488 BRAHMANISM AND BUDDHISM 



ably clear, considering the stout efforts that seem to have been 

 made to obfuscate their sense. 



The first riddle is : 



"Of this dear gray Hotar priest the middle brother is of the rock; 

 the third brother carries ghee on his back. Here have I seen the 

 householder that has seven sons." 



It is the god Agni, "Fire," in three important aspects. The first 

 is the sun, or heavenly fire, the old, or immemorial sacrifice fire in 

 the sky; the second is the fire of the heavenly rock, or cloud, that is, 

 lightning; the third is the earthly sacrifice fire upon whose back the 

 oblations of ghee are poured. The whole is the household fire with 

 seven sons, that is, many tongues. 



The second riddle is: "Seven hitch the car that has one wheel; 

 a single horse that has seven names draws it. The wheel of three 

 naves is imperishable, and not to be checked: upon it do all beings 

 stand." 



The riddle is in the main clear. The answer is the sun. A single 

 wheel drawn by the seven sun-steeds courses on the sky. The three 

 naves are either three divisions of the day, or, less probably, of the 

 year. In the light of the imperishable sun all beings carry on their 

 existence. 



As a specimen of a theosophic riddle we may take 46. It contains 

 the suggestion, fateful for all advanced Hindu thought, that above 

 and behind the great multitude of gods there is one supreme per- 

 sonality; behind the gods there is that "Only Being" of whom the 

 gods are but various names. 



"They call (it) Indra, Mitra, Varuna, and Agni, or the heavenly 

 bird Garutmant (the sun). The sages call the One Being in many 

 ways; they call it Agni, Yama, Mataricvan." 



It is but a step from this idea to the pantheistic, absolute, without 

 a second, Brahman-Atman of the Upanishads and the Vedanta 

 philosophy that perfervid monism, the like of which the world 

 has not seen outside of India. 



Significantly this riddle habit has insinuated itself into the more 

 systematic and continuous speculations. There is a famous hymn, 

 Rig- Veda, 10, 121, in which Prajapati, the lord of creatures and the 

 world, the typical Father-god, is lauded without stint, but his name 

 is never mentioned: instead at the end of each stanza, the question 

 is asked as a kind of riddle, "Who is this god that has such and such 

 qualities, and performs such and such wonderful deeds?" Of course 

 every one knows, but the later theologians have gravely constructed 

 a god "Who" out of the question: mirabile dictu, the riddle ques- 

 tion turned into an anthropomorphic god ! 



1. "In the beginning there arose the germ of golden light; he 



