Page:Durga Puja - With Notes and Illustrations.djvu/24

 redeemed and the immortal gods saved from their arch enemy the Demon. Suratha a king of the Chaitra family who flourished in the Savarni (the 8th) Manvantara of the world celebrated this festival in the month of Chaitra.

This myth of the Puranas regarding the origin of Durga, and her worship in the month of Chaitra in the spring season, under the name of Vasantotsava occurs in the Yajur Veda in a less metaphorical and more plain form. Brahma the Creator being desirous of multiplying his progeny himself became pregnant in a new form, and produced the Asuras with the thighs, and threw at them eatables in an earthen vessel. Then he destroyed the form which generated the Asuras. That form of his body became metamorphosed into dark night. He also created the gods with the mouth, and gave them nectar to drink in a golden cup, and the mouth became a bright day. The Gods are the day, and the Asuras the night. In the earlier Vedas the word Dyu, meaning day, light, is identified with the gods, and darkness, night, with the asuras.

The Dyu of the Vedas and the story of the battle between darkness and light for the kingdom of heaven have been obscured in the myth of the Puranas given above. The anecdote of Suratha (a name of the sun) the founder of the festival in the Vernal season is nothing more than an allegorical expression of the observance of the commencement of the solar year in earlier days when