Materials for the Study of the Early History of the Vaishnava Sect c8.31

c8.31

It is clear that Vishnu was a great god even in the earliest Vedic times. But he was not regarded by anybody as the Sole God, or even as the greatest God. His inferiority to Indra appears even in the hymns devoted to his own glorification, and nothing better is said of him, in Rig Veda, i, 22, 19, than that “he is the worthy friend of Indra—Indrasya yujyaḥ sakhā.” He is also ordered about by Indra⁶ :—