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6 THE SACRED BOOKS
able hymn, probably among the latest in date, which speaks
of the one Supreme God who exists behind all these, unknown,
omnipotent.
Gradually this idea of monotheism, of the one deity behind
all outer powers and forces, mounts through the Song Vedas.
The gods who were to dominate later Brahmanism are, however,
scarcely known, even to the latest or Atharva Song
Veda. Vishnu appears as a minor weather-god, the warmth
and
" brightness of the sun. Brahma," in the older Rig,
is
merely a common noun meaning prayer or worship, and the
brahmins are those who pray.
With the later priestly books of meditation, however, the
Brahmawas and Upanishads, the meaning of " brahma " expands
and expands to cover all religious thought and aspiration
and wisdom, until at last the god Brahma, with the same
name as the old priestly caste, emerges clearly as the only
God.
THE UPANISHADS
The most celebrated of these Upanishads are given here.
They are the profound efforts of able, thinking men to explain
the meaning of the universe. Their thought is based on monotheism,
that is, they see this world as the creation of a single
beneficent Being. They try also to see this Creator as allpowerful
and all-perfect ;
and at once they meet the two perplexing
riddles which have hampered every man-made
rational religion. The one riddle is involved in the Creator's
Creation implies change; but if the Creator is
perfection.
and always has been all-perfect, then the conditions surrounding
him before the creation must have been all-perfect.
the other hand, the changing of these conditions implies
discontent with them. Thus the mere desire to create implies
preceding lack of perfection somewhere and denies the god's
perfection. The second riddle is more obvious. How reconcile
an all-powerful Creator with the existence of evil and
suffering in this created world Here, evil wars against
good, that is against the god unless we conceive him as an
;
evil god, in which case good should perish. So here is the
On