CHAP II. "May the golden-eyed Savitri come hither.
"May the golden-handed, life-bestowing well-guarding, exhilarating and affluent Savitri be present at the sacrifice."
These phrases, which seem to have no reference to the later myth, carry us to the myth of the one-eyed Odin, who, like Savitar, is also Wegtam, or the wanderer, the broad heaven looking down on the earth with its one gleaming eye, the sun.[1] Like Indra, Varuna, and Vishnu, he is Skambha, the supporter.
"Savitri has established the earth by supports; Savitri has fixed the sky in unsupported space; [2] he has milked the atmosphere, restless (or noisy) as a horse; Savitri, the son of the waters, knows the place where the ocean, supported, issued forth." [3]
SECTION II.— SOMA.
T he physical and spiritual Soma. The ninth book of the Rig Veda consists wholly of hymns written in praise of Soma, who is lauded as the source of life and vigour, of spiritual mental power and bodily strength both to gods and men, the generator or parent of Agni, Sûrya, Indra, and Vishnu. Of the phrases employed in describing the nature and functions of Soma, many relate exclusively to the juice of the Soma plant, and to the process by which that juice is converted into an intoxicating drink. These phrases are often curiously blended with expressions which speak of a god exalted higher even than Varuna or Indra, while others show clearly that, like almost all other names of Hindu mythology, Soma was a word which might be applied alike to the gladdening power of wine and to the life-giving force from which the sky and sun derive their strength and brilliancy. In the latter sense, Soma imparts to Indra the power which enables him to overcome Vritra, and, like
- ↑ H. H.Wilson, R. V. Sanhita, i. 99.
- ↑ Dr. Muir points out the inconsistency of this phrase with the later mythology, which spoke of the earth as resting on the head of the serpent S'esha, or on other supports, and remarks that the Siddhantas, or scientific astronomical works of India, maintain that the earth is unsupported. In these it is said plainly that, " if the earth were supported by any material substance or living creature, then that would require a second supporter, and for that second a third would be required. Here we have the absurdity of an interminable series. If the last of the series be supposed to remain from its own inherent power, then why may not the same power be supposed to exist in the first — that is, in the earth ? " Dr. Muir adds that Arjya Bhatta, one of the most ancient of Indian scientific astronomers, even maintained that the alternation of day and night is produced by the rotation of the earth on its own axis. Sanskrit Texts, part iv. p. 97. It is remarkable that the Copernican system should thus have been anticipated in the East, as by Aristarchos of Samos in the West, without making any impression on the thought of the age.
- ↑ R. V. X. 149, I ; Muir, Sanskrit TcxtSy part iv. p. 97.
