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CHAPTER III.

THE RIG VEDA. THE UPPER GODS.


The hymns of the Rig Veda may be divided into three classes, those in
which are especially lauded the older divinities, those in which
appear as most prominent the sacrificial gods, and those in which a
long-weakened polytheism is giving place to the light of a clearer
pantheism. In each category there are hymns of different age and
quality, for neither did the more ancient with the growth of new
divinities cease to be revered, nor did pantheism inhibit the formal
acknowledgment of the primitive pantheon. The cult once established
persisted, and even when, at a later time, all the gods had been
reduced to nominal fractions of the All-god, their ritualistic
individuality still was preserved. The chief reason for this lies in
the nature of these gods and in the attitude of the worshipper. No
matter how much the cult of later gods might prevail, the other gods,
who represented the daily phenomena of nature, were still visible,
awe-inspiring, divine. The firmest pantheist questioned not the
advisability of propitiating the sun-god, however much he might regard
this god as but a part of one that was greater. Belief in India was
never so philosophical that the believer did not dread the lightning,
and seek to avert it by praying to the special god that wielded it.
But active veneration in later times was extended in fact only to the