@ exile, in reply to your post # 43.
You missed that topic. It is in the 'Ancient History and Mythology' forum, I was thinking that you would participate in that (though there is still time
![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
), It is at
http://www.interfaith.org/forum/the-sixteen-homelands-of-aryans-16124.html#post274651.
There was a lot of coming (into India) and some going (back) too. Some Aryans, including Zoroaster's people, came to Punjab but returned to northern areas because they did not like the heat in Punjab and suffered fevers. Otherwise, it would not have been mentioned in Vendidad.
RigVeda was composed in different periods. Some before the coming of Aryans in India and some later. That is why they say that books 1 and 10 were composed later than the other books. But the many of the ideas (not the words) are common to both in older books of the Iranian Aryans and the Indian Aryans. That is why RigVeda mentions seven suns and an unformed one. That is why RigVeda mentions a long night (Ati-Ratra). That is why dawns (Ushas) lingered for one month before the sun appeared and that is why there were priests who completed their annual ritual cycle in nine or ten months (Navagwahas and Dashagwahas). And the Vendidad mentions a deluge with snow. These are remembrances of their homeland which was far in North, somewhere near the polar region.
In RV 2.30.4, the priest says that as Brihaspati did with a bolt, Indra, as you did earlier also, O Asura, now too you pierce the Vrkadvaras.
"The Demons often mentioned in the hymns are of two kinds. The higher and more powerful class are the aerial foes of the gods. These, are seldom called asura in the RV., where in the older parts that word means a divine being, like ahura in the Avesta. The term dasa, or dasyu, properly the name of the dark aborigines (Aup differs. These were not aborigines but supposed demons in the 'Ariyanem Veijo', the original Aryan homeland, who hid the sun for two months and Indra had to kill them to bring back sun and the spring and let the waters of River Saraswati flow), is frequently used in the sense of fiend to designate the aerial demons." -
A Vedic Reader (Excerpts)
(Note: If these are aerial demons, how could these be aborigines. Are aborigines aerial? The writer is clearly confused)
"Bhargava believes that, in most of the ancient hymns, the word, Asura, is always used as an adjective meaning 'powerful' or 'mighty'. In the Rig Veda, two generous kings, as well as some priests, have been described as Asura. One hymn requests a son who is an Asura. In nine hymns, Indra is described as Asura. Five times, he is said to possess asurya, and once he is said to possess asuratva. Agni has total of 12 Asura descriptions, Varuna has 10, Mitra has eight, and Rudra has six." -
Asura - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In RV 7.99.5, Asura is used in the sense of 'powerful' and 'mighty', and I do not see any dichotomy in this. Rendering it into modern English, it is:
"You have destroyed, you Indra, and you Vishnu, Sambara's nine-and-ninety fenced castles;
You both smote down a hundred times a thousand resistless heroes of the mighty Varchin."
"The dichotomy is evident in the earliest texts of either culture, though neither the Rigveda's Asuras nor the Gathas' Daevas are 'demons'. However, sometimes the deities cooperate. Nevertheless, the demonisation of the Asuras in post-Rigvedic India and the demonisation of the Daevas in Zoroastrian Iran took place "so late that the associated terms cannot be considered a feature of Indo-Iranian religious dialectology." -
Asura - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia