Soma

The total number of mantra-verses dedicated to Soma is about 1200; this number includes all the mantrās in the Maṇḍala 9 with 114 Sūktās or 1108 verses. To understand the nature and function of Soma, one has to study all these 1200 mantrās in some detail.

The scholars in the past have taken short cuts in this study. There is a creeper by the name of Soma which was used in the rituals of the Vedic age called as yajña. Specifically, the Soma creeper was crushed and its juice, after purification, was offered to the fire in the altar. Commentators such as Sāyaṇa or Mahīdhara, proponents of the rituals, identify Soma occurring in the Rig Veda mantrās almost exclusively with the Soma-juice obtained from the creeper. The Western Indologists also regard Soma as the juice from the creeper; in most places they regard it as an intoxicant like liquor. But a straight-forward reading of the epithets to Soma in most of the mantrās gives a picture which is radically different from that of the juice of the creeper.

In several mantrās, Soma is associated with the word ‘mada’ which means intoxication, joy or exaltation. Hence it is said that Soma juice is an intoxicating liquor. Further these translators and commentators claim that the phrase, ‘drinking Soma, Indra kills Vṛtra’, implies that Indra becomes inebriated with the drink of Soma and in that state of intoxication, he kills Vṛtra. These Indologists completely ignore the hundreds of epithets to Indra which state that Indra is not a human being, but a cosmic power. Indra does not need any liquids to be blissful. Being joyful is his natural state.