The first Mandala ("book") of the

Rigveda The ''Rigveda'' or ''Rig Veda'' (, , from wikt:ऋच्, ऋच्, "praise" and wikt:वेद, वेद, "knowledge") is an ancient Indian Miscellany, collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns (''sūktas''). It is one of the four sacred canoni ...

has 191 hymns. Together with

Mandala 10 The tenth mandala, or chapter, of the ''Rigveda'' contains 191 hymns. Together with Mandala 1, it forms the latest part of the Rigveda, containing material, including the ''Purusha Sukta'' (10.90) and the dialogue of Sarama with the Panis (10. ...

, it forms the latest part of the Rigveda. Its composition likely dates to the late Vedic period (1000-500 BCE) or the

Early Iron Age The Iron Age () is the final epoch of the three historical Metal Ages, after the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age. It has also been considered as the final age of the three-age division starting with prehistory (before recorded history) and progr ...

(around 1000 BCE).

Hymn 1.1 is addressed to

Agni Agni ( ) is the Deva (Hinduism), Hindu god of fire. As the Guardians of the directions#Aṣṭa-Dikpāla ("Guardians of Eight Directions"), guardian deity of the southeast direction, he is typically found in southeast corners of Hindu temples. ...

, arranged so that the name of this god is the first word of the ''Rigveda''. The remaining hymns are mainly addressed to Agni and

Indra Indra (; ) is the Hindu god of weather, considered the king of the Deva (Hinduism), Devas and Svarga in Hinduism. He is associated with the sky, lightning, weather, thunder, storms, rains, river flows, and war. volumes Indra is the m ...

. Hymns 1.154 to 1.156 are addressed to

Vishnu Vishnu (; , , ), also known as Narayana and Hari, is one of the Hindu deities, principal deities of Hinduism. He is the supreme being within Vaishnavism, one of the major traditions within contemporary Hinduism, and the god of preservation ( ...

. Hymn 1.3 is dedicated to the

Ashvins The Ashvins (, ), also known as the Ashvini Kumaras and Asvinau,, §1.42. are Hindu deities, Hindu Divine twins, twin gods associated with medicine, health, healing, sciences, and the twilight. In the ''Rigveda'', they are described as youthf ...

. Hymn 1.164.46, part of a hymn to the

Vishvadevas The visvedevas (, ) refers to the designation used to address the entirety of the various deities featured in the Vedas. It also refers to a specific classification of deities in the Puranas. The visvedevas are sometimes regarded as the most com ...

, is often quoted as an example of emerging

monism Monism attributes oneness or singleness () to a concept, such as to existence. Various kinds of monism can be distinguished: * Priority monism states that all existing things go back to a source that is distinct from them; e.g., in Neoplatonis ...

monotheism Monotheism is the belief that one God is the only, or at least the dominant deity.F. L. Cross, Cross, F.L.; Livingstone, E.A., eds. (1974). "Monotheism". The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2 ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. A ...

. It forms the basis for the well-known statement "Truth is one, sages call it by various names": :' :' :"They call him Indra,

Mitra ''Mitra'' (Proto-Indo-Iranian language, Proto-Indo-Iranian: wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Iranian/mitrás, ''*mitrás'') is the name of an Indo-Iranians#Religion, Indo-Iranian divinity that predates the Rigveda, Rigvedic Mitra (Hindu god), Mitrá ...

Varuna Varuna (; , ) is a Hindu god. He is one of the earliest deities in pantheon, whose role underwent a significant transformation from the Vedic to the Puranic periods. In the early Vedic era, Varuna is seen as the god-sovereign, ruling the sky ...

, Agni / and he is heavenly nobly-winged Garutman." :"To what is One, sages give many a title / they call it Agni,

Yama Yama (), also known as Kāla and Dharmarāja, is the Hindu god of death and justice, responsible for the dispensation of law and punishment of sinners in his abode, Naraka. He is often identified with Dharmadeva, the personification of ''Dharm ...

, Matarisvan." (trans. Griffith) : – ''Rigveda 1.164.46''

Interpretation

Max Muller Max or MAX may refer to: Animals * Max (American dog) (1983–2013), at one time purported to be the world's oldest living dog * Max (British dog), the first pet dog to win the PDSA Order of Merit (animal equivalent of the OBE) * Max (gorilla) ( ...

described the character of the Vedic hymns as a form of

henotheism Henotheism is the worship of a single, supreme god that does not deny the existence or possible existence of other deities that may be worshipped. Friedrich Schelling (1775–1854) coined the word, and Friedrich Welcker (1784–1868) ...

, in which "numerous deities are successively praised as if they were one ultimate God." According to Graham, in the Vedic society it was believed that humans could contact the gods through the spoken utterances of the Vedic seers, and "the One Real" (''

ekam Ekam is the Sanskrit for "1 (number), one, single, solitary" (neuter gender), as a noun meaning "Henosis, unity". In Hinduism, it refers to a concept of monism akin to that of Brahman in Advaita philosophy and Smarta theology. Truth is One A ...

sat'') in 1.164.46 refers to

Vāc Vac (, ') is a Vedic goddess who is a personified form of divine speech. She enters into the inspired poets and visionaries, gives expression and energy to those she loves; she is called the "mother of the Vedas" and consort of Prajapati, the Vedi ...

, both "speech" and goddess of speech, the "one ultimate, supreme God", and "one supreme Goddess." In later Vedic literature, "Speech or utterance is also identified with the supreme power or transcendent reality," and "equated with Brahman in this sense." Frauwallner states that "many gods are traced back to the one

God In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the un ...

head. The one (''ekam'') is not meant adjectively as a quality but as a substantive, as the upholding centre of reality." The Vedic henotheism may have grown out of a growing recognition of a "unitary essence beyond all the deities," in which the deities were conceptualized as pluralistic manifestations of the same divine essence beyond this plurality. The Vedic era conceptualization of the divine or the One, states Jeaneane Fowler, is more abstract than a monotheistic God, it is the Reality behind the phenomenal universe, which it treats as "limitless, indescribable, absolute principle", thus the Vedic divine is something of a

panentheism Panentheism (; "all in God", from the Greek , and ) is the belief that the divine intersects every part of the universe and also extends beyond space and time. The term was coined by the German philosopher Karl Krause in 1828 (after reviewin ...

. In late Vedic era, with the start of Upanishadic age (~800-600 BCE), from the henotheistic, panentheistic concepts emerge the concepts which scholars variously call

nondualism Nondualism includes a number of philosophical and spiritual traditions that emphasize the absence of fundamental duality or separation in existence. This viewpoint questions the boundaries conventionally imposed between self and other, min ...

, as well as forms of non-theism.

Selected hymns

Publications

The ''editio princeps'' of the book is due to

Friedrich August Rosen Friedrich August Rosen (2 September 1805 in Hannover – 12 September 1837 in London) was a German Orientalist, brother of Georg Rosen and a close friend of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. He studied in Leipzig, and from 1824 in Berlin under Franz ...

, published posthumously in 1838. It was the earliest edition of a Rigvedic Mandala, predating

Max Müller Friedrich Max Müller (; 6 December 1823 – 28 October 1900) was a German-born British comparative philologist and oriental studies, Orientalist. He was one of the founders of the Western academic disciplines of Indology and religious s ...

's edition of the entire Rigveda by more than 50 years.

References

Sources

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External links