Page:The Religion of the Veda.djvu/184
of heaven which suggests the god's salient quality of overseer, be it encompassing sky, be it moon. I choose two other gods as the type of translucent gods, Vishnu and Pūshan; in both cases we shall be engaged with variant aspects of the sun. This may seem to some minds a suspicious monotony of explanation, in fact it is the so-called solar theory. But I am nothing daunted: the sun is important and ever present with early observers; I shall let him fight his own battles.
If I am not mistaken, I have done the cause of Vishnu a service in pointing out that the name itself is compounded of the two words vi and snu, meaning "through the back."[1] The leading fact in Vishnu's activity in the Veda is that he takes three strides (tredhā vi kram). A passage in the Sāma-Veda states that "Vishnu strode through over the back of the earth."[2] Here the word for "through" is vi; the word for "back" is sānu (snu) – the two parts of the name Vishnu. The third of these enormous strides lands Vishnu in the highest heaven, in the bright realm of light, where even the winged birds do not dare to fly.[3] There in the highest stepping