The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v2.c36.s1.15

v2.c36.s1.15

The attitude of the Fathers to the living is assumed by the latter to be one of friendship : they are invoked to turn the merit acquired by their good deeds to the overthrow of the foe of the living, but to their own they are dangerous only when these sin against them by failing to provide them with due offerings, a fact which seems clearly alluded to as early as the Rigveda.⁹ Their power to injure is pre-supposed by the help they are to give in the overthrow of enemies, but very little is said directly about it. In a spell against the Dasyus, who at the offering for the dead mix themselves with the Fathers looking like kinsmen, a torch is employed, but this is hardly any definite evidence that the Fathers *per se* were dangerous.¹⁰ Nor is the mere fact that various objects are buried at cross-roads for the destruction of enemies¹¹ any proof of their activity in effecting the desired destruction, since many other evil spirits inhabit cross-roads. The souls of unborn children become according to a late piece of evidence blood suckers,¹² and possibly this may explain the special objection felt in Vedic religion to the slayer of an embryo, but this explanation is not necessary. The danger from the dead is, as we have seen, fear of death, not of the spirits of the Fathers. Moreover, as we have noted, the Atharvaveda finds for the evils which are practised on men the cause in demons,¹ not in souls of the dead, which is again a strong piece of evidence that the mischievous powers of the dead were not strongly felt in the Vedic period.