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Contents 1 Etymology 2 Vishnu in Smriti and Shruti 2.1 In the Vedas 2.2 In the Brahmanas   2.3 In the Upanishads 2.4 In the Bhagavad Gita 2.5 In the Viṣṇu Smṛti 3 Theological attributes 3.1 Three forms 3.2 Five forms 4 Relations with other Deities   5 Iconography 6 Avatars 7 Thousand names of Lord Vishnu 8 Footnotes 9 References 10 External links

Etymology

The traditional Sanskrit explanation of the name Viṣṇu involves the root viś, meaning “to settle, to enter”, or also (in the Rigveda) “to pervade”, and a suffix nu, translating to approximately “the All-Pervading One”. An early  ommentator on the Vedas, Yaska, in his Nirukta, defines Vishnu as ‘vishnu vishateh; one who enters everywhere’, and ‘yad vishito bhavati tad vishnurbhavati; that which is free from fetters and bondages is Vishnu.’

Adi Sankara in his
commentary on Vishnu Sahasranama
states derivation from this root, with a meaning “presence everywhere” (“As he
pervades everything, vevesti, he is called Visnu“). Adi Sankara states
(regarding Vishnu Purana, 3.1.45):
“The Power of the Supreme Being has entered within the universe. The root
Viś means ‘enter into.’” Swami Chinmayananda,
in his translation of Vishnu sahasranama further elaborates on that verse: The
root Vis means to enter. The entire world of things and beings is pervaded by
Him and the Upanishad emphatically insists in its mantra “whatever that is there
is the world of change.” Hence, it means that He is not limited by space, time
or substance. Chinmayananda states that which pervades everything is Vishnu.

Vishnu in Smriti and Shruti

In the Vedas

In the Rigveda, Vishnu is mentioned 93
times. He is frequently invoked alongside other deities, especially Indra, who he helps in
killing Vritra,
and with whom He drinks Soma. His companionship with Indra
is reflected by his later titles Indrānuja and “Upendra”, both referring
to Vishnu as being the brother of Indra. Lord Vishnu is called Upendra because
He appeared in the family of Aditi (Indra’s mother) in one of His incarnations,
Vamana. His distinguishing characteristic in the Vedas is his association with
Light. This association is found because the lord is indifferent from the Divine
Bhramjyoti, which is the cause of material as well as spiritual effulgence. One
celebrated act of Vishnu in the Rigveda is the ‘three steps’ by which he strode
over this (universe) and in three places planted his step. The ‘Vishnu Sukta’ of
the Rig Veda (1.154) says that the first and second of Vishnu’s strides (those
encompassing the earth and air) are visible to men and the third is in the
heights of heaven (sky). This last place is described as Vishnu’s supreme abode
in RV 1.22.20:

The princes evermore behold / that loftiest place where Visnu is / Laid
as it were an eye in heaven. (trans. Griffith)

Griffith’s “princes” are the sūri, either “inciters” or lords of a
sacrifice, or priests charged with pressing the Soma. The verse is quoted as
expressing Vishnu’s supremacy by Vaishnavites.

Though such solar aspects have been associated with Vishnu by tradition as
well as modern-scholarship, he was not just the representation of the sun, as he
traverses in his strides both vertically and horizontally.

In hymns I.22.17, 1.154.3, 1.154.4 he strides across the earth with three
steps, in VI.49.13 , VII.100.3 strides across the earth three times and in
I.154.1,I.155.5,VII.29.7 he strides vertically, with the final step in the
heavens. The same Veda also says he strode wide and created space in the cosmos
for Indra to fight Vritra. By his stride he said to have made dwelling for men
possible, the three being a symbolic representation of its all-encompassing
nature. This all-enveloping nature and benevolence to men were to remain the
enduring attributes of Vishnu. As the triple-strider he is known as Tri-vikrama
and as Uru-krama for the strides were wide.

In some Rigvedic hymns, Indra seeks the help of Vishnu in destroying Vritra, indicating
that he is not sufficient to accomplish it on his own.This is further supported in the Skanda purana by atreya
Rsi that Lord Vishnu is the Sole Godhead and other demigods are just His
different energies.

In another interpretation, the characteristic of Vishnu as the supreme god
appeared much earlier in the Vedic texts. For example, the following Vedic hymns
express that point of view:

• Rig Veda
  (7.99.1-7 and 7.100.1-7)
• Purusha Sukta of
  Taittiriya Aranyaka (3.13.2) also refers master of Hari and Lakshmi (Vishnu) as Purusha,
  the supreme,primeval Godhead.
• Visvakarma Sukta of Rig Veda (10.82) describes
  Vishnu as Padmanabha (lotus-naveled
  one, from whose navel sprang the lotus which contained
  Brahma, who
  created the universe)
• 10.082.06: The waters verily first retained the embryo in which all the
  gods were aggregated, single deposited on the navel of the unborn (creator),
  in which all beings abide. The reference to the navel of the unborn
  is an indication of reference to Vishnu.
• The Rig
  Veda (1.22.20) states, oṃ tad viṣṇoḥ paramam padam sadā paśyanti
  sūrayaḥ: “Those who are entirely devoted to lord Vishnu,after
  death,go to the supreme spiritual planet,where they lead eternal lives under
  the thralldom of His superior,internal energy.”

The foreword of P. Sankaranarayan’s translation of Vishnu sahasranama,
Bhavan’s Book University, cites Rig Veda V.I.15b.3, for the importance of
chanting Vishnu’s name, “O ye who wish to gain realization of the supreme truth,
utter the name of Vishnu at least once in the steadfast faith that it will lead
you to such realization.”

In the Brahmanas

In the Rigveda, Shakala shakha: Aitareya Brahmana
Verse 1 : “Agnir vai devānām avamo Viṣṇuḥ paramas, tadantareṇa sarvā anyā
devatā” declares that Agni is the lowest or youngest god and Vishnu is the
greatest and the oldest God. In the Brahmanas, the supremacy
of Lord Vishnu is clearly announced. Here He is repeatedly addressed as
“Yajnapati” or the one whom all the sacrifices are meant to please.^{[citation
needed]} Even if the sacrifices are offered to the demigods, Lord
Vishnu is the one who accepts the sacrifice and allots the respective fruits to
the performer.^{[citation
needed]} There is mention of one such incident where a demoniac
person performs a sacrifice by abducting the rsis forcefully. The sacrifice was
meant to bring about the destruction of Indra. But the rsis,who used to worship
indra as a demigod were intelligent enough to alter a single pronunciation of
the ved-mantra. The purpose of the entire sacrifice was reversed. When the fruit
of the sacrifice was given, as in when the demon was on the verge of dying, he
clearly calls out to lord Vishnu,whom he addresses as Supreme Godhead and “the
father of all living entities including himself”. Aitareya Brahmana: 1:1:1
mentions Vishnu as the Supreme God.

In the Upanishads

The oldest of the Upanishads, that form the
philosophical culmination of the Vedas, are dated to the 7th or 8th centuries
BCE. The upanishads,right from Gopal tapani upanishad to the Brhad ranya
upanishad state His Godhood.The Katha-upanishad, describes Vishnu in supremacy
-

He who has no understanding, who is unmindful and always impure, never
reaches that place, but enters into the round of births. But he who has
understanding, who is mindful and always pure, reaches indeed that place, from
whence he is not born again. But he who has understanding for his charioteer
(intellect), and who holds the reins of the mind, he reaches the end of his
journey, and that is the highest place of Vishnu.

In the Bhagavad Gita

In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna, an avatar
of Vishnu, teaches Arjuna the nature of the Supreme
being and the different processes of Yoga, ultimately culminating in
devotional surrender, similar to that of the catursloki of the Bhagavata
Purana.

• “I am the goal, the sustainer, the master, the witness, the abode, the
  refuge, and the most dear friend. I am the creation and the annihilation, the
  basis of everything, the resting place and the eternal seed.”
• “But what need is there, Arjuna, for all this detailed knowledge? With a
  single fragment of Myself I pervade and support this entire universe.”
• “If hundreds of thousands of suns were to rise at once into the sky, their
  radiance might resemble the effulgence of the Supreme Person in that universal
  form.”
• “Abandon all varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall
  deliver you from all sinful reactions. Do not despair.”

In the Viṣṇu Smṛti

The Viṣṇu
Smṛti (700-1000CE) is one of the latest books of the Dharmaśāstra
tradition of Hinduism and also the only one which does not deal directly with
the means of knowing dharma, focusing instead on the
bhakti tradition
and requiring daily puja to the god Viṣṇu.
It is also known for its handling of the controversial subject of the practice
of sati (the burning of a
widow on her husband’s funeral pyre). The text was not actually composed by the sage Viṣṇu himself, but rather by an
individual or group writing much after his death. This group brought together a
collection of all of the commonly known legal maxims which were attributed to
the sage Viṣṇu into one book as the Indian oral culture began to be recorded
more formally.

Theological attributes

Vishnu takes form as an all-inclusive deity, known as Purusha or Mahāpurusha, Paramātma [Supreme
Soul], Antaryāmi [In-dweller], and he is the Sheshin
[Totality] in whom all souls are contained.

Vishnu is the only Bhagavan (which in Sanskrit
means “possessing bhāga Divine Glory”), as declared in the Bhagavata 1.2.11 in the
verse: “vadanti tat tattva-vidas tattvam yaj jnanam advayam brahmeti paramatmeti
bhagavan iti sabdyate”. The meaning of the verse is as follows: “Learned
transcendentalists who know the Absolute Truth call this nondual substance Brahman, Paramatma and Bhagavan.

In the Vishnu Purana (6.5.79) the
personality named Parashara Rishi defines six
bhagas as follows:

aiśvaryasya samagrasya vīryasya yaśasaḥ śriyaḥ

jñāna-vairāgyayoś caiva ṣannāḥ bhaga itīṇganā

Jiva Gosvami explains the
verse in his Gopala
Champu (Pūrva 15.73) and Bhagavata
Sandarbha 46.10:

jñāna-śakti-balaiśvarya-vīrya-tejām.sy aśeṣataḥ

bhagavac-chabda-vācyāni vinā heyair guṇādibhiḥ

“The substantives of the word bhagavat (bhagavat-śabda-vācyāni) are unlimited (aśes.atah.) knowledge (jñāna), energies (śakti),
strength (bala), opulence (aiśvarya), heroism (vīrya), splendor (tejas),
without (vinā) objectionable (heyair) qualities (guṇādibhiḥ).”

Vishnu possesses six such divine glories, namely,

• Jñāna Omniscient; defined as the power
  to know about all beings simultaneously;
• Aishvarya Sovereignty, which persist
  in unchallenged rule over all;
• Shakti Energy, or power, which is the
  capacity to make the impossible possible;
• Bala Strength,
  which is the capacity to support everything by his will and without any
  fatigue;
• Virya Vigour, or valour which
  indicates the power to retain immateriality as the Supreme Spirit or Being in
  spite of being the material cause of mutable creations;
• Tèjas Resplendent, or Splendour,
  which expresses his self-sufficiency and the capacity to overpower everything
  by his spiritual effulgence; cited from Bhakti Schools of Vedanta, by
  Swami Tapasyananda.

However, the actual number of auspicious qualities of Vishnu is countless,
with the above-mentioned six qualities being the most important. Other important
qualities attributed to Vishnu are Gambhirya (inestimatable grandeur), Audarya
(generosity), and Karunya (compassion.)

The Rigveda
says: Vishnu can travel in three strides. The first stride is the Earth. The
second stride is the visible sky. The third stride cannot be seen by men and is
the heaven where the gods and the righteous dead live. (This feature of three
strides also appears in the story of his avatar Vamana called Trivikrama.) The Sanskrit for
“to stride” is the root kram; its
reduplicated perfect
tense is chakram (guņa grade) or chakra
(zero-grade),
and in the Rigveda he is called by epithets such as
vi-chakra-māņas = “he who has made 3 strides”. The
Sanskrit word chakra also means “wheel”. That may have suggested the idea
of Vishnu carrying a chakra.

Three forms

In Gaudiya Vaishnavism,
a school of Vaishnavism, the
Satvata-tantra describes three different forms, or aspects, of Vishnu as Maha
Vishnu, Garbhodaksayi
Vishnu and Kshirodakasayi
Vishnu, with each form having a different role in the maintenance of the
Universe and its inhabitants:

“For material creation, Lord Krishna’s plenary expansion assumes three
Vishnus. The first one, Maha-Vishnu, creates the total material energy, known as
the mahat-tattva. The second, Garbhodakasayi Vishnu, enters into all the
universes to create diversities in each of them. The third, Kshirodakasayi
Vishnu, is diffused as the all-pervading Supersoul in all the universes and is
known as Paramatma. He is present even
within the atoms. Anyone who knows these three Vishnus can be liberated from
material entanglement.”

Five forms

In Sri Vaishnavism, another school, Vishnu assumes five forms:

1. In the Para Form, Para is the highest form of Vishnu found only in Sri Vaikunta also called Moksha, along with his consort Lakshmi, (and Bhuma Devi and Nila devi, avatars of Lakshmi) and surrounded by liberated souls like Ananta, Garuda, and a host of Muktas (liberated souls).
2. In the Vyuha form which itself divides into four, Vishnu assumes four forms, which exercise different cosmic functions and controls activities of living beings.
3. In the Vibhava form, Vishnu assume various manifestations, called Vibhavas, more popularly known as Avataras from time to time, in order to protect the virtuous, punish the evil-doers and re-establish righteousness.
4. In the Antaryami; “Dwelling within” or “Suksma Vasudeva” form, Vishnu exists within the souls of all living beings and in every atom of matter. In the Arcavatara or Image manifestation, the Lord is easily approachable to the devotees since they cannot worship Para, Vyuha, Vibhava and Antaryami forms directly, which can only be imagined or meditated upon because they are beyond our reach. Such images can be