Indian Philosophy v1.c8.s2.109

v1.c8.s2.109

Indra had also to battle with other gods worshipped by the different tribes settled in India. There were worshippers of waters,¹ the Aśvattha tree.² Many of the demons with whom Indra fought were the tribal gods such as Vṛtra, the serpent.³ Another foe of Indra, in the period of the Ṛg-Veda, was Kṛṣṇa, the deified hero of a tribe called the Kṛṣṇas. The verse reads: "The fleet Kṛṣṇa lived on the banks of the Amśumatī (Jumna) river with ten thousand troops. Indra of his own wisdom became cognisant of this loud-yelling chief. He destroyed the marauding host for our benefit."⁴ This is the interpretation suggested by Sāyaṇa, and the story has some interest in connection with the Kṛṣṇa cult. The later Purāṇas speak of the opposition between Indra and Kṛṣṇa. It may be that Kṛṣṇa is the god of the pastoral tribe which was conquered by Indra in the Ṛg-Veda period, though at the time of the Bhagavadgītā he recovered much lost ground and got reinforced by becoming identified with the Vāsudeva of the Bhāgavatas and the Viṣṇu of the Vaiṣṇavas. It is this miscellaneous origin and history that make him the author of the Bhagavadgītā, the personation of the