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Devatā — The Grammar of the Divine
before this →Karma & Saṃsāra — Action and Its Fruit
Readers from outside count many gods. The tradition holds one reality under many names — and the names are not arbitrary. Each devatā is a function as much as a person.
adhiyajña
the ritual register — Agni, Soma — powers invoked in the yajña
adhidaiva
the cosmic register — Indra, Varuṇa, Ūṣas — powers in the world
adhyātma
the inner register — prāṇa, manas, vāk — powers in the person
Saguṇa and nirguṇa
with form, without form
The same reality is approached saguṇa — with name, form, and story, for worship and love — and nirguṇa — without any attribute, for knowledge. The iṣṭa-devatā is the chosen form through which one begins; it is a door, not a boundary.
the line again“The real is one; the wise speak of it in many
ways.” The devatās are those ways, made personal — Indra, Mitra, Varuṇa, Agni, and
the divine bird, all named and then relativized in the same verse.
ONE REALITYsaguṇa · nirguṇa
MANY FORMSiṣṭa-devatā — the door one enters by
THREE POWERSŚiva = awareness · Śakti = dynamism · Viṣṇu = sustaining
introduces →devatāiṣṭa-devatāsaguṇanirguṇaśakti