7/20/2014 Lord Agni, the First God in the Vedas http://www.indiadivine.org/news/hindu-gods-and-goddesses/lord-agni-the-first-god-in-the-vedas-r741 2/8 Agni is the first word of the first prayer of the first Veda. Lord Agni is the revered Fire God and accepter of sacrifices of the ancient world and even today. He is also the divine messenger of the gods between different worlds. He bridges humankind and heavenly orders - so all the sacrifices are made to him in order to go to numerous deities in the cosmos. He has the ability to transfer offerings across existences and is the link between heaven and earth. The brother of Lord Indra is ever young and immortal, being lit and re-lit every day. His name itself literally means fire – Ignis (Latin) and Agni (Sanskrit). He is equivalently said to be the fire of the colossal sun and countless stars, of powerful lightning and of the hearth that men light for worship. While other gods exist faraway in different realms and have personified representation on earth, he is the one who remains closest to man in an elemental form. In fact the Fire God is the contact point of all gods and he is said to encompass them as the circumference of a great wheel, with each god being a spoke. In the sacred Rig Veda he is sometimes addressed as Lord Rudra, who is regarded by scholars to be a precursor of Lord Shiva. Though the Guardian of the South East has no major sect in modern Hindu practices (except a handful of Agnihotri Brahmins), he is invoked in all religious ceremonies and pujas. Alongside Lord Indra and Lord Varuna, he is a part of the three supreme Vedic gods who once ruled the roost. Gradually across centuries without losing his esteemed standing he successfully transitioned into the complex tiered Hindu pantheon of deities.
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