Indra, the champion fighter and Soma-drinker

Nothing is more frequently impressed on the worshipper than Indra’s physical immensity and strength. He is “ so superior to men, heaven and earth do not suffice for his girdle,” and “ when he grasps the two boundless worlds, they are but a handful to him.” “ He contains all that exists as the tire of a wheel contains the spokes ” ; indeed, “ as the axle passes both wheels, so his greatness surpasses both worlds ” ; but, “not a hundred heavens and a hundred earths, with a thousand suns—no, not all created worlds could contain him." But it is Indra’s soma-drinking capacities which inspire the poets with the most extravagant absurdities ; he is said to drink it in pailfuls—tubfuls—thirty lakes at a sitting ; he is invited to drink freely, like a thirsty stag, or a bull roaming in a water less waste. The acme is reached when he is credited with two bellies, which are compared to two lakes, and which he is requested to fill—which he does with a will, if we are to believe the translator who reads a certain verse as saying that Indra cannot wait for the soma to be drawn for him, but gulps down cask, fau cet, and all’; it is doubtless after an exploit of the kind that he is admiringly described as staggering about at the sacrificial feast, tottering like a boat on the waters—“ soma in his belly, great might in his body, wisdom in his head, and lightning in his hand.” It is in this “ exhilarated ” condition that the hero-god performs his most notable deeds and most brilliantly earns his highest title, that of VRITRAHAN — “ Slayer of Vritra,” the cloud-demon of Drought. The same idea re-appears in a spiritualized form in the hymns in which Soma the god is invoked jointly with Indra and both are besought for help against fiends or earthly foes, when they impartially share the credit and praise. In one place Soma is called “the soul of Indra.”

The leader and war-god of the Aryas.

As the god of war on earth between men and men, Indra is not merely the Aryas’ champion and helper in single battles, he is the leader of the Aryan eastward movement generally ; it is he who guides them from the Indus to the Yamuna, and makes their path one of conquest : “ Look forward for us, O Indra, as a leader, and guide us onward towards greater riches. Take us safely across, lead us wisely  and in safety.” Nothing could mean more clearly: pushing eastward, crossing rivers, dislodging dasyns.

The dispenser of wealth.

It must be admitted that the goods which the Arya pleads for to Indra are always of the most material kind. When it is not rain or the dispersion of darkness, it is cows, horses, many sons healthy and strong, gold and riches of every kind, victory in war, and “ the riches of the enemies.” He is essentially the creation of a rushing, active, coveting time— a “ storm and stress ” period,—and his personality has none of the spiritual charm which radiates from such contemplative conceptions as Varuna or Aditi, or the philosophical play of fancy which makes the elusive forms of Agni and Soma so truly divine. Still, there is something very touching and tender in the confiding familiarity with which he is addressed in some few passages, as in the following: “ Come, O Indra, brother. . . . Here thy friends have lived from oldest time ; look now on thy later friends, and the youngest. . . . For thou wast our fathers’ friend of old and willingly didst grant them their wishes. . . . We call on thee, who dost not make thy ear deaf to our voice, but hearest us from afar. For thou, O gracious one, hast always been both father and mother to us . . . the most fatherly of fathers. “ The old songs hasten to thee ever anew . . . like harnessed steeds, like kine that lick their young calves, like wives that fondle and cling to the stateliest of husbands. . . . O stay, go not from us, thou mighty one, when I offer thee the well-pressed soma. I take hold of thy robe, as a son of his father’s robe, with my song. . . .” If we believe his worshippers, Indra certainly is not insensible to so much love and trust. The hymns abound in lists of the things he does for them and gives them : he threshes their foes as corn sheaves on the threshing-floor ; he comes to his friends with both hands full of riches, and benefits shoot from him as boughs from a tree—and he is asked to shower down wealth on his worshippers as the hook shakes the ripe fruit from the tree. . . . He is the helper of the poor—the deliverer and the comforter—a wall of defence—his friendship is indestructible— it is no idle phrase when one poet exclaims: “ We are thine and thou art ours ! . . “ The days dawn prosperously for him who says : Come, let us press the soma for Indra ! . . . That king’s power is never shaken in whose house Indra drinks strong soma mixed with milk; he flourishes in peace, conquers in war, and dwells securely at home, enjoying high renown.” It is but just to say that Indra is very exclusive in his friendships, and “ will have nothing to do with the wretch who does not press the soma” —  with such native peoples as have not become converted to the Aryan faith.

That one whose favors were so very substantial, and who was so lavish of them, should be the object of selfish and envious solicitations, is but natural. Many are the passages in which Indra is warned against rival petitioners, with a naive directness which is highly amusing, for instance: “ I will harness the bays to Indra’s chariot and draw him down by a new song. Do not let other hymn-singers—and there are many — turn thee from thy way.”— “ Speed thee hither, Indra, with thy mettlesome bays ; let no one snare thee, like a hird in a net, but drive straight on, as through a flat country.”— No less amusing are the remonstrances, nay, downright up braidings, with which one or other worshipper does not fear to assail his favorite god if he thinks himself slighted or inadequately remembered : “ Gracious are thy hands, O Indra, and beneficent when they bestow gifts on the singer. Where tarriest thou ? Why hastest thou not to the drinking-bout ? Or art thou disinclined to give ? ”— “Why do men call thee generous, thou wealthy one? A giver thou art, so I hear : then give to me. Let my hymn be blest with treasure, O mighty one. . . .”— Most characteristic of all in the way of chiding is the following, though there is no lack of separate passages where the god is called “ stingy,” and “ tardy,” and “ grudging ” : “ Had I, O Indra, so much wealth as thou possesses, I should freely give to my worshipper, thou source of wealth ; I should not leave him in poverty.—I would lavish riches on him day by day, wherever he might be ; for nothing is more valuable to us than thou art—not kindred, not even a father.”— Or this “ Were all the riches mine, O Indra, which thou ownest, my poet should be wealthy.—I would help him, bless him with gifts, O Lord of Might, were I the Lord of Ivine. . . . For no god nor mortal can hinder thy liberality, O Indra, when it is thy will to give.” 

Rivalry between Indra and Varuna.

When scholars tell us that Indra is a creation of a later and different epoch from that of the old sky-gods Dyaus and Varuna, a growth, moreover, of India’s own soil—(it were perhaps more correct to say Punjab’s)—they by no means rest their assertion on mere circumstantial evidence. There is, in the Rig-Veda itself, ample evidence of the impetuous Storm- and War-god having supplanted the two great Asuras, and that by no means peaceably, without strife and bitterness dividing the followers of the new worship and the old—until the latter were carried away by the tide of the times and public feeling. If the interpretation of scattered single lines or expressions might still leave room for doubt, the following entire hymn does not. Nothing could be more explicit. It is in the dramatic form of a dialogue : each god speaks for himself, and the poet decides between their rival claims. “( Vdruna speaks) : I am the King : mine is the lordship. All the gods are subject to me, the universal life-giver, and follow Varuna’s ordinances ; I rule in men’s highest sanctuary.—I am King Varuna ; my own are these primeval heavenly powers. . . . —I, O Indra, am Varuna, and mine are the two wide, deep, blessed worlds. A wise maker, I created all the beings ; Heaven and Earth are by me preserved.—I made the flowing waters to swell ; I established in their sacred seat the heavens; I, the holy Aditya, spread out the tripartite (or threefold) universe.” (Heaven, Earth, and Atmosphere.) “ (Indra speaks) : I am invoked by the steed-possessing of men, when pressed hard in battle ; I am the mighty one who stirs up the fight and whirls up the dust, in my overwhelming strength. All that have I done, nor can the might of all the gods restrain me, the Unconquered ; when I am exhilarated by libations and prayers, then quake both boundless worlds.” “ ( The priest speaks) : That thou didst all these things, all beings know ; and now thou hast proclaimed it to Varuna, O Ruler ! Thee, Indra, men praise as the slayer of Vritra ; it was thou who didst let loose the imprisoned waters.” There is another hymn—a much later one, as shown by the far abstruser tone and more elaborate diction —which tells (or commemorates) the same story. There the poet summons Agni out of the darkness to conduct the sacrifice. The divine hotar then announces that he is loth to forsake an old friend and go among strangers, but that he “ has long observed the guest of the other party,” has travelled through many places, and he concludes “ I now say farewell to the Father, the Asura ; I go from him to whom no sacrifices are offered to him to whom men sacrifice.—In choosing Indra, I give up the Father, though I have lived with him many years in friendship. Agni, Varuna, and Soma must give way ; the power goes to another, I see it come.”