Indra’s stormy infancy

Indra clearly was the god for a struggling, conquering, unscrupulously pushing people, rather than the great Aditya—majestic, serene, and just. In what way the supremacy was, so to speak, officially transferred to him, there is nothing to inform us. There is quite a number of passages, even of whole hymns, full of allusions to Indra’s birth, childhood, early exploits, and the like. But the wording is so obscure, most of the things alluded to are so utterly unknown to us, that nothing coherent or satisfactory can be made out of all these texts. Heaven and earth are said to quake with fear before his anger at his birth. His mother (who is she?) seems to die almost as soon as he is born ; then he is said to have taken his father by the foot and hurled him down. There are also hints of conspiracy to kill him in his sleep or on his wanderings, and he himself is made to say : “ Pressed hard by hunger, I cooked dogs’ entrails; I found no god who would take pity on me ; I saw my wife deeply bowed with grief ; then the eagle brought me sweet Soma.” it would be vain to try to piece a consistent story out of these shreds : for there are plenty of other lines, even in the same hymn, which point to different versions of the same events. All that we can gather from the above quotations, and other passages, is the plain allusion (in mythical language) to the antagonism and persecution of which he is the object, on the part of the other gods, i. e., the followers of the older gods.

Harmony restored

Neither do we know when or how the feud between “ the gods ” was laid. But certain it is that harmony was restored at some time, for we meet with numerous hymns addressed to Indra and Vdruna jointly ; they peacefully share at last the government of the world, each in his own line. This is expressly intimated in a text: “ The one [Indra] loves to slay foes, the other [Vdruna] always maintains his ordinances.” Indra is also frequently addressed jointly with several of the greater gods — with Agni, Soma, Vayu, and others. Vayu and Agni, indeed, became in the course of time most closely associated with him—till, at the later period of Brahmanic theology, the three—Rain, Fire, and Wind—formed a sort of mystic trinity or triad.

Parjanya, the Storm-god

The personality of Indra, though sufficiently transparent, still has enough of complexity in its duality (Storm-god and War-god) to suggest evolution from simpler material, from a more directly naturalistic conception. We shall hardly go wrongif we seek the latter in PARJANYA, the Storm-god pure and simple, originally neither more nor less than the rain-cloud or the thunder-cloud itself, for parjanya is frequently used in the Rig-Veda as acommon noun for cloud. Of several texts, one is absolutely decisive: “Even during the day the Maruts shed darkness by the water-bringing parjanya." Now nothing but a cloud can shed dark- ness during the day. Agni is asked to “send the rain-bringing parjanya hither”; then the plural is used : “ the parjanya [clouds] bring joy to the earth.” But these are isolated survivals. The Rain-and-Storm god (for India knows little of our quiet rains) is almost always separated from the cloud, which is sometimes his chariot, sometimes the barrel or skin filled with the water which he pours down on the worlds ; then he is the “ Son of Heaven,” who “speaks a gleam-accompanied, resounding word which brings refreshment.” Parjanya has one peculiar feature : he pours the seed on the earth ; it enters the plants andthere becomes the germ. His name is hardly ever mentioned without some allusion being made to this important duty of his, and he is in consequence directly invoked as the special guardian of plants :“ Parjanya, who brings us food through the plants.”

Does not this forcibly remind us of that curious Old-Eranian belief that the seeds of all plants were carried down to earth by the rain ? From all this it will be seen that Parjanya very possibly goes back to the oldest Aryan period, and might fairly claim a place, in Aryan India, among the “ Older gods,” the subject-matter of our preceding chapter. But, with every presumption in favor of the suggestion, which great scholars endorse, two the link is broken, direct proof is wanting, no corresponding name being found in Indo-Eranian antiquity. One thing is sure : that Indra and Parjanya are distinct mythical persons, not convertible quantities. We have a text which says expressly: “ Great Indra, who is like to Parjanya in power.” It is extremely probable that at one time they were, so to speak, parallel gods, i. e., that two different Aryan tribes worshipped the Storm-and-Rain god under these two different names, with some differences also in their functions; that Indra happened to be the god of the more pushing, warlike tribes, and thus early developed into the champion of Aryan conquest, and by his growing popularity quickly eclipsed his former brother. Among the five or six hymns to Parjanya, there is one—which is one of the very few Vedic pieces of complete and faultless poetical beauty, without anticlimaxes or any of the puerilities or vulgarities which so often leave us disappointed with otherwise fine effusions :

“  Sing unto the strong with these songs, laud Parjanya, with praise worship him. Loud bellows the Bull ; he lays down the seed and fruit in the herbs.— He cleaves the trees asunder, he slays the Rakshasas ; all living creatures fear the wearer of the mighty bolt. Even the sinless trembles before him, the giver of rain, for Parjanya, thundering, slays the evil-doers.—As a driver who urges his horses with his whip, he makes the rainy messengers appear. From far arises the roar of the lion when Parjanya makes the cloud full of rain. The winds rage, the lightnings shoot through the air, the herbs sprout forth from the ground, the heavens overflow, refreshment is borne to all creatures when Parjanya blesses the earth with rain.. Thou, Parjanya, shield us well, by whose doing the earth is shaken, by whose doing the hoofed herd is supported, by whose doing herbs of all kinds sprout forth. —. . . . Oh come to us with the thunder-cloud, pouring down the waters, Asura, our father. Roar, thunder, give fruit, fly round us with thy chariot that is filled with water. Pull strongly the downward-bent, well-fastened water-skin ; may the heights and the valleys be made even.—. Lift up the great barrel, pour down ; loosened may the streams rush forward. Drench heaven and earth, give good drink to the kine. . . Well hast thou poured down the rain, now cease ; thou makest that we can pass over the dry plains ; thou hast made the herbs to sprout that we may eat, and hast received praise from the creatures.”

The Rig-Veda was not generally known, even In name, sixty years ago, except among English and a few German scholars,—certainly not in Russia. Yet we find in the works of the great Russian poet Pushkin a short poem, which might be a free paraphrase on this hymn to Parjanya. We must be permitted to translate it for our readers, as it suggests interesting comparisons, and may serve as an additional warning not to be too prompt to suspect connections or imitation wherever there is similarity of thought or imagery. Besides, the poem is both short and beautiful.

                                                                                                                                                       THE CLOUD.
                                                                                                                                       Thou latest straggler of a storm that ’s fled !
                                                                                                                                          Alone thou floatest o’er the joyous blue,
                                                                                                                                        And castest, on thy envious course and sad,
                                                                                                                                                 O’er day reviving an ungenial hue.
                                                                                                                                         It was but now thy shade the sky o’erspread.
                                                                                                                                       And from thy gloom the threatening lightning broke,
                                                                                                                                          And from thy womb the mystic thunder spoke,
                                                                                                                                          And with thy rain the thirsting earth was fed.
                                                                                                                                         Enough then ! hie thee from the peaceful scene !
                                                                                                                                         Refreshed is earth, and long dispersed the storm ;
                                                                                                                                         The zephyr courts the trees and sweeps thy form
                                                                                                                                               Far from the azure of the sky serene.

Rudra

But little need be added specially about Indra’s companions in battle, the warlike Maruts—the Storm-Winds. They are the sons of PRISHNI, the Cloud-cow, and of Rudra, rather a subordinate deity in the Veda, though undoubtedly very old, but who, in later Brahmanism and especially Hinduism, rose to the highest rank. He is thought by the latest scholars to be a personification of the stormy sky, as opposed to the serene sky—Varuna. Ludwig suggests that the oldest conception of Dyaus —the Sky in its entirety, in all its manifestations — split itself into those of Varuna and Rudra, the latter representing the elementary, the former the spiritual and moral side of the original conception —of course a later evolution, yet older than Indra. Rudra undoubtedly is a wielder of the thunderbolt : it is his deadly arrow, with which he is entreated not to strike the worshipper, or his children, or his cattle, but, if need be, to draw his mighty bow against “somebody else.” “The Terrible” Crudra ) is his name, and terrible he is ; and the flattering things which are said of and to him, about his beauty, his splendor, his healing powers, must be taken as the deprecatory utterances of fear. The best that is expected of him is to spare. It will be seen how widely this deity differs from Indra.

The Maruts

The Maruts themselves are frequently called Rudras. They appear always in troops ; sometimes they are twenty-seven, sometimes sixty-six; then there are said to be thousands of them—ways of saying “ a great many.” They are all alike ; no distinctions are made between them, either of age or appearance ; they always act in a body and are “ of one mind.” Sometimes they drive along “with golden mantles waving, sometimes “ cloaked in rain,” and once they are shown “clothed in the woolly cloud ” as they “ split open the rock with might.” Their chariots, drawn by self-yoked dappled mares or spotted deer, fleet as birds, now are “ laden with lightning,” now with buckets and barrels of water which they pour down as they go, singing loudly. Their very sweat is rain, and pleasant to the ear is the crack of their whips (the whistle and whizz of the wind that ushers in a storm). They are boisterous and noisy. The hymns are simply inexhaustible on this theme, and rise on some occasions to naturalistic poetry of great beauty. No enemy is there to face them, not in heaven nor on earth ; they make the mountains to tremble, they rend and shake the trees like wild elephants ; the earth totters and quakes before them with fear “ as an aged king.” Of course they are entreated for all the usual good things of which Indra is commonly the dispenser, and they are not spared rebuke any more than Indra when they do not respond promptly enough to their votaries’ instances “ Were ye but mortals, O sons of Prishni, and your worshipper were an immortal—ye should not be neglected as the insect (?) in the grass, nor should ye go the road to Yama [die] ; nor be perpetually subjected to distress and danger.”