human mind this last outcome, present in the ancient literature of this gifted people, is of unusual importance. The rather mystic idea of the divinity of Devotion and its expression, the notion that the sacred inspired thought and word can itself be god, will concern us more later on. From the point of view of religious feeling it is the last and best word of the Hindus as to the nature of the divine. There comes to mind the first verse of the Gospel of John: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Here the original Greek for "Word" is Logos. This is not quite the same as the Hindu "Devotion," or "Holy Utterance," which we shall meet again in its finished expression as Brahma. The Logos originated in the philosophy of the Stoics and the Neo-Platonists: it is intellectual rather than emotional. But the two are alike in this: they seek the creative power and the creative plan in the mind or heart of the universe rather than in its mechanical manifestations. We shall see farther on how very peculiar is the treatment which the Hindus gave to this important and original concept, led on thereto by the melancholy genius that may be supposed to preside over the hot sombre land. For the present, and in this connection, we may be satisfied to see the origin of this seemingly mystic idea exposed to our eyes with a degree of clearness that is not obscured by its mythological coloring. Like almost all other important religious ideas of the Hindus this idea, when analysed patiently with the help of their rich literature, sheds light on the seeming mysteries of other religions.

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