Yama
This excursus on ‘The Fire-walk’ has been introduced, as an occasion arose, less because of controversy about a neglected theme than for the purpose of giving something positive in a controversial treatise. For the same reason I take advantage of Mr. Max Müller’s remarks on Yama, ‘the first who died,’ to offer a set of notes on myths of the Origin of Death. Yama, in our author’s opinion, is ‘the setting sun’ (i. 45; ii. 563). Agni (Fire) is ‘the first who was born;’ as the other twin, Yama, he was also the first who died (ii. 568). As ‘the setting sun he was the first instance of death.’ Kuhn and others, judging from a passage in the Atharva Veda (xviii. 3, 13), have, however, inferred that Yama ‘was really a human being and the first of mortals.’ He is described in the Atharva as ‘the gatherer of men, who died the first of mortals, who went forward the first to that world.’ In the Atharva we read of ‘reverence to Yama, to Death, who first approached the precipice, finding out the path for many.’ ‘The myth of Yama is perfectly intelligible, if we trace its roots back to the sun of evening’ (ii. 573). Mr. Max Müller then proposes on this head ‘to consult the traditions of real Naturvölker’ (savages). The Harvey Islanders speak of dying as ‘following the sun’s track.’ The Maoris talk of ‘going down with the sun’ (ii. 574). No more is said here about savage myths of ‘the first who died.’ I therefore offer some additions to the two instances in which savages use a poetical phrase connecting the sun’s decline with man’s death.