Fire as Element, Fire as Deity

Hymns to Agni, the mystic fire

अग्निमीळे पुरोहितं यज्ञस्य देवमृत्विजं ।
होतारं रत्नधातमं ॥

agnimīḷe purohitam yajñasya devamṛtvijam ǀ
hotāram ratnadhātamam ǁ

Agni do I adore, the one whose place is in the front, divine priest of the sacrifice,
offerer of oblations who accomplishes the sacrifice, lavishly bestowing wealth.

~Rigveda, 1.1.1 (translation based on Aurobindo Ghose’s translation and analysis of the sukta available HERE.)

Fire is at the heart of Rigvedic ritual: the ground for the sacrifice is defined and made ready by the laying out of sacred fires, the offerings to the gods are made into the ritual fire and it is around the ritual fire that the priests gather and the gods come (Jamison and Brerton, 2010, p.73). Thus Agni, the god of fire, must be propitiated at the very start of the ritual, even before the god the sacrifice seeks to honour. It is therefore no coincidence that the Rigveda opens with a hymn to Agni, as do all the Family Books (Mandalas 2-7) and almost all of the smaller collections in the other mandalas. (For more on the mandalas see ‘The Rigveda: the Structure of the Text’.) Some 200 of the 1028 hymns of the Rigveda are addressed to him, making him the most invoked god in the Rigveda after Indra.

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AGNI, THE MYSTIC FIRE

Agni plays many roles. He is elemental fire, god of the sacred flame and priest of the sacrifice, all at the same time. As the ritual fire deified, he receives the sacrificial offerings as a god in his own right. He also carries these offerings to the other gods—on the flames and smoke of the ritual fire—and so he is the hotar, the offering priest. He is the go-between between men and gods, for not only does he take our offerings to the gods, he also brings the gods to the sacrifice. As fire in all its forms, he lives with us; but as a god, he is not one of us, and is therefore called our guest. As a god, he is also celestial fire and is often identified with the sun; but he is also the ritual fire and the ordinary fire we light in our homes. As the sun, he is associated with the king, who stands above everyone, sees everything, and rules over all, and as the domestic fire, he contributes to the joys of daily life and living. He is also potentially destructive, capable of burning entire forests with his flames and turning everything in his path to ashes; but when he turns his destructive force against our enemies, he is our ally. He is also the fire of the funeral pyre, the means by which the dead are conveyed to their ancestors. (Jamison and Brereton, 2020, pp. 73-76).

As fire, he lives hidden within wood, and as ritual fire, he is ‘born’ by the rubbing together of the kindling sticks, his ‘parents’. The new-born god grows quickly, to devour the wood that gave him birth. (Jamison and Brereton, 2020, p. 75).

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AGNI HIDES IN THE WATERS

The Rigveda is as devoid of narrative mythology for Agni as it is for the other gods (with the sole exception of Indra, as we saw earlier). It contains perhaps only one story about Agni that may be considered anywhere near complete. This is told in Sukta 51 in Mandala 10. Agni, unwilling to perform his ritual role as the one who bears the priestly oblations to the god, runs away and hides himself in the waters. But Mitra and Varuna find him and ask him to return. The human beings, they say, are ready with their sacrifice but he, Agni, has hidden himself in darkness. Come back, they say to him, with his mind at ease, and make the paths of the gods easy to travel. But Agni is afraid, and it is in fear, he says, that he came far away. Varuna assures him that he is imperishable and will come to no harm in carrying the offerings of the human beings to the gods and asks him again to return. Agni then negotiates a deal—he will return, he says, if he can have the first and last of the offerings as well as ‘the light from the waters and the soul from the plants’ and guaranteed long life. The gods agree to all his demands and so persuade Agni to return.

Here is Aurobindo Ghose’s translation of Sukta 51, Mandala 10:

Large was the covering and it was dense in which thou wert wrapped when thou didst enter into the waters ; one was the god who saw thee but many and manifold were thy bodies which he saw, O Fire, O knower of all things born.

Which of the gods was he who saw everywhere my bodies in many forms ? O Mitra and Varuna, where then dwell all the blazings of the Fire which are paths of the gods?

We desire thee, O Fire, O knower of all things born, when thou hast entered manifoldly into the growths of the earth and into the waters ; there the lord of the law grew aware of thee, O thou of the many diverse lights, shining luminous beyond the ten inner dwelling-places.

O Varuna, fearing the sacrificants' office that so the gods might not yoke me to that work; so my bodies entered manifoldly, for I, Fire, was not conscious of this goal of the movement.

Come to us ; the human being, god-seeking, is desirous of sacrifice, he has made all ready but thou dwellest in the darkness, O Fire. Make the paths of the journeying of the gods easy to travel, let thy mind be at ease, carry the offerings.

The ancient brothers of the Fire chose this goal to be reached as charioteers follow a path ; therefore in fear I came far away, O Varuna. I started back as a gaur from the bowstring of the archer.

Since we make thy life imperishable, O Fire, O knower of all things born, so that yoked with it thou shalt not come to harm, then with thy mind at ease thou canst carry their share of the offering to the gods, O high-born Fire.

Give me the absolutes that precede and follow the sacrifice as my share of the oblation packed with the energy; give me the light from the waters and the soul from the plants and let there be long life for the Fire, O gods.

Thine be the absolute precedents and consequents of the sacrifice, the portions packed with energy of the oblation; thine, O Fire, be all this sacrifice; may the four regions bow down to thee.

~Transl. Aurobindo Ghose, Sukta 51, Mandala 10, from Hymns to the Mystic Fire, pp. 405-407

The tale is continued in the next two suktas of the same mandala: in 10.52 Agni declares that the gods have made him the oblation-bearer and the gods affirm his role and honour him for it, and in 10.53, the priests declare that he has arrived and, ‘robed in vital vigour’, he will make their calling on the gods effective (by carrying their oblation to them). (Griffiths, 1896, Book X, Hymn 53)

Interestingly, Agni is linked closely, and somewhat paradoxically, to the waters: he lies hidden within wood/plants, which are nurtured by water, and therefore ultimately he lies within the waters—till he born from the kindling sticks. (For more on this link between Agni and water, see Jamison and Brereton, 2020, p. 75-76.)

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HIS MANY NAMES

Agni is known by many names:
as rakshohan, he is the destroyer of demons;
as vaishvanara, he is the one universally known, relating to all men, worshipped everywhere; in this form he becomes the sun or sunlight;
as jatavedas, he is the ritual fire;
as narashamsa, he is the one praised by all men;
as tanunapat, he is the son of himself;
as agni kravyad, he is the flesh-eating fire of the funeral pyre.

Agni is much more than fire and its forms. He represents, too, our inner Light, the Flame which guides mankind in its journey towards the highest Truth.

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Magnificient flame, blazing fire, priest of the sacrifice, mediator between gods and men, shining guardian of the cosmic order—there is much more to be said, written, read, and understood about Agni. This post serves as only the briefest of introductions to perhaps the most mystical of the ancient gods of the Rigveda. For those who want a deeper look at the mystical and spiritual aspects of Agni, and indeed of the Rigvedic paradigm, I can think of no better place to start than the writings of Aurobindo Ghose. He brings clarity and coherence to complex ideas, and elevates the Rigveda from a confusing collection of ancient suktas to a work of deep mystical significance.

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On this note, I will wish my readers happy holidays and a joyous 2024!
Fish will return in the new year!

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SELECTED SOURCES AND FURTHER READING

1. Ghose, Aurobindo. Hymns to the Mystic Fire. Vol. 2 of Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary Library. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Publ. Dept., 1972. 

2. Jamison, Stephanie W., and Joel P. Brereton. The Rigveda: The earliest religious poetry of India. 3 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. 

3. Brereton, Joel P.; and Jamison, Stephanie W. The Rigveda: A Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020.

4. Griffiths, Ralph T., trans. The Rig Veda. 1896. As available online at sacred-texts.com. https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rigveda/index.htm. 

5. "Rig Veda. Mandala 1. Sukta 1". 2022. Sri-Aurobindo.Co.In. https://sri-aurobindo.co.in/workings/matherials/rigveda/01/01-001.htm