Page:The Religion of the Veda.djvu/189

 Transparent and Opaque Gods 173

I went and asked the waning moon, The waning moon replied :

“ I have been smitten with a sword,1 My sorry face I hide.” ‘

I went and asked the lovely sun,

The deer sun gave reply ;

“Nine days I ’11 seek, and on the tenth I’ll not set in the sky,WI

The familiar notion that the sun oversees every— thing” appeals in this instance to the simple reasoning power of shepherd folk. A more suitable origin for a. shepherd god it is not easy to imagine. They there- fore dress him out in shepherd’s clothes, feed him on shopherd’s food, and turn him into a. heavenly bell». Wether of their ﬂocks. But his real natural history does not seem to me to be very much disguised by the simpleuminded fable. We may safely call Pﬂshan . a. translucent god.

The most prominent of the gods of the Rig-Veda. is Indra. About two hundred and ﬁfty hymns are devoted to his praise, perhaps one-fourth of all the hymns of the collection. No account of Vedic religion can pass by his big personality, and yet his essence and quality are that of lower, rather than higher

1 Cf. the Lithuanian folk-song, above, p.114.

9 Professor Chase’s rendering, thmaﬂz'mz: a f Me American Philau legion? Association, vol. XML, p. 193.

3”H lLoS 7min! 57:2'775, ﬂied 3.. 277 ; xEschylus, Pmmeﬂieus Bound, gI.