The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c34.s2.17

v2.c34.s2.17

The nature of the heaven which is attained by the spirits is described repeatedly in the Rigveda:⁴ it is further elaborated in the later Saṁhitās, but all its characteristics are the same: there is light, the sun for the highest waters, every form of happiness, the Svadhā, which is at once⁵ the food of the spirits, and the power which they win by it, their self-determination. The spirits are so material as not merely to enjoy the most material things, Soma, milk, honey, Surā, ghee, but also to delight in the joys of love,⁶ a fact indicating how corporeal was their nature. The sound of singing and the flute is also among the delights available, and there is a fig-tree where Yama drinks with the gods.⁷ There are wish-cows, which yield all desires, and there is perfect harmony and joy unbounded. The picture is singularly simple: it is merely the pleasant things of earth to the priestly imagination, heaped upon one another: the total absence of anything which could be regarded as natural in the heaven of warriors is a striking reminder that the conceptions of Vedic India, in so far as they are within reach of our knowledge, were the ideas of priests and not of the whole community. The idea thus presented prevailed throughout the Vedic periods: even in the Brāhmaṇas among speculations of various sorts, it is often said that men obtain unity with the sun, which clearly means that he goes to dwell in the heaven of the sun where are the Fathers, the gods, and above all Yama.