The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c15.25

v1.c15.25

In the Rigveda this tendency to assimilation, which may be called in some degree monotheistic, but with a pronounced tendency to pantheism, practically excludes the growth of any real hierarchy among the gods. The Rigveda,⁵ indeed, expressly says of the gods that some are great, some small, some young, some old, and there is no reason to doubt that this was a view widely held: the mere fact that another poet ⁶ assures the gods that they are none of them small or young, but all great, is rather proof of the prevalence of the contrary view than an indication that the assurance which he gives was generally accepted as correct. Moreover, there is the patent fact that, when all allowances are made for the nature of the subject-matter, two Vedic deities do appear as being of much greater importance than the others, Indra as the great ruler, and Varuṇa as the lord of physical and moral order. In the Avesta, on the other hand, Indra is only to be discerned dimly as a demon, and Varuṇa has his counterpart in the glorious and righteous Ahura Mazdāh. It is therefore natural enough to imagine that the original great god of the Aryans was Varuṇa and that it was in India that Indra was made up to the stature of Varuṇa, and even overthrew his prominence. In the alternative it has even been maintained, as by Jacobi,¹ that the Avesta did not know Indra at all as a god, and that he is really of Indian origin.