Vedic India as embodied principally in the Rig-Veda / [Zénaïde A. Ragozin].

  • Ragozin, Zénaïde A. (Zénaïde Alexeïevna), 1835-1924.
Date:
[1895]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Vedic India as embodied principally in the Rig-Veda / [Zénaïde A. Ragozin]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    the arid space ; he reaches earth with the clear waters ; he devours what is old (wood), and pene- trates into new plants.” (I., 95, 10.) And again : “When he is brought down from the highest Father o o [Dyaus, Heaven], he climbs into the sapful plants to be born again, ever most young.” 23. This is undoubtedly one of the ways in which Agni was supposed to have descended to the earth. But this manifestation is accomplished in a very roundabout way and continually repeated. The question remained, in what more direct manner he came among men for the first time in his more fa- miliar and visible form—for Agni’s original home is not sought on earth. It is said : “ Agni was born first in heaven ; his second birth is with us ; the third in the clouds, imperishable. . . .” (X.,45, 1.) The Aryas, no doubt, had several myths embodying their beliefs or traditions—speculations or reminiscences —on this fascinating question, which has not only not lost any of its interest in the course of the ages, but rather gained more, in the first place because we are better able to measure and appraise all that fire has done for our race, in the second because we have hardly arrived nearer to a reliable or at least plausible solution, and we are so made that curiosity never relents until satisfied. But the Rig-Veda is not a book of mythology. Myths are not told by the old Rishis, but only alluded to as things well known to their audience,—just as a modern preacher might refer to Jonah’s adventure with the whale or the Hebrew boys’ fortitude before the fiery ordeal, without every time narrating at length the familiar