ABSTRACT
The worship of fire as a god (Agni) is central to Vedic religion. In the Vedic and Iranian views, fire is a substance that is active everywhere in cosmos. Fire is the fertile element in the cosmos; in the sky, in the storm and in the soil, and also in man and woman. Roughly one fifth of the hymns in the Rigveda are dedicated to Agni – the god who personifies fire. Vedic rituals are performed at different levels of complexity and in different contexts, from more mundane to highly elaborate ceremonies taking a long time to prepare and several days to complete, like the agnicayana. The divinities involved are Agni and Soma, in other words, fire and sacred fluid. The simplest ritual consists of a fire sacrifice to Agni (agnihotra). Three fires are needed: gārhaptya, the household fire, āhavanīya, the sacrificial fire, and daksiņāgni, which is believed to give protection from evil. The Iranian fire ritual is, in many respects, like the Vedic complex. Thus, the sacred fire and the rituals surrounding it have defined large parts of cult and cosmology in different Indo-European cultural traditions.
