The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c18.s2.8

v1.c18.s2.8

It is clear that the name was held by the Rigvedic poets to be derived from a word *bṛh* in the sense of Brahman, prayer, as it is parallel with Brahmaṇaspati, and the meaning of the name is, therefore, lord of prayer or devotion. The great similarity to Agni, which makes Bṛhaspati in much merely his double, can best be explained on the theory that Bṛhaspati is Agni in his priestly form, but that the connexion was one early developed.⁴ The most plausible of alternative views is undoubtedly that of Roth,⁵ which takes the god as a direct personification of the power of devotion, and Oldenberg⁶ develops a similar idea in insisting that Bṛhaspati is the typical priest who assists in the feats of the gods by his songs and his prayers. In that case it is necessary to suppose that he has won to himself the attributes of the gods by his close association with them in their activities, a view to which there is no good ground of objection in itself, but which is on the other hand not in any way more probable than the idea that the name was at first an epithet of the god. On the other hand Weber⁷ and Hopkins⁸ start from the marked similarity to Indra in the warlike deeds of Bṛhaspati, and make him out to be derived from the character of Indra modified under the views of the priesthood:⁹ this view is also legitimate, but is subject to the objection that on the whole it is easier to explain the development, if the Agni side be taken as the standing point in the discussion of the nature of the god. It is, however, impossible to accept the efforts of Hillebrandt¹ to prove that Bṛhaspati is the moon, especially as a god of magic and the magic southern fire; the long list of parallels with Soma which he adduces will on investigation be found merely to refer either to points which are commonplaces of many Vedic gods, or to points in which Agni and Soma agree. The fact that Bṛhaspati produces effects on the plants is wholly inadequate to make out that he is a moon god, for there is no very clear trace in the Rigveda of the doctrine that all growth or even that most growth is due to the action of the moon: the heat and the water which are characteristic of Agni are essentially connected with plant life.