Indian Philosophy v1.c8.s2.36

v1.c8.s2.36

Varuṇa is the god of the sky. The name is derived from the root “var,” to “cover” or “compass.” He is identical with the Greek Ouranos and the Ahuramazda of the Avesta. His physical origin is manifest. He is the coverer or the enfolder. He covers the whole starry expanse of heaven “as with a robe, with all the creatures thereof and their dwellings.”⁶ Mitra is his constant companion. Varuṇa and Mitra, when used together, express night and day, darkness and light. Varuṇa’s figure is steadily transformed and idealised till he becomes the most moral god of the Vedas. He watches over the world, punishes the evildoers and forgives the sins of those who implore his pardon. The sun is his eye, the sky is his garment and the storm is his breath.⁷ Rivers flow by his command⁸; the sun shines, the star and the moon are in their courses for fear of him.⁹ By his law heaven and earth are held apart. He upholds the physical and the moral order. He is no capricious god, but a “dhṛtavrata,” one of fixed resolve. Other gods obey his orders. He is omniscient, and as such knows the flight of the birds in the sky, the path of the ships on the ocean and the course of the wind. Not a sparrow can fall without his knowledge. He is the supreme God, the God of gods, harsh to the guilty and gracious to the penitent. He conforms to the eternal law of the moral world which he has established. Yet in his mercy he is willing to forgive those who offend against him. “He is merciful even to him who has committed sin.”¹⁰ In almost all the hymns to Varuṇa we find prayers for the forgiveness of sin, filled with confessions of guilt and repentance,¹ which show that the Aryan poets had a sense of the burden of sin and prayer.