The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c23.s2.48

v1.c23.s2.48

In the case of the disease demons it is not easy precisely to determine what conception was formed of them. The idea formed of them certainly hovers between the conception of a spirit like Takman, 'fever', who brings the disease, and a more materialistic, or scientific, conception of some substance which carries the disease itself. The constant efforts to drive out diseases by means of spells and sympathetic magic may, according to Oldenberg, fairly be held to contain a more advanced conception of the nature of disease than the more simple concept of a demon disease. But this is not at all clear, unless we accept Oldenberg's animistic views. The real question is whether the demon disease was conceived in the first place abstractly, the disease being caused by a demon, and the demon identified with the disease it caused, or whether the disease was conceived as something real and material, with a life of its own. The latter view seems to accord most with primitive thought, and with the material, if less personal, character of the disease as attacked by the means of the sorcerer in the Atharvaveda, in which, however, constant hints of the personal character are still to be found. The actual signs of the disease, the symptoms visible to the eye, are in the primitive mind the disease itself, which is, as the symptoms come and go, clearly a living entity.