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Since Indra's lightning[9] is a form of fire, there is found in this union the first mystic dualism of two distinct gods as one. This comes out more in Agni-worship than in Indraworship, and will be treated below. The snake or dragon killed by Indra is Vritra, the restrainer, who catches and keeps in the clouds the rain that is falling to earth. He often is called simply the snake, and as the Budhnya Snake, or snake of the cloud-depths, is possibly the Python (=Budh-nya).[10] There is here a touch of primitive belief in an old enemy of man—the serpent! But the Budhnya Snake has been developed in opposite ways, and has contradictory functions.[11]
Indra, however, is no more the lightning than he is the sun. One poet says that he is like the sun;[12] another, that he is like the lightning (viii. 93. 9), which he carries in his arms (viii. 12. 7); another, that he is like the light of dawn (x. 89. 12). So various are the activities, so many the phenomena, that with him first the seer is obliged to look back of all these phenomena and find in them one person, and thus he is the most anthropomorphized of the Vedic gods. He is born of heaven or born of clouds (iv. 18), but that his mother is Aditi is not certain. As the most powerful god Indra is again regarded as the All-god (viii. 98. 1-2). With this final supremacy, that distinction between battle-gods and gods sovereign, which Bergaigne insists upon—the sovereign gods belonging to une conception unitaire de l'ordre du monde (iii. p. 3; ii. p. 167)—fades away. As Varuna became gradually greatest, so did Indra in turn. But Varuna was a philosopher's god, not a warrior's; and Varuna was not double and mystical. So even the priest (Agni) leaves Varuna, and with the warrior takes more pleasure in his twin Indra; of him making an All-god, a greatest god. Varuna is passive; Indra is energetic; but Indra does not struggle for his lordship. Inspired by soma, he smites, triumphs, punishes. Victor already, he descends upon his enemies and with a blow destroys them. It is rarely that he feels the effect of battle; he never doubts its issue.
There is evidence that this supremacy was not gained without contradiction, and the novelty of the last extravagant Indra-worship may be deduced, perhaps, from such passages as viii. 96. 15; and 100.3, where are expressed doubts in regard to the existence of a real Indra. How late is the worship of the popular Indra, and that it is not
