Soma
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2008-07-13T18:59:41Z
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/* Candidates for the Soma plant */
{{otheruses1|the Vedic plant and ritual}}
{{Refimprove|date=December 2007}}
{{Hinduism_small}}
'''Soma''' ([[Sanskrit]]: [[:wikt:सोम|सोम]]), or '''[[Haoma]]''' ([[Avestan]]), from [[Proto-Indo-Iranian]] *''sauma-'', was a ritual drink of importance among the early [[Indo-Iranians]], and the later [[Vedic civilization|Vedic]] and [[Greater Iran|greater Persian]] cultures. It is frequently mentioned in the [[Rigveda]], which contains many hymns praising its energizing qualities. In the [[Avesta]], Haoma has an entire ''Yasht'' dedicated to it.
It is described as prepared by pressing juice from the stalks of a certain mountain plant, which has been variously hypothesized to be [[water]], [http://books.google.com/books?id=uKeubCiBOPQC&pg=PA205&lpg=PA205&dq=soma+honey&source=web&ots=yilmZXkJrz&sig=FFfHCzPRCpSzO95Kz-iNL_kBm_4 honey], [[alcohol]], [[mead]], a [[psychedelic mushroom]], [[cannabis]], ''[[Peganum harmala]]'', [[pomegranate]], [[Nelumbo nucifera|Blue lotus]][http://www.erowid.org/library/books/soma_divine_hallucinogen.shtml], or [[ephedra]]. In both Vedic and Zoroastrian tradition, the drink is identified with the plant, and also personified as a divinity, the three forming a religious or mythological unity. It is considered by some to be the symbolic representation of the [[Meaning of Life|Supreme Truth]].
==Etymology==
Both Soma and the Avestan ''[[Haoma]]'' are derived from [[Proto-Indo-Iranian]] ''*sauma-''. The name of the [[Scythia]]n tribe ''Hauma-varga'' is related to the word, and probably connected with the ritual. The word is derived from an Indo-Iranian root ''*sav-'' (Sanskrit ''sav-'') "to press", i.e. ''*sav-ma-'' is the drink prepared by pressing the stalks of a plant (cf. ''[[Espresso|es-presso]]''). The root is probably [[Proto-Indo-European language|Proto-Indo-European]] (''*sewh-''), and also appears in ''son'' (from ''*suhnu-'', "pressed out" i.e. "newly born").
==Vedic Soma==
In the [[Vedas]], Soma is portrayed as sacred and as a god ([[deva (Hinduism)|deva]]). The god, the drink and the plant probably referred to the same entity, or at least the differentiation was ambiguous. In this aspect, Soma is similar to the Greek [[ambrosia]] (cognate to ''[[amrita]]''); it is what the gods drink, and what made them deities. [[Indra]] and [[Agni]] are portrayed as consuming Soma in copious quantities. The consumption of Soma by human beings was probably under the belief that it bestowed divine qualities on them.
====In the Rigveda====
The ''[[Rigveda]]'' (8.48.3, tr. [[Ralph T.H. Griffith|Griffith]]) states,
:a ''{{IAST|ápāma sómam amŕtā abhūmâganma jyótir ávidāma devân}}''
:c ''{{IAST|kíṃ nūnám asmân kṛṇavad árātiḥ kím u dhūrtír amṛta mártyasya}}''
:We have drunk Soma and become immortal; we have attained the light, the Gods discovered.
:Now what may foeman's malice do to harm us? What, O Immortal, mortal man's deception?
The Ninth [[Mandala]] of the [[Rigveda]] is known as the '''Soma Mandala'''. It consists entirely of hymns addressed to '''Soma Pavamana''' ("purified Soma"). The drink Soma was kept and distributed by the [[Gandharva]]s. The Rigveda associates the [[Sushoma]], [[Arjikiya]] and other regions with Soma (e.g. 8.7.29; 8.64.10-11). [[Sharyanavat]] was possibly the name of a pond or lake on the banks of which Soma could be found.
The plant is described as growing in the mountains (''giristha'', cf. [[Orestes]]), with long stalks, and of yellow or tawny (''[[hari]]'') colour. The drink is prepared by priests pounding the stalks with stones, an occupation that creates [[tapas (Sanskrit)|tapas]] (literally "heat"). The juice so gathered is mixed with other ingredients (including milk) before it is drunk.
Growing far away, in the mountains, Soma had to be purchased from travelling traders. The plant supposedly grew in the [[Hindukush]] and thus it had to be imported to the [[Punjab region]].{{Fact|date=February 2007}} Later, knowledge of the plant was lost altogether, and Indian ritual reflects this, in expiatory prayers apologizing to the gods for the use of a substitute plant (e.g. [[rhubarb]]) because Soma had become unavailable.
====In Hinduism====
{{See also|Chandra}}
In [[Hindu]] art, the god Soma was depicted as a bull or bird, and sometimes as an embryo, but rarely as an adult human. In [[Hinduism]], the god Soma evolved into a [[lunar deity]], and became associated with the [[underworld]]. The [[moon]] is the cup from which the gods drink Soma, and so Soma became identified with the moon god [[Chandra]]. A waxing moon meant Soma was recreating himself, ready to be drunk again. Alternatively, Soma's twenty-seven wives were the star goddesses, the [[Nakshatras]] - daughters of the cosmic progenitor [[Daksha]] - who told their father that he paid too much attention to just one of them, [[Rohini (nakshatra)|Rohini]]. Daksha subsequently cursed Soma to wither and die, but the wives intervened and the death became periodic and temporary, and is symbolized by the waxing and waning of the moon.
The famous [[ayurvedic]] scholar [[Sushruta]] wrote that the best Soma is found in the upper [[Indus River|Indus]] and [[Kashmir]] region (Sushruta Samhita: 537-538, SS.CS. 29.28-31).
==Avestan Haoma==
{{main|Haoma}}
The continuing of ''Haoma'' in [[Zoroastrianism]] may be glimpsed from the [[Avesta]] (particularly in the ''Hōm Yast'', Yasna 9.11), and [[Avestan language]] ''*hauma'' also survived as [[middle Persian]] ''hōm''. The plant ''Haoma'' yielded the essential ingredient for the ritual drink, ''parahaoma''.
In the ''Hōm yašt'' of the [[Avesta]], the ''[[Yazata]]'' (divine) Haoma appears to Zoroaster "at the time of pressing" (''havani ratu'') in the form of a beautiful man. Yasna 9.1 and 9.2 exhort him to gather and press Haoma plants. Haoma's epitheta include "the Golden-Green One" (''zairi-'', Sanskrit ''hari-''), "righteous" (''ašavan-''), "furthering righteousness" (''aša-vazah-''), and "of good wisdom" (''hu.xratu-'', Sanskrit ''sukratu-'').
In Yasna 9.22, Haoma grants "speed and strength to warriors, excellent and righteous sons to those giving birth, spiritual power and knowledge to those who apply themselves to the study of the nasks". As the religion's chief cult divinity he came to be perceived as its divine priest. In Yasna 9.26, [[Ahura Mazda]] is said to have invested him with the sacred girdle, and in Yasna 10.89, to have installed Haoma as the "swiftly sacrificing ''zaotar''" (Sanskrit ''hotar'') for himself and the [[Amesha Spenta]]. Haoma services were celebrated until the 1960s in a strongly conservative village near [[Yazd]]{{Fact|date=February 2007}}.
==Candidates for the Soma plant==
{{main|Botanical identity of Soma-Haoma}}
There has been much speculation as to the original [[Proto-Indo-Iranian]] ''Sauma'' plant. It was generally assumed to be [[Psychedelics, dissociatives and deliriants|hallucinogenic]], based on RV 8.48 cited above. But note that this is the ''only'' evidence of hallucinogenic properties, in a book full of hymns to Soma. The typical description of Soma is associated with excitation and ''tapas''. Soma is associated with the warrior-god Indra, and appears to have been drunk before battle. For these reasons, there are energizing plants as well as hallucinogenic plants among the candidates that have been suggested, including [[honey]]<ref>http://books.google.com/books?id=uKeubCiBOPQC&pg=PA205&lpg=PA205&dq=soma+honey&source=web&ots=yilmZXkJrz&sig=FFfHCzPRCpSzO95Kz-iNL_kBm_4</ref>, and [[Amanita muscaria|fly agaric]] (''Amanita muscaria'') which was widely used as a brew of sorts among [[Siberian shamanism|Siberian shamans]] for its hallucinogenic and entheogenic properties. Several texts like the [[Atharvaveda]] extol the medicinal properties of Soma and he is regarded as the king of medicinal herbs (and also of the [[Brahmana]] class).
Since the late 1700s, when [[Abraham Hyacinthe Anquetil-Duperron]] and others made portions of the Avesta available to Western scholars, several scholars have sought a representative botanical equivalent of the ''haoma'' as described in the texts and as used in living Zoroastrian practice. Most of the proposals concentrated on either linguistic evidence or comparative pharmacology or reflected ritual use. Rarely were all three considered together, which usually resulted in such proposals being quickly rejected.
In the late 19th century, the highly conservative Zoroastrians of [[Yazd]] (Iran) were found to use [[Ephedra]] (''genus'' [[Ephedra (genus)|Ephedra]]), which was locally known as ''hum'' or ''homa'' and which they exported to the Indian Zoroastrians. (Aitchison, 1888) The plant, as Falk also established, requires a cool and dry climate. Later, it was discovered that a number of [[Iranian languages]] and Persian dialects have ''hom'' or similar terms as the local name for some variant of Ephedra.
There are numerous mountain regions in the northwest Indian subcontinent which have cool and dry conditions where soma plant can grow. In later vedic texts the mention of best soma plant coming from kashmir has been mentioned. This is also supported by the presence of high concentration of vedic Brahmans in Kashmir up to the present day who setteled there in ancient times because of the easy availability of soma plant.
From the late 1960s onwards, several studies attempted to establish ''soma'' as a [[Psychoactive drug|psychoactive substance]]. A number of proposals were made, including an important one in 1968 by [[R. Gordon Wasson]], an amateur mycologist, who asserted that ''soma'' was an inebriant, and suggested fly-agaric mushroom, ''[[Amanita muscaria]]'', as the likely candidate. Wasson and his co-author, Wendy Doniger O'Flaherty, drew parallels between Vedic descriptions and reports of Siberian uses of the fly-agaric in [[Shamanism|shamanic]] ritual. ({{cite journal|last=Wasson|first=Robert Gordon|title=Soma: Divine Mushroom of Immortality|journal=Ethno-Mycological Studies|volume=1|location=New York|year=1968}})
==In Western culture==
In Western culture Soma often refers to some form of intoxicating drug. In [[Aldous Huxley]]'s [[dystopian]] novel ''[[Brave New World]]'', [[Soma (Brave New World)|Soma]] is a popular dream-inducing drug. It provides an easy escape from the hassles of daily life and is employed by the government as a method of control through pleasure. It is ubiquitous and ordinary among the culture of the novel and everyone is shown to use it at some point, in various situations: sex, relaxation, concentration, confidence. It is seemingly a single-chemical combination of many of today's drugs' effects, giving its users the full hedonistic spectrum depending on dosage.
Soma is the central theme of the poem ''The Brewing of the Soma'' by the American Quaker poet, [[John Whittier]] (1807-1892) from which the well-known Christian hymn "[[Dear Lord and Father of Mankind]]" is derived. Whittier here portrays the drinking of soma as distracting the mind from the proper worship of God.
In the book [[Junkie (novel)|Junkie]], author [[William S. Burroughs]] refers to soma as a non-addictive, high-quality form of opium said to exist in ancient India. He hypothesizes that, were such a drug to exist, drug dealers would be quick to seize on the opportunity and cut the drug until it became generic "junk."
For other used of the word Soma, see [[Soma (disambiguation)]].
==References==
<references />
*Bakels, C.C. 2003. [http://users.primushost.com/~india/ejvs/ejvs0901/ejvs0901c.txt “The contents of ceramic vessels in the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex, Turkmenistan.”] in ''Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies'', Vol. 9. Issue 1c (May 5)
*Bhishagratna, Kunjalal (tr.) ''Susruta Samhita''. Varanasi: Chowkhama Sanksrit Series, 1981.
*[[David Frawley|Frawley, David]]. ''The Rig Veda and the History of India''. Aditya Prakashan, 2001. ISBN 81-7742-039-9
*Jay, Mike. ''Blue Tide: The Search for Soma''. Autonomedia, 1999.
*Lamborn Wilson, Peter. ''Ploughing the clouds:The search for Irish Soma'', City Lights,1999.
*McDonald, A. "A botanical perspective on the identity of soma (Nelumbo nucifera Gaertn.) based on scriptural and iconographic records" in ''Economic Botany'' 2004;58
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[[Category:Entheogens]]
[[Category:Herbal and fungal hallucinogens]]
[[Category:Hindu mythology]]
[[Category:Materials involved in Hinduism]]
[[Category:Mythological substances]]
[[Category:Rig Veda]]
[[Category:Rigvedic deities]]
[[Category:Historical beverages]]
[[Category:Sanskrit words and phrases]]
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