jādikām). In his essay on "The Highest Gods of the Arian Races" (Journ. Germ. Or. Society, vi. 71), Professor Roth translates these two words by "the eternal," and "the perishable." In his Lexicon, however, the same author (s.v.) describes Diti as a goddess associated with Aditi, without any distinct conception, and merely, as it appears, as a contrast to her." Aditi may, however, here represent the sky, and Diti the earth; or, if we are right in understanding the verse before us to describe two distinct appearances of Mitra and Varuna, one at the rising and the other at the setting of the sun, Aditi might possibly stand for the whole of nature as seen by day, and Diti for the creation as seen by night. At all events the two together appear to be put by the poet for the entire aggregate of visible nature.81 Diti occurs again as a goddess, but without Aditi, in another place (vii. 15, 12, Team Agne vīravad yaśo devaś cha Savita Bhagaḥ | Ditiś cha dāti vāryam | "You, Agni, and the divine Savitri and Bhaga, (bestow) renown with descendants; and Diti confers what is desirable." Sāyaṇa here explains Diti as meaning a particular goddess (Ditir api devī). Roth (8.v.) considers her to be a personification of liberality or opulence. Professor Müller, Trans. i. 244, considers that the original reading in this passage was Aditi, and that Diti has been substituted by later reciters. Diti is also named along with Aditi as a goddess, A.V. xv. 6, 7, and xv. 18, 4; Vāj. S. xviii. 22; and in A.V. vii. 7. 1, her sons are mentioned. These sons, the Daityas, as is well known, were regarded in later Indian mythology as the enemies of the gods.

(7) Aditi may be a personification of Universal Nature.

Perhaps Aditi may best be regarded as a personification of universal, all-embracing Nature, or Being, with which she is in fact identified in the following remarkable verse. She is the source and substance of all things celestial and intermediate, divine and human, present and future (i.89, 10): "Aditi is the sky; Aditi is the air (or intermediate firmament); Aditi is the mother, and father, and son; Aditi is all the gods, and the five tribes; 82 Aditi is whatever has been

81 The words aditi and diti occur together in another passage, iv. 2, 11 (ditim cha rāsa aditím urushya), where Sāyaṇa takes diti for "the liberal man," and aditi for the "illiberal," and translates "grant us a liberal giver, and preserve us from the illiberal," while Roth renders them by "wealth" and "penury" respectively.

In another place, vi. 51, 11, Aditi is invoked, along with Indra, the earth, the

born; Aditi is whatever shall be born" (Aditir dyaur Aditir antariksham Aditir mātā sa pitā sa putraḥ | viśve devāḥ Aditiḥ panchajanāḥ Aditir jātam Aditir janitvam 1).

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Sayana states that here Aditi is either the earth, or the mother of the gods, and that she is lauded under the character of universal nature 1 (Aditir ādīnā akhanḍanīyā vā pṛithivī devamātā vā | ... evam̃ sakala-jagad-ätmanā Aditiḥ stuyate). Yaska says (Nir. iv. 22 f.), that Aditi means 'not poor, the mother of the gods" (Aditir adīnā devamātā), and that the variety of her manifestations is set forth in this verse, or that the objects which are there characterized as aditi are adīna, the reverse of dina, "poor" (ity Aditer vibhutim achashțe | enāny adīnāni vā). This text occurs at the end of a hymn addressed to all the gods, and does not appear to have any connexion with the verses which precede, from which it derives no elucidation." 85

Compare with it Taitt. Br. iii. 12, 3, 1, where it is similarly said "that the self-existent Brahma, who is the highest austere-fervour, is son, father, and mother (Svayambhu Brahma paramam tapo yat | sa eva putraḥ sa pitā sa mātā).

With this may be compared Eschylus, Fragment 443:

Ζεύς ἐστιν αἰθὴρ, Ζεὺς δὲ γῆ, Ζεὺς δ ̓ οὐρανός·

Ζεύς τοι τὰ πάντα χὤ τι τῶν δ ̓ ὑπέρτερον.

ground (kshama), Pūshan, Bhaga, and the five tribes (pañchajanāḥ), to bestow blessings. Are the "five tribes" to be understood here, with some old commentators (see Nir. iii. 8) of the Gandharvas, Pitris, Devas, Asuras, and Rakshasas; or with the Aitareya Brahmana quoted by Sayana on i. 89, 10, of gods, men, Gandharvas, Apsarases, serpents, and Pitris (the Gandharvas and Apsarases being taken as one class)? Perhaps we should rather understand the term, as in x. 53, 4, 5 (panchajanāḥ mama hotram jushadhvam, "ye five tribes, welcome my offering "), as denoting the whole pantheon, or a particular portion of it. In R.V. x. 55, 3, pancha devāḥ, the five gods, or classes of gods, are mentioned, and in x. 60, 4, "the five tribes in the sky" (divīva pancha krishṭayaḥ). See the 1st vol. of this work, p. 177.

83 In a note on this verse (Orient und Occident, ii. p. 253) Professor Benfey remarks "The conception of this goddess is still dark."

84 M. Ad. Regnier, E'tude sur l'idiome des Vedas, p. 28, remarks: Aditi is the name of a divinity, a personification of the All, the mother of the gods."

85 There is a hymn (x. 100)-addressed to different gods, and where they are invoked in succession-in which the words a sarvatātim aditim vṛinīmahe form the conclusion of all the verses except the last. The precise meaning of these words was not very clear to me, especially as they have no necessary connection with the preceding portions of the different stanzas in which they occur. But Professor Aufrecht suggests that the verb vṛinīmahe governs a double accusative, and that the words

"Zeus is the Æther, Zeus is the Earth, Zeus is the Heaven. Zeus is all things, and whatever is above them." See Müller, Lectures on Language, ii. 441.

The signification, "earth" or "nature," may be that in which the word Aditi is employed in R.V. i. 24, 1: Kasya nunam katamasya amṛitānām manāmahe chāru devasya nama | ko no mahyai Aditaye punar dat pitaram cha dṛiśeyam mātaram cha | 2. Agner vayam prathamasya amṛitānām manāmahe chāru devasya nāma | sa no mahyai Aditaye punar dāt pitaram cha dṛiśeyam mātaram cha | "of which god, now, of which all the immortals, shall we invoke the amiable name? who shall give us back to the great Aditi, that I may behold my father and my mother? 2. Let us invoke the amiable name of the divine Agni, the first of the immortals; he shall give us back to the great Aditi, that I may behold my father and my mother." These words are declared in the Aitareya Brahmana to have been uttered by Sunaśśepa when he was about to be immolated (see Professor Wilson's Essay in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, xiii. 100; Professor Roth's paper in Weber's Indische Studien, i. 46; Müller's Ancient Sanskrit Literature, pp. 408 ff.; Haug's Aitareya Brahmana, ii. 460 ff., and the First Vol. of this work, pp. 355 ff. In regard to the passage immediately before us, Müller's Lectures on Language, ii. 500, and his Translation of the Rigveda, i. 243, may also be consulted). Whether this account be correct or not, the words may be understood as spoken by some one in danger of death from sickness or otherwise, who prayed to be permitted again to behold the face of nature. This interpretation is confirmed by the epithet mahi, "great," applied in this verse to Aditi, which would not be so suitable if, with Roth (8.v.), we should take the word here in the sense of "freedom" or "security." If we should understand the father and mother whom the suppliant is anxious to behold, as meaning heaven

mean "We ask Aditi for sarvatāti," (whatever that may mean). In an ingenious excursus on R.V. i. 94, 15 (Orient und Occident, ii. 519 ff.), Professor Benfey regards the word as coming originally from the same root as the Latin sălut, of which he supposes the primitive form to have been salvotāt, and to have the same signification. This sense certainly suits the context of the four passages on which principally he founds it, viz., i. 106, 2; iii. 54, 11; ix. 96, 4; x. 36, 14. In a note to his translation of this paper (Orient und Occident, iii. 470) he explains the words under consideration, 66 we supplicate Aditi for welfare." In his transl. of R.V. i. 247, Müller similarly renders them: We implore Aditi for health and wealth."

and earth (see above), it would become still more probable that Aditi is to be understood as meaning "nature." Sayana (in loco) understands the word of the Earth (prithivyai).

(8) Aditi as a forgiver of sin.

Benfey in his translation of the hymn just referred to i. 24 (Orient und Occident, i. 33), treats Aditi as a proper name, and explains it as denoting "sinlessness." Whatever may be thought of this interpretation, the goddess Aditi is undoubtedly in many other texts connected with the idea of deliverance from sin. Thus at the end of this same hymn (i. 24, 15), it is said: Ud uttamam Varuna pāśam asmad ava adhamam vi madhyamam śrathaya | atha vayam Aditya vrate tava anāgasaḥ Aditaye syāma | "Varuna, loose from us the uppermost, the middle, and the lowest bond. Then may we, o Aditya, by thy ordination, be without sin against Aditi." 87

The same reference is also found in the following texts:

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i. 162, 22. "May Aditi make us sinless" (anāgastvam no Aditiḥ krinotu).

ii. 27, 14. "Aditi, Mitra, and Varuna, be gracious if we have committed any sin against you" (Adite Mitra Varunauta mṛila yad vo vayam chakṛima kach chid agaḥ).

iv. 12, 4. "Whatever offence we have, through our folly, committed against thee, after the manner of men, o most youthful god, make us free from sin against Aditi; loosen our sins altogether away, o Agni "

86 On the different senses of the word vrata see Müller, Trans. of R.V. i. 225 ff. Here he renders "under thy auspices," p. 228.

87 The abstract noun adititva occurs along with anāgāstva, “sinlessness," in the following line (vii. 51, 1): anāgāstve adititve turāsa imam yajnam dadhatu śroshamānāḥ, "May the mighty gods, listening to us, preserve this ceremony in sinlessness, and prosperity." Though adititva is joined with anāgāstva, it does not follow that it must have the same sense.-In the S'atapatha Brahmana x. 6, 5, 5 (= Bṛihad Aranyaka Upanishad, p. 53 ff.,) the name of Aditi is explained from the root ad, to eat: "Whatever he created, he began to eat for Aditi derives her (or his) name from this, that she (or he) eats every thing" (yad yad eva asṛijata tad attum adhriyata | sarvam vai atti iti tad Aditer adititvam). Aditi is an epithet of Agni in R.V. iv. 1, 20; vii. 9, 3; and of Aryaman in ix. 81, 5. Yaska tells us that Agni also is called Aditi (Agnir apy aditir uchyate, Nir. xi. 23), and quotes in proof of this the 15th verse of a hymn to Agni, R.V. i. 94. In vii. 52, 1, the worshippers ask that they may be aditayaḥ, which Sayana renders by akhandanīyāḥ, “invincible."

(Yach chid hi te purushatra yavishtha achittibhiḥ chakṛima kach chid āgaḥ | kṛidhi su asmān Aditer anāgān vi enām̃si śiśratho vishvag Agne).

v. 82, 6. “May we be free from sin against Aditi through the help of the divine Savitri" (anāgasaḥ Aditaye devasya Savituḥ save).

vii. 87, 7. "May we, fulfilling the ordinances of Aditi, be without sin towards Varuna, who is gracious even to him who has committed sin" (yo mṛilayati chakrushe chid ago vayam syama Varune anāgāḥ | anu vratani Aditer ridhantaḥ).

vii. 93, 7. "Whatever sin we have committed, be thou (Agni) compassionate may Aryaman and Aditi sever it from us" (yat sīm āgaś chakṛima tat su mṛila tad Aryamā Aditiḥ śiśrathantu).

x. 12, 8. "May Mitra here, may Aditi, may the divine Savitri declare us sinless to Varuna" (Mitro no atra Aditir anāgān Savita devo Varunāya vochat).

A consideration of these passages, where Aditi is supplicated for forgiveness of sin, might lead us to suppose that she was regarded as the great power which wields the forces of the universe, and controls the destinies of men by moral laws; and the idea derives some support from her connection with Varuna, whose bonds are so often referred to as afflicting sinners. But this supposition is weakened by the fact that many others of the gods are in the same way petitioned for pardon, as Savitri (iv. 54, 3) and other deities, as the Sun, Dawn, Heaven and Earth (x. 35, 2, 3), Agni (iii. 54, 19).

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(9) Aditi's position sometimes subordinate.

Though, as we have seen, Aditi is regarded as the mother of some of the principal Vedic deities, she is yet, in other texts, represented as playing a subordinate part.

Thus, in vii. 38, 4, she is mentioned as celebrating the praises of Savitri, along with her sons Varuna, Mitra, and Aryaman, and welcoming his aid (abhi yam devī Aditir grināti savam devasya Savitur jushānā | abhi samrājo Varuno grinanti abhi Mitrāso Aryamā sajoshāḥ); and in viii. 12, 14, she is declared to have produced a hymn to Indra uta svarāje Aditiḥ stomam Indrāya jījanat | puruprasastam ūtaye ritasya yat).

88 See on this subject Müller's transl. of the R.V. i. 244 ff.