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"Root up, as of old, like (a tree) overgrown by a creeping plant; subdue the might of the Dasa; may we through [or with] Indra divide his collected wealth."

"According to Aurobindo,... there are passages in which the spiritual interpretation of the Dasas, Dasyus and Panis is the sole one possible and all others are completely excluded. There are no passages in which we lack a choice either between this interpretation and a nature-poetry or between this interpretation and the reading of human enemies."

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

"Around us is the Dasyu, riteless, void of sense, inhuman, keeping alien laws. Baffle, thou Slayer of the foe, the weapon which this Dasa wields."

"That the Dasas and Dasyus were the same as the Shudras is a pure figment of imagination. It is only a wild guess. It is tolerated because persons who make it are respectable scholars. So far as evidence is concerned, there is no particle of it, which can be cited in support of it."

"The Dasyus or Dasas were those who were opposed to the Indra Agni cult and are explicitly described thus in those passages where human Dasyus are clearly meant. They are avtata without (the Arya) rites, anyavrata of different rites, ayajavdna, non-sacrificers, abrahma without prayers, also not having Brahmana priests, anrichah without Riks, brahmadvisha, haters of prayers to Brahmanas, and anindra without Indra, despisers of Indra. They pour no milky draughts, they heat no cauldron. They give no gifts to the Brahmana. . . . Their worship was but enchantment, sorcery, unlike the sacred law of fire-worship, wiles and magic. In all this we hear but the echo of a war of rite with rite, cult with cult and not one of race with race."

"The racial interpretation of the notions light/white and dark/black found in Geldner's translations and echoed or precedented in numerous other publications must be considered dubious. Where there is sufficient context for interpretation, we find that the notions can at least equally well be read as an ‘ideological’ distinction between the ‘dark/black’ world of the dāsas/dasyus and the ‘light/white’ world of the āryas."

"born shone out slaying the Dasyus, the darkness by the Light; he found the Cows, the Waters, Swar."

"The amulet created by Pragâpati has subjected those that hate me. The Atharvans did tie it on, the descendants of the Atharvans did tie it on; with these allied, the Angiras cleft the castles of the Dasyus. With it those that hate me do thou slay!"

"Thou hast conquered the property, whether situated in the plains or hills, (thou hast conquered) the Dasa and the Ārya enemies."

"The great difference between the Dasyus and the Aryans was their religion... It is significant that constant reference is made to difference in religion between Aryans and Dasa and Dasyu."

"Evidence for the characterization of Dasas and Dasyus as black is tenuous in the extreme.... Even apparently clear indications of historical struggles between dark aborigines and Arya conquerors turn out to be misleading.... [The Dasas and Dasyus] appear to be demonic rather than human enemies.... It is a cosmic struggle which is described in detailed accounts that are consistent with one another."

"Knowing that nothing can prove the superiority of the Aryan race better than invasion and conquest of the native races, the Western writers have proceeded to invent the story of the invasion of India by the Aryans, and the conquest by them of the Dasas and Dasyus."

"The Iranian identity of Dasas and Dasyus is now well-established, a development which should at least put an end to the talk of the Dasas being ‘the dark-skinned aboriginals enslaved by the Aryan invaders’."

"It is urged that the Dasyus are described as black of skin and noseless in opposition to the fair and high-nosed Aryans. But the former distinction is certainly applied to the Aryan Gods and the Dasa Powers in the sense of light and darkness, and the word anasah does not mean noseless. Even if it did, it would be wholly inapplicable to the Dravidian races; for the Southern nose can give as good an account of itself as any "Aryan" proboscis in the North."

"Very obviously, the enemies of the Vedic people at that time, when Rg-Vedic books 7 and 4 and the contemporaneous parts of books 1 and 9 were composed, were Iranian, not “black aboriginal”. This is attested from so many angles that one tends to wonder how this mistake could have been made at all, and how the true Iranian identity of the Dāsas (Greek Dahai) could have been missed."

"I have gone over the names of the Dasyus or Asuras, mentioned in the Rigveda, with the view of discovering whether any of them could be regarded as being of non-Aryan or indigenous origin, but I have not observed any to be of that character."

"Thou, O Indra, advancing singly, hast slain the wealthy Dasyu, together with his allies, with thy destructive weapon."

"May this Manu (Sávarni) quickly be born, may he increase like (well-watered) seed, who sends me at once a thousand and a hundred horses for a present. ... Yadu and Indra speaking auspiciously, and possessed of numerous cattle, gave them like (appointed) servants, for the enjoyment (of Manu Sávarni)."

"Armed with the thunderbolt, and confident in his strength, he has gone on destroying the cities of the Dasyus. Thunderer, acknowledging (the praises of thy worshipper), cast, for his sake, thy shaft against the Dasyu, and augment the strength and glory of the A′rya."

"All those tribes in this world, which are excluded from (the community of) those born from the mouth, the arms, the thighs, and the feet (of Brahman), are called Dasyus, whether they speak the language of the Mlekkhas (barbarians) or that of the Aryans."

"The sovereign Indra attacking him overcame the loud-shouting, six-eyed, three-headed Dása, invigorated by his strength, smote the cloud with his iron-tipped finger."

"It was already in the middle of the former century that Christian Lassen qualified the opposition of arya and dasyu or dasa as a contrast between different religions expressed by the age-old symbolism of black opposed to white and not as a contrast of dark complexioned to white coloured men."

"That is the idea—that we should all be wicked if we did not hold to the Christian religion. It seems to me that the people who have held to it have been for the most part extremely wicked. You find this curious fact, that the more intense has been the religion of any period and the more profound has been the dogmatic belief, the greater has been the cruelty and the worse has been the state of affairs. In the so-called Ages of faith, when men really did believe the Christian religion in all its completeness, there was the Inquisition, with all its tortures; there were millions of unfortunate women burned as witches; and there was every kind of cruelty practiced upon all sorts of people in the name of religion. You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress of humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or ever mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. ... You may think that I am going too far when I say that that is still so, I do not think that I am. Take one fact. You will bear with me if I mention it. It is not a pleasant fact, but the churches compel one to mention facts that are not pleasant. Supposing that in this world that we live in today an inexperienced girl is married to a syphilitic man, in that case the Catholic Church says, "This is an indissoluble sacrament. You must stay together for life," and no steps of any sort must be taken by that woman to prevent herself from giving birth to syphilitic children. This is what the Catholic church says. I say that that is fiendish cruelty, and nobody whose natural sympathies have not been warped by dogma, or whose moral nature was not absolutely dead to all sense of suffering, could maintain that it is right and proper that that state of things should continue. That is only an example. There are a great many ways in which at the present moment the church, by its insistence upon what it chooses to call morality, inflicts upon all sorts of people undeserved and unnecessary suffering."

"The Spaniards in Mexico and Peru used to baptize Indian infants and then immediately dash their brains out: by this means they secured these infants went to Heaven."

"You will remember that Christ said, "Judge not lest ye be judged." That principle I do not think you would find was popular in the law courts of Christian countries. I have known in my time quite a number of judges who were very earnest Christians, and none of them felt that they were acting contrary to Christian principles in what they did. Then Christ says, "Give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away." That is a very good principle... Then there is one other maxim of Christ which I think has a great deal in it, but I do not find that it is very popular among some of our Christian friends. He says, "If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that which thou hast, and give to the poor." That is a very excellent maxim, but, as I say, it is not much practised. All these, I think, are good maxims, although they are a little difficult to live up to. I do not profess to live up to them myself; but then, after all, it is not quite the same thing as for a Christian."

"Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes. Fear is the basis of the whole thing—fear of the mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts. Science can help us to get over this craven fear in which mankind has lived for so many generations."

"So far as I can remember, there's not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence."

"Christ says, "The Son of Man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth"; and He goes on about the wailing and gnashing of teeth. It comes in one verse after another, and it is quite manifest to the reader that there is a certain pleasure in contemplating wailing and gnashing of teeth, or else it would not occur so often. Then you all, of course, remember about the sheep and the goats; how at the second coming He is going to divide the sheep from the goats, and He is going to say to the goats: "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire." He continues: "And these shall go away into everlasting fire." Then He says again, "If thy hand offend thee, cut it off; it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched, where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." He repeats that again and again also. I must say that I think all this doctrine, that hell-fire is a punishment for sin, is a doctrine of cruelty. It is a doctrine that put cruelty into the world, and gave the world generations of cruel torture; and the Christ of the Gospels, if you could take Him as his chroniclers represent Him, would certainly have to be considered partly responsible for that."

"There is the instance of the Gadarene swine, where it certainly was not very kind to the pigs to put the devils into them and make them rush down the hill into the sea. You must remember that He was omnipotent, and He could have made the devils simply go away; but He chose to send them into the pigs. Then there is the curious story of the fig-tree, which always rather puzzled me. You remember what happened about the fig-tree. "He was hungry; and seeing a fig-tree afar off having leaves, He came if haply He might find anything thereon; and when he came to it He found nothing but leaves, for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it: 'No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever'.... and Peter.... saith unto Him: 'Master, behold the fig-tree which thou cursedst is withered away.'" This is a very curious story, because it was not the right time of year for figs, and you really could not blame the tree. I cannot myself feel that either in the matter of wisdom or in the matter of virtue Christ stands quite as high as some other people known to History. I think I should put Buddha and Socrates above Him in those respects."

"Just like what Nazi Germany did to the Jews, so liberal America is now doing to the evangelical Christians. It's no different. It is the same thing. It is happening all over again. It is the Democratic Congress, the liberal-based media and the homosexuals who want to destroy the Christians. Wholesale abuse and discrimination and the worst bigotry directed toward any group in America today. More terrible than anything suffered by any minority in history.""

"You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense! I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist."

"By propagating the dogma of Jesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God, the Church contradicts the very sense of the prayer given to us by Jesus Christ himself, "Our Father which art in heaven." And also the words of the Scriptures, "So God created man in his own image." (Genesis 1:27)"

"Christianity really says only one thing: that the infinite incomprehensibility which we call God exists, that we submit to it unconditionally as our own perfection, and that the acceptance of this submission has received a historical and unconditional guarantee in Jesus."

"As with the Christian religion, the worst advertisement for Socialism is its adherents."

"The Old and the New Testament can be appreciated as stupendous achievements of the human mind, but this appreciation should not be used to suppress sexuality. My medical experience has taught me that adolescents who are sexually sick have an unhealthy appreciation of the legend of Jesus."

"I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world."

"The whole conception of a God is a conception derived from the ancient oriental despotisms. It is a conception quite unworthy of free men. When you hear people in church debasing themselves and saying that they are miserable sinners, and all the rest of it, it seems contemptible and not worthy of self-respecting human beings. We ought to stand up and look the world frankly in the face. We ought to make the best we can of the world, and if it is not so good as we wish, after all it will still be better than what these others have made of it in all these ages. A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men."

"All the branches of Christianity suffer by the fact that they seem to be unable to take in the greatest contribution of the modern world to ethical theory, to wit, the concept of a moral obligation to be intelligent."

"You will recall the violence of Christendom as it expanded. The Jews were subjected to periodical pogroms because they were supposed to slaughter Christian children in order to use their blood for religious ceremonies. The Christian were also very intolerant of their own heretics. The Spanish Inquisition saw the fake trials and burnings at the stakes of the Christian heretics. And when Christians discovered new land, they forced the conversion of the natives on pain of death. They claim that it was their Manifest Destiny to bring Christianity and civilisation to the natives, failing which they should exterminate the heathens. But we all know that there was nothing Christian in all these things that they had done. Christianity was a convenient excuse for doing un-Christian things. Similarly many Muslims invoke Islam when they commit unIslamic things. The Al-Quran is very clear. Muslims can only fight in self-defense. And when the enemy sues for peace Muslims must respond positively."

"No egoism is so insufferable as that of the Christian with regard to his soul."

"I am going to tell you something, Pedro, which may surprise you, though you are also a cardinal, and being a cardinal myself. I have spent all my life here in the Roman Curia and I believe I have the authority to tell you this. Having spent twenty-two years at the Holy Office, and been Secretary of State during an entire pontificate, I have reached the following conclusion. There are two elements to the Church, the divine and the human. As for the divine aspect, I have tried to do what little I could; I would give my life for it a thousand times over. But as for its human side, my dear Pedro, how miserable it is. Nevertheless, we must carry on if that is God's will."

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

"Christ is a new man. The new man is a Soviet man. Therefore Christ is a Soviet man!"

"Today we are engaged in a final, all-out battle between Communistic Atheism and Christianity."

"The trouble with Communism is the Communists, just as the trouble with Christianity is the Christians. They really do not believe in it and hence are hypocrites. All of them pant for money and hope to collar it by changing the rules. This fundamental false pretense colors their whole propaganda. They have no more sense of honor than so many congressmen and engage constantly in wholesale lying."

"Some fools in the desert With nothing else to do So scared of the dark They didn't know if they were coming or goin So they invented me And they invented You And other fools keep it all going And growing"

"The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church's public marks of the covenant–baptism and holy communion–must be denied citizenship, just as they were in ancient Israel."

"But Christian parents must also understand that they are not only to propagate and preserve the human race on earth, indeed not only to educate any kind of worshipers of the true God, but children who are to become members of the Church of Christ, to raise up fellow-citizens of the Saints, and members of God's household, that the worshipers of God and Our Savior may daily increase. For although Christian spouses even if sanctified themselves cannot transmit sanctification to their progeny, nay, although the very natural process of generating life has become the way of death by which original sin is passed on to posterity, nevertheless, they share to some extent in the blessings of that primeval marriage of Paradise, since it is theirs to offer their offspring to the Church in order that by this most fruitful Mother of the children of God they may be regenerated through the laver of Baptism unto supernatural justice and finally be made living members of Christ, partakers of immortal life, and heirs of that eternal glory to which we all aspire from our inmost heart."

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: 'I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God.' That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would be either a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse."