The I. Religion of the Vedic Age Pre-Aryan India Proto-Australoids: aboriginal tribes with Stone Age cultures who still survive in central Indian jungles Dravidians: A major racial and linguistic family of dark-skinned non-Aryan peoples most numerous in South India; whether they are descendents of the Indus Valley culture is uncertain. 1800-1500 BCE: The Indo-Aryans from northwest India invaded and established population there. The disappearance of the Indus civilization was probably more to increasing aridity of the climate than to the invasion if Indo-Aryan tribes. Dasas (Dasyus): dark-skinned indigenous inhabitants of northwest India subdued by invading Aryans; the Dasas were probably survivors from the Indus Valley culture and kindred peoples of the Punjab. Karma: "deeds" "works", the principle of inexorable cause and effect. Shiva: (depicted with) a trident headpiece over a frontal human face flanked by two side faces. The Coming of the Indo-Aryans Aryans (Indo-Europeans): semi-nomadic peoples who migrated from eastern Europe and central Asia westward to become the ancestors of the Greeks, Romans, Celts, and Teutons, and eastward to Persia and India (ca. 1500 BCE); their Sanskrit culture infuses the dominant tradition in India today. -began to be less pastoral and more agricultural. Brought cows, horses, sheep, goats, and dogs to India. Ancient diet of milk and meat. Made the stimulating liquid called soma, squeezed from an unknown stalk, which they drank during lengthy rituals after it was mixed with milk. Offered libations of this drink to their gods when they sacrificed. The Ramayana and the Mahabharata: Hindu epics that told the stories of the intertribal clashed between the Aryans and the Dasas. Aryan Social Structure: Each tribe had its own chieftain, known as a rajah. Office was hereditary. -distinguished by large retinue, a palace, and glittering apparel -maintained a private army for the protection of his people but also gathered priests to secure divine blessing on his subjects and the gods' approval of his own acts. The father or pitar was the head of the family, owner of property, and family priest. The wife and mother or matar was a comparatively free individual. Her authority in the home over the children and servants was relatively free from restraints. Wives joined husbands in domestic rites. Daughters were free to remain unmarried without censure and had a voice in selecting a husband and in shaping the marriage contract. Aryans further developed oral tradition, more elaborate ritual sacrifices, and developed folktales and epic stories. Hymns and prayers of their priests gave voice to their expanding religious conceptions.
- Hinduism's earliest sacred writings emerged: the samhitas ("collection") - the Rig-Veda, Sama-Veda, Yajur-Veda, and Atharva Veda Veda: "sacred knowledge", ancient Brahmanic rituals and hymns The Rig-Veda The Rig-Veda: literally means "the Veda of stanzas of praise". It is a collection of over 1,000 Sanskrit hymns, the liturgical handbook of early Aryan hotar priests, the oldest portion of Brahmanic "revealed" (shruti) sacred literature. At first these hymns existed only in oral form. Prayers addressed to a single or often to two or more deities called devas, or "shining ones". Aryans worshipped with three fires: - A western one: the garhapatya, round in shape, representing the earth, the only one mentioned in the Rig-Veda. - An eastern one: the ahavaniya, square in shape, representing the four-directional heavens. - A southern one: the dakshina, shaped like a half moon and representing the dome of air between earth and heaven. Public Rites: Several orders or priests officiated at public rites. A seat on strewn grass near the fires was reserved for the invisible divine guests. -offerings were one or more: clarified or melted, butter (ghee), grain, soma, a goat, sheep, cow, ox, or a horse (horse= the best, most $ and effective) The adhvaryu was the altar builder. Prepared the materials for sacrifice and manually administered them, reciting the appropriate words. The hotar was the libation pourer and invoker of the gods to enjoy the sacrificial offerings and soma. Agnidh or kindler of the sacrificial fire. The Brahmin, the one who in his person represented the central sacred petition or brahman (the prayer) Brahman and the Brahmin's Role Brahman: in Vedic literature, a mana-like magical potency especially associated with sacred utterances (mantras) and prayer; in later philosophical works, Brahman is the ultimate ground of all forms phenomena, and the Word Soul. Another word used in the Rig-Veda to convey a similar meaning is vac or speech. Vacaspati is one of the names of Brahmanaspati. Brihaspati (Brahmanaspati) is a ritual deity, the power of prayer personified. The Brahmin was not merely one who used verbal symbols to point to sacred realities or to address gods. Rather than signifying some external deity, the sacred syllables constituted the holy power in the living moment. Or, to put it another way, the sacred reality actualized itself in the Brahmin's throat. Ritual Sacrifice: Soma The Brahmin performed ritual sacrifices of grain, flesh, and liquids. The most important was a sacred drink, soma (emblem of a deity, Soma), poured out as a libation on a sacred
fire or consumed by participants. Soma is a sacred drink; as Soma, the ritual priest-god of libations. -1) finding/purchasing the plant from which the juice was extracted. -2) reverent transportation by cart or on human heads to the location of the pressing out -3) drawing of the water for the soaking of the now dried-out stems, -4) the squeezing of the stems between "pressing-stones" after they were swollen with water -5) straining the liquid through woolen strainers (sound: "bellowing of a bull", sight "flash of a thin golden color") -6) mixing liquid with milk or honey -7) offering it to the gods and distributing it among humans The soma was a hallucinogenic plant Amanita muscaria Sacrifice and Cosmic Origins New cosmic gods emerged when the rituals were understood to affect not only the gods but the cosmos itself. The cosmos became a sacramental structure throughout. - universe as having been in its totality a cosmic cow or a horse or na man that was primordially sacrificed and dismembered Purusha: the original cosmic Person; in later philosophies, pure consciousness the nonmaterial, coeternal counterpart to prakriti The names of the four varna (classes of castes) are the Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaisya, and Shudra. Varna: classes of castes Brahmin: a member of the Brahmana or priestly class of castes, the highest group in the varna ordering of society. Kshatriya: "Rajanyas", the warrior-chieftain class of castes, the second ranking group in the varnas. Vaisya: the merchant, artisan, and small landholder class of castes, third in the varna order. Shudra: worker class of castes, fourth and lowest ranking in the varna social order. The idea that the whole world originated from a cosmic sacrifice appears in a hymn that honors Vishvakarman as the world maker (or architect)--the craftsman. Another idea from a hymn celebrates Hiranyagarbha, the Golden Egg of Germ (or the womb of great waters that bore the golden egg) from which sprang Prajapati, the Creator, the Maker of gods, humans, and animals who did his creating from the materials supplied by the egg or germ itself. Deities of Earth and Sky Dyaus Pitar or Father Sky (also in Greeks and Romans) Prithivi Mater or Mother Broad-earth (Greeks) Mitra, a highly moralized god representing faith keeping and loyalty, but perhaps originally a sun god (Mithra of the Iranians). Indra Indra is the god of storms and the monsoon, slayer of Vritra in a mythic cosmology in the
Rig-Veda. Ruler of the gods in the mid-region of the sky. God of war as well. Depicted with a thunderbolt, the vajra, in his hand. Also the patron of the Aryans. Killed the drought-dragan Vritra. Henotheism The Vedic attitude is best described as ritual or devotional henotheism. Henotheism is flattering ritual attribution of supreme position and a vast array of powers to one of the many gods, temporarily ignoring, but not denying, the existence of the others. Rudra (Shiva) Rudra: the mountain god of the north wind, sometimes destroyer, sometimes healer, later worshipped under the name Siva, "auspicious". He was feared and awed. Ushas, a Goddess Ushas: a white-robed goddess of the dawn; eternally young, she rides a chariot driven by her male attendants, the twin Asvins, with red-spotted horses. Also plural as female divinities personified: -1) Apah: primal waters -2) Saraswati and Ganga: rivers -3) Vac: ritual power of speech Vayu: the wind, bearer or performs, and the tempestuous little Maruts, or storm spirits. Many sun gods, probably representing different phases of light. Surya: caused the constellations Savitar: bright with sunbeams, traversed in the air's mid-region Yama: the first man to die, now the god of the dead, the judge and ruler of the departed. Vishnu: encompassed the extent of earth, air, and sky and redeemed the world from night. Varuna: