The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c27.s2.20

v1.c27.s2.20

A further question arises whether we can trace behind the Vedic sacrifice as a gift offering the older view that it is really not a gift at all, but an effort to secure the propagation of the life of the herds and of the world of vegetation by the periodic slaying from time to time of the spirit of vegetation, or in the case of animals of a representative of the species, in order to secure the freshness of the life of the vegetation and of the beasts of the earth. In this view, which is that of Sir J. Frazer,³ the sacrifice in the long run is reduced purely and simply to a piece of magic: it represents a period before man ceases to believe himself lord of nature, and master of all that he desires, and, recognizing the futility of his high belief in humanity, turns to the conception of supernatural powers, whom he supplicates for the results, which he thought formerly to bring about by his own magic powers. The substantial element at the back of the theory is, of course, the considerable mass of facts adduced by Mannhardt, and before him by Grimm, which illustrate the widespread usage of the killing of the outworn corn spirit, perhaps with some idea of strengthening it, though of late a very formidable opponent to that theory⁴ has appeared in the shape of the view that the thing which is destroyed is not the corn spirit at all, but the witches and wizards whose attacks on the crops are perpetual, an idea which is richly proved for India by the figures of the Rakṣases and their constant conjunction with sorcery. There are, however, features of the later religion of India such as the legend of Kṛṣṇa and Kaṁsa,⁵ which point to the old vegetation ritual in which the contest between the spirits of winter and summer is revealed, and this conception has certain affinities with the theory of the killing of the corn spirit when outworn. In the Vedic ritual, however, it is extremely difficult to find any case in which this theory can be applied with much plausibility.