Sri Aurobindo. The Secret of the Veda with Selected Hymns

Sri Aurobindo

The Secret of the Veda

with Selected Hymns

Chapter XIV. The Cow and the Angiras Legend

We must now pursue this image of the Cow which we are using as a key to the sense of the Veda, into the striking Vedic parable or legend of the Angiras Rishis, on the whole the most important of all the Vedic myths.

The Vedic hymns, whatever else they may be, are throughout an invocation to certain “Aryan” gods, friends and helpers of man, for ends which are held by the singers,– or seers, as they call themselves (kavi, ṛṣi, vipra),– to be supremely desirable (vara, vāra). These desirable ends, these boons of the gods are summed up in the words rayi, rādhas, which may mean physically wealth or prosperity, and psychologically a felicity or enjoyment which consists in the abundance of certain forms of spiritual wealth. Man contributes as his share of the joint effort the work of the sacrifice, the Word, the Soma Wine and the ghṛtá or clarified butter. The Gods are born in the sacrifice, they increase by the Word, the Wine and the Ghrita and in that strength and in the ecstasy and intoxication of the Wine they accomplish the aims of the sacrificer. The chief elements of the wealth thus acquired are the Cow and the Horse; but there are also others, hiraṇya, gold, vīra, men or heroes, ratha, chariots, prajā or apatya, offspring. The very means of the sacrifice, the fire, the Soma, the ghṛta, are supplied by the Gods and they attend the sacrifice as its priests, purifiers, upholders, heroes of its warfare,– for there are those who hate the sacrifice and the Word, attack the sacrificer and tear or withhold from him the coveted wealth. The chief conditions of the prosperity so ardently desired are the rising of the Dawn and the Sun and the downpour of the rain of heaven and of the seven rivers,– physical or mystic,– called in the Veda the Mighty Ones of heaven. But even this prosperity, this fullness of cows, horses, gold, men, chariots, offspring, is not a final end in itself; all this is a means towards the opening up of the other worlds, the winning of Swar, the ascent to the solar heavens, the attainment by the path of the Truth to the Light and to the heavenly Bliss where the mortal arrives at Immortality.

Such is the undoubted substance of the Veda. The ritual and mythological sense which has been given to it from very ancient times is well known and need not be particularised; in sum, it is the performance of sacrificial worship as the chief duty of man with a view to the enjoyment of wealth here and heaven hereafter. We know also the modern view of the matter in which the Veda is a worship of the personified sun, moon, stars, dawn, wind, rain, fire, sky, rivers and other deities of Nature, the propitiation of these gods by sacrifice, the winning and holding of wealth in this life, chiefly from human and Dravidian enemies and against hostile demons and mortal plunderers, and after death man’s attainment to the Paradise of the gods. We now find, that however valid these ideas may have been for the vulgar, they were not the inner sense of the Veda to the seers, the illumined minds (kavi, vipra) of the Vedic age. For them these material objects were symbols of the immaterial; the cows were the radiances or illuminations of a divine Dawn, the horses and chariots were symbols of force and movement, gold was light, the shining wealth of a divine Sun – the true light, ṛtaṃ jyotiḥ; both the wealth acquired by the sacrifice and the sacrifice itself in all their details symbolised man’s effort and his means towards a greater end, the acquisition of immortality. The aspiration of the Vedic seer was the enrichment and expansion of man’s being, the birth and the formation of the godheads in his life-sacrifice, the increase of the Force, Truth, Light, Joy of which they are the powers until through the enlarged and ever-opening worlds of his being the soul of man rises, sees the divine doors (devīr dvāraḥ) swing open to his call and enters into the supreme felicity of a divine existence beyond heaven and earth. This ascent is the parable of the Angiras Rishis.

All the gods are conquerors and givers of the Cow, the Horse and the divine riches, but it is especially the great deity Indra who is the hero and fighter in this warfare and who wins for man the Light and the Force. Therefore Indra is constantly addressed as the Master of the herds, gopati; he is even imaged as himself the cow and the horse; he is the good milker whom the Rishi wishes to milk and what he yields are perfect forms and ultimate thoughts; he is Vrishabha, the Bull of the herds; his is the wealth of cows and horses which man covets. It is even said in VI.28.5, “O people, these that are the cows, they are Indra; it is Indra I desire with my heart and with my mind.” This identification of the cows and Indra is important and we shall have to return to it, when we deal with Madhuchchhandas’ hymns to that deity.

But ordinarily the Rishis image the acquisition of this wealth as a conquest effected against certain powers, the Dasyus, sometimes represented as possessing the coveted riches which have to be ravished from them by violence, sometimes as stealing them from the Aryan who has then to discover and recover the lost wealth by the aid of the gods. The Dasyus who withhold or steal the cows are called the Panis, a word which seems originally to have meant doers, dealers or traffickers; but this significance is sometimes coloured by its further sense of “misers”. Their chief is Vala, a demon whose name signifies probably the circumscriber or “encloser”, as Vritra means the opponent, obstructer or enfolding coverer. It is easy to suggest, as do the scholars who would read as much primitive history as possible into the Veda, that the Panis are the Dravidians and Vala is their chief or god.

But this sense can only be upheld in isolated passages; in many hymns it is incompatible with the actual words of the Rishis and turns into a jumble of gaudy nonsense their images and figures. We have seen something of this incompatibility already; it will become clearer to us as we examine more closely the mythus of the lost cows.

Vala dwells in a lair, a hole (bila) in the mountains; Indra and the Angiras Rishis have to pursue him there and force him to give up his wealth; for he is Vala of the cows, valaṃ gomantam. The Panis also are represented as concealing the stolen herds in a cave of the mountain which is called their concealing prison, vavrá, or the pen of the cows, vrajá, or sometimes in a significant phrase, gavyam ūrvam, literally the cowey wideness or in the other sense of go “the luminous wideness”, the vast wealth of the shining herds. To recover this lost wealth the sacrifice has to be performed; the Angirases or else Brihaspati and the Angirases have to chant the true word, the mántra; Sarama the heavenly hound has to find out the cows in the cave of the Panis; Indra strong with the Soma wine and the Angirases, the seers, his companions, have to follow the track, enter the cave or violently break open the strong places of the hill, defeat the Panis and drive upward the delivered herds.

Let us, first, take note of certain features which ought not to be overlooked when we seek to determine the interpretation of this parable or this myth. In the first place the legend, however precise in its images, is not yet in the Veda a simple mythological tradition, but is used with a certain freedom and fluidity which betrays the significant image behind the sacred tradition. Often it is stripped of the mythological aspect and applied to the personal need or aspiration of the singer. For it is an action of which Indra is always capable; although he has done it once for all in the type by means of the Angirases, yet he repeats the type continually even in the present, he is constantly the seeker of the cows, gavéṣaṇa, and the restorer of the stolen wealth.

Sometimes we have simply the fact of the stolen cows and the recovery by Indra without any reference to Sarama or the Angirases or the Panis. But it is not always Indra who recovers the herds. We have for instance a hymn to Agni, the second of the fifth Mandala, a hymn of the Atris, in which the singer applies the image of the stolen cows to himself in a language which clearly betrays its symbolism. Agni, long repressed in her womb by mother Earth who is unwilling to give him to the father Heaven, held and concealed in her so long as she is compressed into limited form (peṣī), at length comes to birth when she becomes great and vast (mahiṣī). The birth of Agni is associated with a manifestation or vision of luminous herds. “I beheld afar in a field one shaping his weapons who was golden-tusked and pure-bright of hue; I give to him the Amrita (the immortal essence, Soma) in separate parts; what shall they do to me who have not Indra and have not the word? I beheld in the field as it were a happy herd ranging continuously, many, shining; they seized them not, for he was born; even those (cows) that were old, become young again.” But if these Dasyus who have not Indra, nor the word, are at present powerless to seize on the luminous herds, it was otherwise before this bright and formidable godhead was born. “Who were they that divorced my strength (maryakam; my host of men, my heroes, vīra) from the cows? for they (my men) had no warrior and protector of the kine. Let those who took them from me, release them; he knows and comes driving to us the cattle.”

What, we may fairly ask, are these shining herds, these cows who were old and become young again? Certainly, they are not physical herds, nor is it any earthly field by the Yamuna or the Jhelum that is the scene of this splendid vision of the golden-tusked warrior god and the herds of the shining cattle. They are the herds either of the physical or of the divine Dawn and the language suits ill with the former interpretation; this mystical vision is surely a figure of the divine illumination. They are radiances that were stolen by the powers of darkness and are now divinely recovered not by the god of the physical fire, but by the flaming Force which was concealed in the littleness of the material existence and is now liberated into the clarities of an illumined mental action.

Indra is not, then, the only god who can break up the tenebrous cave and restore the lost radiances. There are other deities to whom various hymns make the attribution of this great victory. Usha is one of them, the divine Dawn, mother of these herds. “True with the gods who are true, great with the gods who are great, sacrificial godhead with the gods sacrificial, she breaks open the strong places, she gives of the shining herds; the cows low towards the Dawn!” (VII.75.7). Agni is another; sometimes he wars by himself as we have already seen, sometimes along with Indra – “Ye two warred over the cows, O Indra, O Agni” (VI.60.2) – or, again, with Soma,– “O Agni and Soma, that heroic might of yours was made conscient when ye robbed the Pani of the cows” (I.93.4). Soma in another passage is associated in this victory with Indra; “This god born by force stayed, with Indra as his comrade, the Pani” and performed all the exploits of the gods warring against the Dasyus (VI.44.22). The Ashwins also are credited with the same achievement in VI.62.11, “Ye two open the doors of the strong pen full of the kine” and again in I.112.18, “O Angiras, (the twin Ashwins are sometimes unified in a single appellation), ye two take delight by the mind and enter first in the opening of the stream of the cows,” where the sense is evidently the liberated, outflowing stream or sea of the Light.

Brihaspati is more frequently the hero of this victory. “Brihaspati, coming first into birth from the great Light in the supreme ether, seven-mouthed, multiply-born, seven-rayed, dispelled the darknesses; he with his host that possess the stubh and the Rik broke Vala into pieces by his cry. Shouting Brihaspati drove upwards the bright herds that speed the offering and they lowed in reply” (IV.50). And again in VI.73.1 and 3, “Brihaspati who is the hill-breaker, the first-born, the Angirasa.... Brihaspati conquered the treasures (vásūni), great pens this god won full of the kine.” The Maruts also, singers of the Rik like Brihaspati, are associated, though less directly in this divine action. “He whom ye foster, O Maruts, shall break open the pen” (VI.66.8), and elsewhere we hear of the cows of the Maruts (I.38.2). Pushan, the Increaser, a form of the sun-god is also invoked for the pursuit and recovery of the stolen cattle, (VI.54); “Let Pushan follow after our kine, let him protect our war-steeds.... Pushan, go thou after the kine.... Let him drive back to us that which was lost.” Even Saraswati becomes a slayer of the Panis. And in Madhuchchhandas’ hymn (I.11.5) we have this striking image, “O lord of the thunderbolt, thou didst uncover the hole of Vala of the cows; the gods, unfearing, entered speeding (or putting forth their force) into thee.”

Is there a definite sense in these variations which will bind them together into a single coherent idea or is it at random that the Rishis invoke now this and now the other deity in the search and war for their lost cattle? If we will consent to take the ideas of the Veda as a whole instead of bewildering ourselves in the play of separate detail, we shall find a very simple and sufficient answer. This matter of the lost herds is only part of a whole system of connected symbols and images. They are recovered by the sacrifice and the fiery god Agni is the flame, the power and the priest of the sacrifice; – by the Word, and Brihaspati is the father of the Word, the Maruts its singers or Brahmas, brahmāṇo marutaḥ, Saraswati its inspiration; – by the Wine, and Soma is the god of the Wine and the Ashwins its seekers, finders, givers, drinkers. The herds are the herds of Light and the Light comes by the Dawn and by the Sun of whom Pushan is a form. Finally, Indra is the head of all these gods, lord of the light, king of the luminous heaven called Swar,– he is, we say, the luminous or divine Mind; into him all the gods enter and take part in his unveiling of the hidden light. We see therefore that there is a perfect appropriateness in the attribution of one and the same victory to these different deities and in Madhuchchhandas’ image of the gods entering into Indra for the stroke against Vala. Nothing has been done at random or in obedience to a confused fluidity of ideas. The Veda is perfect and beautiful in its coherence and its unity.

Moreover, the conquest of the Light is only part of the great action of the Vedic sacrifice. The gods have to win by it all the boons (viśvā vāryā) which are necessary for the conquest of immortality and the emergence of the hidden illuminations is only one of these. Force, the Horse, is as necessary as Light, the Cow; not only must Vala be reached and the light won from his jealous grasp, but Vritra must be slain and the waters released; the emergence of the shining herds means the rising of the Dawn and the Sun; that again is incomplete without the sacrifice, the fire, the wine. All these things are different members of one action, sometimes mentioned separately, sometimes in groups, sometimes together as if in a single action, a grand total conquest. And the result of their possession is the revelation of the vast Truth and the conquest of Swar, the luminous world, called frequently the wide other world, urúm u lokám or simply u lokám. We must grasp this unity first if we are to understand the separate introduction of these symbols in the various passages of the Rig Veda.

Thus in VI.73 which has already been cited, we find a brief hymn of three verses in which these symbols are briefly put together in their unity; it might almost be described as one of the mnemonic hymns of the Veda which serve to keep in mind the unity of its sense and its symbolism. “He who is the hill-breaker, first-born, possessed of the truth, Brihaspati, the Angirasa, the giver of the oblation, pervader of the two worlds, dweller in the heat and light (of the sun), our father, roars aloud as the Bull to the two firmaments. Brihaspati who for man the voyager has fashioned that other world in the calling of the gods, slaying the Vritra-forces breaks open the cities, conquering foes and overpowering unfriends in his battles. Brihaspati conquers for him the treasures, great pens this god wins full of the kine, seeking the conquest of the world of Swar, unassailable; Brihaspati slays the Foe by the hymns of illumination (arkaiḥ).” We see at once the unity of this many-sided symbolism.

Another passage more mystic in its language brings in the idea of the dawn and the restoration or new-birth of light in the sun which are not expressly mentioned in the brief hymn to Brihaspati. It is in the praise of Soma of which the opening phrase has already been cited, VI.44.22; “This god born by force stayed with Indra as his comrade the Pani; he it was wrested from his own unblest father (the divided being) his weapons of war and his forms of knowledge (māyāḥ), he it was made the Dawns glorious in their lord, he it was created in the Sun the Light within, he it was found the triple principle (of immortality) in heaven in its regions of splendour (the three worlds of Swar) and in the tripartite worlds the hidden immortality (this is the giving of the Amrita in separate parts alluded to in the Atris’ hymn to Agni, the threefold offering of the Soma given on the three levels, triṣu sānuṣu, body, life and mind); he it was supported widely heaven and earth, he it was fashioned the car with the seven rays; he it was held by his force the ripe yield (of the madhu or ghṛta) in the cows, even the fountain of the ten movements.” It certainly seems astonishing to me that so many acute and eager minds should have read such hymns as these without realising that they are the sacred poems of symbolists and mystics, not of Nature-worshipping barbarians or of rude Aryan invaders warring with the civilised and Vedantic Dravidians.

Let us now pass rapidly through certain other passages in which there is a more scattered collocation of these symbols. First, we find that in this image of the cavern-pen in the hill, as elsewhere, the Cow and Horse go together. We have seen Pushan called upon to seek for the cows and protect the horses. The two forms of the Aryan’s wealth always at the mercy of marauders? But let us see. “So in thy ecstasy of the Soma thou didst break open, O hero (Indra), the pen of the Cow and the Horse, like a city” (VIII.32.5). “Break open for us the thousands of the Cow and the Horse” (VIII.34.14). “That which thou holdest, O Indra, the Cow and the Horse and the imperishable enjoyment, confirm that in the sacrificer and not in the Pani; he who lies in the slumber, doing not the work and seeking not the gods, let him perish by his own impulsions; thereafter confirm perpetually (in us) the wealth that must increase” (VIII.97.2 and 3). In another hymn the Panis are said to withhold the wealth of cows and horses. Always they are powers who receive the coveted wealth but do not use it, preferring to slumber, avoiding the divine action (vratá), and they are powers who must perish or be conquered before the wealth can be securely possessed by the sacrificer. And always the Cow and the Horse represent a concealed and imprisoned wealth which has to be uncovered and released by a divine puissance.

With the conquest of the shining herds is also associated the conquest or the birth or illumination of the Dawn and the Sun, but this is a point whose significance we shall have to consider in another chapter. And associated with the Herds, the Dawn and the Sun are the Waters; for the slaying of Vritra with the release of the waters and the defeat of Vala with the release of the herds are two companion and not unconnected myths. In certain passages even, as in I.32.4, the slaying of Vritra is represented as the preliminary to the birth of the Sun, the Dawn and Heaven, and in others the opening of the Hill to the flowing of the Waters. For the general connection we may note the following passages: VII.90.4, “The Dawns broke forth perfect in their shining and unhurt; meditating they (the Angirases) found the wide Light; they who desire opened the wideness of the cows and the waters for them flowed forth from heaven”; I.72.8, “By right thought the seven Mighty Ones of heaven (the seven rivers) knew the truth and knew the doors of bliss; Sarama found the strong wideness of the cows and by that the human creature enjoys”; I.100.18, of Indra and the Maruts, “He with his shining companions won the field, won the Sun, won the waters”; V.14.4, of Agni, “Agni, born, shone out slaying the Dasyus, by the Light the Darkness; he found the cows, the waters and Swar”; VI.60.2, of Indra and Agni, “Ye two warred over the cows, the waters, Swar, the dawns that were ravished; O Indra, O Agni, thou unitest (to us) the regions, Swar, the brilliant dawns, the waters and the cows”; I.32.12, of Indra, “O hero, thou didst conquer the cow, thou didst conquer the Soma; thou didst loose forth to their flowing the seven rivers.”

In the last passage we see Soma coupled with the cows among the conquests of Indra. Usually the Soma intoxication is the strength in which Indra conquers the cows; e.g. III.43.7, the Soma “in the intoxication of which thou didst open up the cowpens”; II.15.8, “He, hymned by the Angirases, broke Vala and hurled apart the strong places of the hill; he severed their artificial obstructions; these things Indra did in the intoxication of the Soma.” Sometimes, however, the working is reversed and it is the Light that brings the bliss of the Soma wine or they come together as in I.62.5, “Hymned by the Angirases, O achiever of works, thou didst open the dawns with (or by) the Sun and with (or by) the cows the Soma.”

Agni is also, like the Soma, an indispensable element of the sacrifice and therefore we find Agni too included in these formulas of association, as in VII.99.4. “Ye made that wide other world for (as the goal of) the sacrifice, bringing into being the Sun and the Dawn and Agni,” and we have the same formula in III.31.15 with the addition of the Path and in VII.44.3 with the addition of the cow.

From these examples it will appear how closely the different symbols and parables of the Veda are connected with each other and we shall therefore miss the true road of interpretation if we treat the legend of the Angirases and the Panis as an isolated mythus which we can interpret at our pleasure without careful regard to its setting in the general thought of the Veda and the light that that general thought casts upon the figured language in which the legend is recounted.

¹ SABCL, volume 10: Cows

“Cow” in original text in Arya, vol. 2, No 3, p.167.