The Race to Heaven

In the beginning, the old books say, there were two great families. One was the Adityas, the sons of Aditi. The other was the Angirases, a family of priests and singers.

Both wanted the world of heaven, and each wanted to get there before the other.

"We shall go first," said the Adityas.

"No. We shall," said the Angirases.

The way to heaven was a Soma sacrifice, and the Angirases were the first to see how it could be done. They planned to press the Soma on the next day. A sacrifice needs priests, so they decided to invite the Adityas to serve at it. They called Agni, who was one of their own family.

"Go and tell the Adityas," they said. "Tomorrow we press Soma for the world of heaven."

Agni went.

The Adityas saw him coming, and in that moment they saw something better: a way to press the Soma and finish the rite within a single day.

Agni delivered his message. "We announce to you a pressing tomorrow, for the world of heaven."

"And we announce one to you," said the Adityas. "Today. With you as our chief priest we shall go to heaven."

Agni thought about it.

"So be it," he said.

He went back to the Angirases with his answer. They were waiting.

"Did you give them the message?"

"I gave it. And they gave me one in return."

The Angirases looked at him. "You did not accept?"

"I did accept," said Agni. "A man who comes to offer you a priest's work comes bringing fame. To refuse him is to refuse fame. So I did not refuse."

There was nothing to be done. The invitation had been properly made, and a priest who is properly asked should go. So the Angirases, who had meant to be served, went and served. They performed the sacrifice for the Adityas.

Another passage of the same book gives the result. The Adityas reached heaven first, and the Angirases came sixty years behind them.

A sacrifice must be paid for. The Adityas were generous. They gave the Angirases this whole earth as their fee.

The Angirases accepted it, and it burned them. They could not hold it. They cast the earth away. She turned into a lioness with gaping jaws and went about attacking people. The heat of that burning cracked her open. Before then, says the Brahmana, the earth was all smooth and level, and the fissures in the ground come from that day.

"Never accept a gift that someone else has laid aside," the priests say because of this. "It has been pierced with heat, and it will pierce you."

Then the Adityas brought a second fee. It was the sun himself, who had taken the shape of a white horse, with a halter on him.

"We bring you this," they said.

This one the Angirases took.

At that point in the long sacrifice the priest still chants a set of old verses about it. The Adityas brought a fee to the Angirases, the verses go. This one they would not accept. That one they did accept. And the Brahmana ends with a rule that every sacrificer was meant to remember: a sacrifice without a fee is a cart without a driver, so something must be given, even if it is small.

The Shatapatha begins the same way and then goes somewhere else.

The Angirases made their sacrifice ready and sent Agni to the Adityas. "Tell them of our Soma feast tomorrow. Say, serve as priests at this sacrifice of ours."

The Adityas talked among themselves.

"Find a way for the Angirases to serve us, and not we them."

"Only a sacrifice will get us out of this. Let us hold another Soma feast."

So they said to Agni, "You have announced a feast for tomorrow. We announce one to you and to the Angirases for today. And you shall be our Hotri."

The Angirases came after Agni, very angry. "You went as our messenger. Why did you not think of us?"

"The blameless chose me," said Agni. "Chosen by the blameless, I could not walk away."

So the Angirases officiated, with Soma bought on that same day.

Then came the fee. The Adityas brought forward Vac, the goddess Speech.

The Angirases would not take her. "We shall be the losers if we accept her," they said.

A sacrifice is not complete until the fee is paid, and so the rite hung unfinished. The Adityas brought Surya, the sun, and him the Angirases accepted. That is why, the book says, a white horse with a gold ornament on its front is given at this rite. It is an image of the one who burns up there.

But Vac was angry.

"In what way is he better than I am? Why did they take him and not me?"

She left them. She became a lioness, and she prowled the ground between the gods and the Asuras, who were at war, seizing whatever she found. Both sides called to her. Agni carried the message for the gods.

"What will be mine if I come over to you?" she asked.

"The offering shall reach you even before it reaches Agni," said the gods.

"Then whatever blessing you ask through me shall come true," said Vac, and she went over to the gods. The raised altar of the Soma sacrifice is hers, and butter is poured on it before any is poured into the fire.