Vedic Mythology c5.s2.27

c5.s2.27

Indra is said to have settled the quaking mountains and plains (2, 12²; 10, 44⁸). In a later text Indra is said to have cut off the wings of the mountains, which originally alighted wherever they pleased and thus made the earth unsteady. The wings became the thunder clouds (MS. 1, 10¹³). This is a favourite myth in post-Vedic literature. PISCHEL (VS. 1, 174) traces its origin to a verse of the RV. (4, 54⁵). Indra also fixed the bright realms of the sky (8, 14⁹). He supported the earth and propped the sky (2, 17⁵ &c.). He holds asunder heaven and earth as two wheels are kept apart by the axle (10, 89⁴). He stretches out heaven and earth (8, 3⁶) like a hide (8, 6⁵). He is the generator of heaven and earth (8, 36⁴ cp. 6, 47⁴). He generated that which is and shall be by his great secret name (10, 55²) and made the nonexistent into the existent in a moment (6, 24⁵). The separation and supporting of heaven and earth are sometimes described as the result of Indra's victory over a demon (5, 29⁴), who held them together (8, 6¹⁷). When he was born for the Vṛtra fight, Indra spread out the earth and fixed the sky (8, 78⁵). The dragon-slayer made earth visible to heaven, when he opened a path for the streams (2, 13⁵). Similarly he is said to have found heaven and earth which were hidden (8, 85¹⁶) or to have won them along with light and waters (3, 34⁸). Possibly the effect of light extending the range of vision and seeming to separate heaven and earth apparently pressed together by darkness, may have been the starting point of such conceptions.