Madhuvidya

Author(s): S D Laddu, T N Dharmadhikari, Madhvi Kolhatkar, Pratibha Pingle
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 198

SAYANA'S INTERPRETATION OF DAURGAHÉ BADHYA MANE...
longing to Durgaha and Tṛkşi12 respectively. Trkşi is known in the Ṛgveda as the son of Trasadasyu (8.22.7). A king Durgaha is also mentioned in the Ṛgveda whose grandsons were generous and had acquired fame among the gods (8.65.12). It is difficult to say whether this Durgaha was identical with Purukutsa himself or it was the name of his father, i.e. whether Purukutsa offered the sacrifice with his own horse or with that of his father.
As regards the principal points of this incident, that Purukutsa performed a sacrifice with daurgaha, that Purukutsäni offered worship to Indra and Varuna, and that as a result of these two acts she got the son Trasadasyu who was destined to be powerful like Indra, there is no conflict in the Indian tradition as represented by the RV stanzas, the Satapatha Brāhmaṇa, and the Itihasa stanzas. There is a conflict only between the Vedic tradition and the Itihasa on the one hand and the interpretation of the RV stanzas and the Itihasa by the mediaeval commentators on the other.
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Finally a word about ardhadevá (8.42.8,9). H.-P. SCHMIDT (329, 330) translates it as 'demi-god" and remarks that a human being, was "thought to be specially endowed with divine powers which entitled him to be called ardhadevá, 'demi-god" (346). This seems to me to slightly miss the mark. Trasadasyu owes his birth to the favour of two gods Indra and Varuna. But he was born inbibed with the qualitiy of only one of them viz. Indra. Like Indra he was the overpowerer or breaker of obstacles (vṛtratúr-, vṛtrahán-). This attribute of Trasadasyu was so striking that it is repeated in both the stanzas 8 and 9 narrating his birth. If Trasadasyu had imbibed at birth the quality also of the other god Varuna, then, in his self-praise, he would have referred to it in one of the two stanzas as 'guardian of rta or vrata', which would have made him comparable to
12 This has been already suggested by FOY (KZ 34.366-367) cited by A. A. MACDONELL, Vedic Mythology p. 149.
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