[81] Rig-Veda, v. 85. 8.
[82] Ibid. vii. 86. 6; x. 164. 3.
[83] Ibid. vii. 88. 6. Cf. Kaegi, op. cit. p. 68.
[84] Laws of Manu, xi. 45 sq. Cf. Vasishtha, 20.
[85] Rájendralála Mitra, Indo-Aryans, i. 393.
In the Greek literature there are several instances of guilt being attached to the accidental transgression of some sacred law, the transgressor being perfectly unaware of the nature of his deed. Oedipus is the most famous example of this. Actaeon is punished for having seen Diana. Pausanias, the Spartan king, made sacrifice to Zeus Phyxius, to atone for the death of the maiden whom he had slain by misfortune.[86]
[86] Farnell, op. cit. i. 72.
The Babylonian psalmist, assuming that one of the gods is angry with him because he is suffering pain, exclaims:—“The sin which I committed I know not. The transgression I committed I know not. The affliction which was my food—I know it not. The evil which trampled me down—I know it not. The lord in the wrath of his heart has regarded me; the god in the fierceness of his heart has punished me.”[87] In another psalm it is said:—“He knows not his sin against the god, he knows not his transgression against the god and the goddess. Yet the god has smitten, the goddess has departed from him.”[88]
[87] Zimmern, Babylonische Busspsalmen, p. 63.
[88] Sayce, Hibbert Lectures on the Religion of the Ancient Babylonians, p. 505. Cf. Mürdter-Delitzsch, Geschichte Babyloniens und Assyriens, p. 38.