Ardor (33 page)

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If every act that happens in life is derived from a ritual gesture, then how can certain essential gestures that influence everything and are inextricably linked with everything, but have an unforeseeable and half-clandestine character, appear in the rite, how can they find a ceremonial position within it? The erotic gaze, for example, the exchange of glances between a man and a woman who do not know each other?

Movies, novels: these are the places where eyes meet, as part of a casual chain of events. But the Vedic ritualists, in their frenzy to include everything in the network of prescribed gestures, had even thought of this. There is a priest, the
ne
ṣṭṛ
, whose main role was to escort and guide the sacrificer’s wife—the only woman present—onto the scene of the sacrifice. The wife of the sacrificer, though, had no complicated duties. Only two subtle, erotic gestures, which the
ne
ṣṭṛ
supervised. Three times she exchanged glances with the
udg
ā
t
ṛ
, the “chanter.” That was enough for sexual union to take place, one of the many times it occurred during the rite. For the woman, at that moment, had thought: “You are Praj
ā
pati, the male, he who gives the seed: place the seed in me!” Then she sat down and exposed her right thigh three times. Then three times, in silence, she poured over it the
pannejan
ī
water she had drawn that morning. Everyone was silent, all that could be heard was the gentle flow of water. Then she went back to hide herself in her tent.

At a certain point the sacrificer placed a bowl of ghee before his consort and told her to look at it. And so the woman “lowers her eyes to the sacrificial ghee.” Now—we are told—“the ghee is seed.” So what is happening, between the woman’s eye and the ghee, is “fertile intercourse.” At this moment the sacrificer’s wife betrays her husband on his own instructions. But if the husband didn’t ask her to look at the ghee, then his wife would be excluded from the sacrifice. There again, as soon as the wife looks at the ghee, their intercourse renders it impure, so the ghee has to be heated once again on the
g
ā
rhapatya
fire to remove its impurity before returning it to the
ā
havan
ī
ya
fire. This is the formula that makes it possible to get around the difficulty: if the wife didn’t look at the ghee, the sacrifice would be flawed, in that she would be excluded from it; if she looked at it on the
ā
havan
ī
ya
fire, the offering would be rendered irredeemably impure. She can therefore look at it, but only on the
g
ā
rhapatya
fire. The ritualist is there first and foremost to show how to get around these conflicts, to avoid these paralyzing alternatives.

From a whole range of details we are reminded that what is occurring during the sacrificial liturgy is also a sexual act. The
sadas
, “hut,” has many purposes during the ceremony, including that of accommodating the six
dhi
ṣṇ
ya
fires of the officiants. But it is also a secret that has to be protected, since what it conceals is like intercourse between husband and wife—between the sacrificer and his wife. And “if a husband and wife are seen during intercourse, they immediately run away from each other, because they are doing something unbecoming.” There is only one point from which it is permissible to see what is going on in the
sadas
: from the door, “because the door is made by the gods.” Every other line of vision, every other angle of observation is illicit, like the act of a
voyeur.

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The oblation is preceded by a cry, an invocation, the
va
ṣ
a
ṭ
: “May Agni conduct you to the gods!” That cry is the orgasm. If the oblation were presented before the
va
ṣ
a
ṭ
it would be like seed not shed into the vagina, the cry of orgasm would not coincide with ejaculation. And so “the oblation is made either at the same time as the
va
ṣ
a
ṭ
or immediately after it has been uttered.”

The ejaculation, like immolation, can be regarded as the culmination of a process, but also marks its interruption, the beginning of a withdrawal from pleasure. If the pleasure is not interrupted, it would be as if the sacrificer were able to remain in his new body, intact, in the sky. But then he would have to leave his other body between the jaws of Agni and Soma, lifeless before the
ā
havan
ī
ya
fire.

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In the divine erotica, multiple seductions were frequent: Agni with the wives of the Saptar
ṣ
is or Soma with his sisters or
Ś
iva once again with the wives of the Saptar
ṣ
is. Or Agni with the waters: “Agni once desired the waters: ‘May I couple with them,’ he thought. He coupled with them; and his seed became gold.” When Alberich pursues the Rhine Maidens to possess the gold from which to make the Ring, he searches for Agni’s seed, submerged there from remote times as a sign of the mutual penetration of opposites that makes life possible. “Gold’s bright eye” is there, “which now wakes, now sleeps,” writes Wagner in impeccably Vedic terms (Wellgunde in the Prelude of
Das Rheingold
). To snatch the gold from the waters brings disaster since it returns the world to a state where its elements are separated and thus cannot be regenerated. Neither the waters nor the gold will ever manage to regain the radiance that is the hallmark of elusive and everlasting life.

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There is nothing more misleading than to think of the
Ṛ
gveda
as a work concerned only with sublime tone and enigmas, incapable of describing things directly. We also find irreverence toward the gods is already there, as well as every other trait later to be developed in Indian history. And no god is mocked and jeered more than Indra, the king of kings. In the tenth and last cycle of the
Ṛ
gveda
, which is also the one containing some of the loftiest enigmatic hymns, we find the hymn of V
ṛṣā
kapi, the monkey-man. It is a hymn with multiple voices, divided between Indr
āṇī
(a sort of Mrs. Indra, who is given no name of her own), Indra himself, the monkey-man V
ṛṣā
kapi, and his wife, V
ṛṣā
kap
ā
y
ī
(a mirror image of Indr
āṇī
). It is not clear who the monkey-man is, nor to what extent he is an animal or a man. Perhaps he is a bastard son of Indra, produced with one of his concubines, whom his father keeps with him and protects. But the monkey-man shows disrespect (we don’t know in what way) to the mistress of the house (Indr
āṇī
), who takes it out on her husband. The tone of the scene is exactly like that of the
commedia dell’arte
—or even Neapolitan comedy in the style of Scarpetta or De Filippo. The
trickster
V
ṛṣā
kapi could be Punch. The scene is a family row, packed with sexual innuendo and bawdiness. The wife of the king of kings, furious because Indra won’t intervene against the monkey-man, says to him: “No woman has a butt as fine as mine, no one fucks as well as me, no one grips tighter, no one can raise her thighs higher.” No surprise that the dour Leopold von Schroeder should confess that the hymn “contains passages so obscene that I hesitated long before including it in this collection.” Geldner resorts to euphemism in his translation. As for Renou, twice in this verse he resorts to ellipsis. So people of modern times, proud cultivators of low style, need have no worry. Even the Vedic seers were familiar with such language and used it when the situation arose. And they also understood the comic effect produced by the clash of conflicting tones. Throughout the hymn devoted to the pranks of the monkey-man every verse ends with the exclamation “
ví
ś
vasm
ā
d Índra úttara
ḥ
,” “Indra
über alles.
”

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In the
Atharvaveda
it is said that Earth “has black knees” like a child at play, but for another reason: because the flames have licked them, for Earth is “cloaked in fire.” And, if we close our eyes, how do we recognize Earth? From its scent. It is the same fragrance that marked the fortunes of the Genies and the Nymphs, the Gandharvas and the Apsaras. He who invokes Earth also wants to acquire that fragrance. It is a fragrance associated with far-off memories: “That scent of yours that has penetrated the lotus, the scent which the immortal gods carried with them to the marriage of S
ū
ry
ā
, O Earth, that primeval scent, let me be entirely perfumed by it.” The scent of Earth recalls one of the happiest moments in the lives of the gods: when S
ū
ry
ā
, daughter of the Sun, went to marry King Soma. The Earth’s scent did not envelop S
ū
ry
ā
alone, but all girlhood splendor: “That scent of yours which is in human beings, female and male, which is their fortune, their pleasure, that which is in horses, warriors, that in wild animals and elephants, the splendor, O Earth, which is in the young girl, bathe us in it, so that no one wishes us harm!” All subsequent marriages, ever after, were a pale copy of what took place on S
ū
ry
ā
and Soma’s wedding day. Even the hymn in the
Ṛ
gveda
that describes it begins by talking about Earth: “Earth is underpinned by Truth.” And how could Earth be ignored on such an occasion? The hymn tells us straightaway that Earth—here called P
ṛ
thiv
ī
, the Vast—“is great” thanks only to
soma
, to this intoxicating plant. Earth, for us, would not be so immense without
soma
to help us perceive it.

The bride soon appears: “S
ū
ry
ā
’s fine dress was entirely embroidered with verses. The cushion was Intellect, the ointment was Gaze, the basket was Sky and Earth, on the day on which S
ū
ry
ā
went to her husband.” Beside her, two handsome identical young men: the A
ś
vins, her brothers and attendants. S
ū
ry
ā
moved forward: “Her chariot was Thought, and Sky was the canopy.” The chariot was drawn by the two months of summer. So summertime is auspicious for weddings. The effect of all that happened from the moment of S
ū
ry
ā
’s arrival has reverberated down to today, though the daughter of the Sun is long forgotten. And from that day the psyche of the bride has received its imprint. This must encourage the husband to be humble. Even though he will be the first to touch his bride’s body, he will be her fourth lover: “Soma had her first, the Gandharva had her second, her third husband was Agni, the fourth the son of man.” Though the twentieth century would include psychology among its discoveries, no inquiry into the psyche of the young girl, the
kór
ē
, has reached such precision. When she reaches her wedding, even if her body is intact, every young girl has a long love story behind her. Her first lover was Soma—or Hades—since he is the ruler, as white as moonlight or as black as the darkness of the Underworld. For he is absolute and final. But after Soma comes the Gandharva Vi
ś
v
ā
vasu, the wicked genie, the mental image of eros that besieges the young girl in her solitude, her dreams, her games. He is stubborn and wily, he knows how to wheedle his way into women’s rooms and excite their fancy. Before the young girl can reach her marriage he has to be ritually driven out: “‘Leave here: this woman has a husband!’ thus I addressed Vi
ś
v
ā
vasu with the homage of my songs. ‘Look for another young girl, who is still living with her parents: this is your fate: understand it.’” And if the Gandharva obstinately remains, he has to be told: “Leave here, Vi
ś
v
ā
vasu! We implore you, paying homage to you, look for another, who may be lustful! Allow the bride to be united with her husband.”

The third lover is Agni. Why? Agni is everyone’s lover. Women, old and young, gathered around the fire and showed him the soles of their feet. From there the heat of the flames began to caress them, then climbed even farther, beneath their dresses, up to their thighs. If the Saptar
ṣ
is’ wives betrayed them with Agni, what resistance could there be from an ordinary girl who had not yet been touched—and who is now being caressed in a way that no one else would ever equal? The fourth is “the son of man.” His male arrogance is the most unfitting and unseemly. And yet, through the lengthy exercise of patience, with no claims to domination, he will have to find his way through the indelible memories of those lovers who have preceded him and whom he will try to emulate to succeed at last in being at least the fourth. And nothing will change when the young girl becomes a mother with many children. As the hymn says toward the end, invoking Indra: “Put inside her ten children, let her husband be the eleventh!”