Sun

heroes are always connected with cattle, as is Indra in the Vedas, or Héraklés, or Hermes. The Egyptian picture represents Thoth, as me enger of the gods, announcing to a maid the approaching birth of the deified King A me no phis III. Kneph, as the creator, is his father, and priests hold up to the infant the holy cro , emblem of life. The Me iah was to eat “butter and honey,” and on such ambrosia Them is fed Apollo, though the “ milk and butter” of the “mystery of infants” were suppre ed by the Council of Carthage in 691 a.c. as belonging to a pagan rite (see also Baptism). The legend of Krishna’s being carried as an infant over the river has been also compared with the legend of St Christopher—the “ Christ-bearer ” —who by night carries the divine child over a river. Like other sun gods Krishna is said, in the Padma and Bhagavat Puranas, to have descended into the aby of the western ocean, and to “the infernal city Yama-par.” Kasya the wife of his. Guru (“teacher”) besought him to restore her children, and Yama with his dogs was terrified by the sound of Krishna’s conch shell, and yielded them up (Moor, Hindu Pantheon). So Héraklés brought back the dead heroes from Hades, and Orpheus recovered Euridiké, Christ and Osiris alike visited hell, as did the Baldur of the Norse. Krishna is also a dragon slayer (see Kalya), and dances among the “living creatures,” as Apollo charms them with his harp. They are the zodiakal beasts of heaven. He appears in the Hindu Rasi-jatra among the Gopi nymphs, as Zeus is nursed by nymphs; and the Vishnu Purana gives him 16,000 wives, and 180,000 sons. His “milk maids” surround their dancing shepherd lover, who is trans-. figured gloriously on the mountain. He is Govinda, son of Nanda | (the shepherd child of the bull), incarnate in seven preceding forms of his father Hari-Narayana, and even as Rudra. The parallels, as Davies says (Bhagavad Gita), are “coincidences which occur in all religions,” so that it matters little whether this “Divine song” be later than the rest of the Maba-bharata epik. It is inserted to prove that the Incarnate Word—the God who is in all—existed from the beginning of the world, and dwelt for a time among men (see Bhagavad-Gita). The Rig Veda was recited some 3000 years ago, and in it we read: ‘Thou art ours, and we are thine... Light of Light, and Far from Darkne , is thy name... O Indra we wise ones have been in thee... We O gods are in you... These worlds would perish if I did not work my work.” In the Gita Krishna says: “Those who worship me are in me, and I in them... Repose thy mind and understanding on me, and thou shalt hereafter dwell with me” (see John v, 17; xv, 7: 1 John i, 5), So Laotze in China said, “I am the way, the way of life,’ before Christ. 439