Original Sanskrit Texts on the Origin and History of the People of India, their Religion and Institutions v5.c49.3

v5.c49.3

Soma is the god who represents and animates this juice, an intoxicating draught which plays a conspicuous part in the sacrifices of the Vedic age. He is, or rather was in former times, the Indian Dionysus or Bacchus. Not only are the whole of the hymns in the ninth book of the Rig-veda, one hundred and fourteen in number, besides a few in other places, dedicated to his honour, but constant references to the juice of the soma occur in a large proportion of the other hymns. It is clear therefore, as remarked by Professor Whitney (Journal of the American Oriental Society, iii. 299), that his worship must at one time have attained a remarkable popularity. This circumstance is thus explained by the writer to whom I have referred: "The simple-minded Arian people, whose whole religion was a worship of the wonderful powers and phenomena of nature, had no sooner perceived that this liquid had power to elevate the spirits, and produce a temporary frenzy, under the influence of which the individual was prompted to, and capable of, deeds beyond his natural powers, than they found in it something divine: it was to their apprehension a god, endowing those into whom it entered with godlike powers; the plant which afforded it became to them the king of plants; the process of preparing it was a holy sacrifice; the instruments used therefor were sacred. The high antiquity of this cultus is attested by the references to it found occurring in the Persian Avesta;³⁹¹ it seems, however, to have received a new impulse on Indian territory."