Development of Hinduism

SR No.: 007303
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: M M Ninan
Publisher: M M Ninan
Total Pages: 582
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 45 MB

Page 556

PURUSHA SUKTHAM
but cast away (the eighth) Marttanda (the sun) With seven sons (only) Aditi approached the former generation of gods. Again, for birth as for death she disclosed Marttana"
Brahmanaspati is elsewhere (R.V ii. 26,3) styled as "the father of the gods” while Brhaspati (who is same or a similar deity) is called "our father" (R.V. vi. 73,1). In R.V. ii 23,17 Brahmanaspathi himself is said to have been generated by Tvashtr superior to all creatures.
R.V.x. 129 is rendered as
1. Then was not non-existent nor existent: there was no realm of air, no sky beyond it. What covered in, and where? and what gave shelter? Was water there, unfathomed depth of water? 2 Death was not then, nor was there aught immortal: no sign was there, the day's and night's divider. That One Thing, breathless, breathed by its own nature: apart from it was nothing whatsoever. 3 Darkness there was: at first concealed in darkness this All was indiscriminated chaos. All that existed then was void and form less: by the great power of Warmth was born that Unit. 4 Thereafter rose Desire in the beginning, Desire, the primal seed and germ of Spirit. Sages who searched with their heart's thought discovered the existent's kinship in the non-existent. 5 Transversely was their severing line extended: what was above it then, and what below it? There were begetters, there were mighty forces, free action here and energy up yonder 6 Who verily knows and who can here declare it, whence it was born and whence comes this creation? The Gods are later than this world's production. Who knows then whence it first came into being? 7 He, the first origin of this creation, whether he formed it all or did not form it, Whose eye controls this world in highest heaven, he verily knows it, or perhaps he knows not.
Thus in this description we have two generations of gods already in existence after the cosmos came in existence. It was after these the purusha medha took place.
Once the cosmos with all its sentient beings came into existence, there happens a yajna.
yajna: (Sanskrit) "Worship; sacrifice."
A form of ritual worship especially prevalent in Vedic times, in which oblations - ghee, grains, spices and exotic woods - are offered into a fire according to scriptural injunctions while special mantras are chanted.
- The element fire, Agni, is revered as the divine messenger who carries offerings and prayers to the Gods.
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