Hindu Deities

"Indra has an extent like the sea (I.30.3)."

"Indra, an ocean of wealth (I.51.1)."

"Hymns to Indra like the ocean in their convergence (I.56.2)."

"As rivers to the ocean strong hymns and songs have entered Indra whose extent is vast (VI.36.3)."

"He slew the dragon lying at the mountain. The creator fashioned for him his flashing thunderbolt. As milch cows bellowing as they flowed, directly the waters entered the ocean (I.32.2)."

"Agni the one ocean, the upholder of treasures (X.5.1)."

"Having controlled the Nahusha people, Agni made them tribute bearers by his strength. In whose peace all people stand seeking grace according to their nature, the Universal Man sits at the supreme place of Heaven and Earth, in the lap of the parents. The Divine Fire, as the universal ruler, received the foundation treasures in the rising of the Sun. From the inferior and superior oceans, he received them, from Heaven and Earth (VII.6.5-7)."

"Iravathan Mahadevan proposes that “the mysterious cult object that you find before the unicorn on the unicorn seals is a filter. (…) Since we know that the unicorn seals were the most popular ones, and every unicorn has this cult object before it, whatever it represents must be part of the central religious ritual of the Harappan religion. We know of one religion whose central religious cult [object] was a filter, that is the soma [cult] of the Indo-Aryans.”131 If this is not an argument for the identity of Vedic and Harappan, I don’t know what is. Yet, Mahadevan dismisses this conclusion citing the well-known arguments that the Vedas know of no cities while Harappa had no horses, so “the only other possibility is that a soma-like cult (…) must have existed in Harappa and that it was taken over by the Indo-Iranians and incoming Indo-Aryans.”"

"Forming the ray from Heaven, you flow through all forms. Soma, as the ocean you overflow. Soma, beloved enter the ocean."

"To the ocean the Soma drops, like cows to their home, have come to the source of truth."

"The king of the river plunges into the sea, lodged in the rivers, he holds to the wave of the waters."

"Soma, as the ecstatic, you were the first to extend the ocean for the Gods."

"Flowing Soma, the Divine King the vast truth, crosses the ocean by the wave (IX.107.15)"

"Forming the ray from Heaven, you flow through all forms. Soma, as the ocean you overflow. Cleansing themselves, the living ones, as to the sea, the Soma drops have come to the source of truth. Soma, beloved, enter the ocean (IX.64.8, 17, 27)."

"Soma, as the ecstatic, you were the first to extend the ocean for the Gods (IX. 107.23)."

"All delights converge in Agni, as seven mighty streams into the ocean (I.71.7)."

"Agni, you move to the ocean of Heaven...to the waters which are beyond the luminous heaven of the Sun and to those which stand below it."

"Agni, whose vesture is the ocean. (VIII. 102.4-6)."

"Flow on Soma as the great ocean the Father of the Gods through all the laws (IX.109.2)."

"I choose the grace of Heaven and Earth, of the mother rivers, and the mountains of Sharyanavat (X.35.2).1"

"Agni – (Sk.). The God of Fire in the Veda; the oldest and the most revered of Gods in India."

"It is astonishing to what a degree some remember instances from their past lives, whereas others have completely lost all memories of their former accumulations. A karmic cause does not completely explain such a marked difference in the understanding of life. Truly, the deciding factor in such understanding lies not in the circumstances of former lives, but in the acceptance of Agni. People call such wisdom a talent, but it is no special talent to keep Agni alight. Only the kindling of the centers produces uninterrupted vigilance of consciousness. Even a partial manifestation of Agni already preserves the accumulations inviolate. Agni is no violator, but our friend. It must be explained that the ascent of the spirit is indeed a manifestation of Agni."

"The translations by Grassmann and Ludwig show once again quite strikingly the errors that an exegesis that wants to see in the Veda something other than a purely Indian monument and that does not take Indian views into account must lead to. ... Here, verse 1 says that the gods determined that the place where a man who makes a sacrifice is to be found is the east. Such a man, the text says directly, is the east, but verse 4 says that in the west is a miser who lets nothing come of it and a rich man who gives no gifts. ... "In the west are the ill-wishers whose horses are badly harnessed; in the east are those who are here for giving, who give a variety of gifts," i.e. the misers who have given bad horses are to be in the extreme west, the region of the sunset, thus of darkness and therefore of raksas, while the generous are to be in the east, the region of the sunrise, thus in the eternal light, which is what 10, 107,2 says. So 7,6,3 is to be translated quite literally: "He (Agni), the Eastern One, has made those who do not make sacrifices into Westerners," i.e. he, the bright one, has plunged them into deep darkness."

"Agni, the Lord of Fire, rules over all the fire elementals and devas on the three planes of human evolution, the physical, the astral, and the mental, and rules over them not only on this planet, called the Earth, but on the three planes in all parts of the system. (p. 65)"

"I praise Agni, the priest who is the light and the invoker of the sacrifice, whose chants bestow treasure."

"Come to us quickly, Indra, from Heaven or Earth, from the ocean or the heavenly sea (IV.21.3)."

"Agni, the sum-total of the Gods. He is Vishnu and the Sun in His glory; He is the fire of matter and the fire of mind blended and fused; He is the intelligence which throbs in every atom; He is the Mind that actuates the system; He is the fire of substance and the substance of fire; He is the Flame and that which the Flame destroys. (p. 602) All potentiality lies in the vitalising, energising power of Agni, and in His ability to stimulate. He is life itself, and the driving force of evolution, of psychic development and of consciousness. (p. 606)."

""Our God is a consuming Fire" refers primarily to Agni, the controlling factor in this age. The devas of the fire will play an increasingly important part in all earth processes. To them is given the work of inaugurating the New Age, the new world and civilisation and the new continent … Agni controls not only the fires of the earth and rules the mental plane, but He is definitely associated with the work of arousing the sacred fire, the kundalini . . . The Lord of Fire will achieve his peculiar work for this cycle by arousing the fire of kundalini in the large numbers of those who are ready. This will be begun in this century, and carried forward actively for the next one thousand years. (p. 390/1)"

"Whether in the east, the south, the north or the west you are called by men, come quickly with your powers; whether you exult yourself on the slope of Heaven in the Sun-world or in the ocean of Soma (VIII.65.2-3)."

"Oh Agni, for your firm law our words like cattle are spoken, as rivers to the sea (VIII.44.25).24"

"Far far away hath Agni chased those Dasyus, and, in the east, hath turned the godless westward."

"Vaiśvānara the God, at the sun's setting, hath taken to himself deep-hidden treasures: Agni hath taken them from earth and heaven, from the sea under and the sea above us."

"From Heaven, Agni first was born; second on Earth from us as the knower of all births; third, in the Waters as the God-mind, enkindled perpetually, those of wisdom laud him. In the ocean, in the Waters, as the God-mind, you are enkindled as the Divine vision, oh Agni, in the udder of Heaven. Standing in the third region, in the lap of the Waters, the bull has grown (X.45.1, 3)."

"Flow on Soma as peace for us, draw out for our milk an ambrosial juice, increase the ocean of the hymn (IX.61.15)."

"To the ocean the Soma drops, like cows to their home, have come to the source of truth (IX.66.12).79"

"The ocean-going angels have flowed to the wise Soma (IX.78.3).80"

"Flow on Soma as wealth from four oceans to us, a thousandfold and from every side (IX.33.6)."

"Indra is a fourfold ocean, the support of treasures (X.47.2)."

"The Soma libations have extended like the oceans (IX.80.1)."

"The personification of ṛta among the Vedic gods is Varuṇa, lord (Asura) of heavenly hosts, the star-studded night sky, the oceanic expanse above us."

"The Maruts move through Heaven, Agni through the Earth, the Wind moves through the atmosphere. Through the Waters and the oceans, Varuna moves."

"That is the great magic power of this divine greatest seer, Varuna, that no one can challenge, when the diverse flowing streams cannot fill the one ocean with their water."

"Varuna is a secret ocean."

"Varuna knows the station of the birds who fly through the atmosphere. He knows the ocean-going ships (I.25.7)."

"He surveys the all-encompassing richnesses between the eastern and the western mark."

"Savitar (the Sun God) has revealed eight mountains of the earth, three desert (or shore) regions and seven rivers."

"Indra was the god of the thunderstorm that puts an end to the oppressive summer heat and opens the rainy season.... However, the Buddha arrived just in time for Indra to play a role in his career. it was Indra himself who persuaded the freshly awakened Shakyamuni to start preaching his newfound path. Buddhist monks then spread the cult of Indra to foreign lands as far as Japan. Indra’s weapon, the lightning or vajra, became the emblem of instant Enlightenment. The sought-after “Self-nature” (Chinese zixing) is present all the time, deep in all of us; but when we embark on the path of meditation and finally awaken to it, it strikes like lightning."

"The legend of Indra’s slaying VRtra… in the Vedas is merely an allegorical narrative of the production of rain. VRtra, sometimes also named Ahi, is nothing more than the accumulation of vapour condensed or figuratively shut up in, or obstructed by, a cloud. Indra, with his thunderbolt, or atmospheric or electrical influence, divides the aggregate mass, and vent is given to the rain which then descends upon the earth."

"Temples were built in ancient times in Tamilnadu for worshipping Indra. Grand festivals were celebrated by the Tamil kings in honor of Indra, the “the national hero of the Aryans.’ Indra was so much cherished by the Tamil people, that priority of worship was given to him in the great Epic Silappadikaram’ – the epic of the Anklet. Besides, references to Indra worship are found in Tholkapiam (600 BCE) Purananuru, Paripadal Aingurunuru and Pattupaddu, all belonging to the Sangam period. Certainly Seran Senguttuvan, his brother Illango Adikal, and, above all, the great Sangam Poets were not naïve as to accept Indra the lord of the Aryans who were the enemies of the Dravidians as their God, How can historians reconcile these contradictory views?"

"To Indra I direct my songs in an unceasing flow, like waters from the bottom of the sea (X.89.4)."