The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c20.s5.1

v1.c20.s5.1

Of these divine figures special interest attaches to Aramati, ‘devotion’, who is also described as the great one: in the Avesta Aramaiti is a genius of the earth and also of wisdom, and there seems no real reason for objection to the view that the personification goes back to the Indo-Iranian period,¹ though it is doubtful whether we can see in the Rigvedic epithet ‘great’ a suggestion that the earth which often bears this epithet was placed under the care of this spirit, and still more whether we can believe Sāyaṇa’s assertion that Aramati is the earth. Another spirit who may with propriety be referred to the Indo-Iranian period is Puramdhi,² whose name occurs some nine times in the Rigveda: she is usually mentioned along with Bhaga, who himself is a representative of this class of gods, but who has become an Āditya, twice or thrice with Pūṣan and Savitṛ, and once with Agni and Viṣṇu. She clearly corresponds to the Avestan Pārendi, who is normally ranked as goddess of plenty and abundance: the view of Hillebrandt³ sees in her and in the Vedic Puramdhi a goddess of activity: the scanty evidence leaves us with no conclusive means of testing either version, especially as the two ideas can be made by a little ingenuity almost synonymous. A goddess Dhiṣaṇā⁴ who is mentioned about a dozen times in the Rigveda⁵ may also be a goddess of abundance or of impulsion. Anumati, ‘favour of the gods’, is twice personified in the Rigveda,⁶ and is besought to be propitious and to grant long life. In the Yajurveda and in the Atharvaveda she appears as a goddess who presides over propagation and favours love, and in the Sūtras she is clearly understood as connected with the moon, denoting the day before full moon.⁷ It is difficult to suppose that this view of the deity is anything but a later conception, for there is nothing to support it in the early mention of the deity. Sūnṛtā,⁸ ‘bounty’, is here and there personified in the Rigveda, while on the contrary the spirit of niggardliness, Arāti,⁹ ‘avarice’, is represented as a demon in the Atharvaveda. Asunīti,¹⁰ ‘spirit leading’, is besought in the Rigveda in one hymn to grant long life.