Madhuvidya

SR No.: 006525
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S D Laddu, T N Dharmadhikari, Madhvi Kolhatkar, Pratibha Pingle
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 2001
Total Pages: 762
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Literature, & Philosophy
File Size: 17 MB

Page 216

TWO NOTES ON YAŠTS
73
etc., astram... tvadvadhayābhimantritam, Rām. 2.96.50 etc. cited by Böhtlingk-Roth.
If the spells are uttered to make the weapon more effective and yet in the present case the weapon turns back without inflicting any injury, then frāna in this context can best be rendered by 'in spite of'. The passage then gives good meaning : “Back flies the spear which the Mitra-enemy throws in spite of the evil spells which the Mitra-enemy puts into action."
This suggestion was made by me to GERSHEVITCH when I was reading this yast with him in the summer of 1958. He accepted the suggestion and recorded it in the Addenda, p. 323. He says there, "Such a meaning can be obtained e. g. by taking frāna, as a preposition, to mean'in spite of', or by replacing Bth.'s ' because of the abundance of evil spells' by with the abundance......', in the sense of 'with (=despite) all the evil spells."
But it is doubtful whether we can imagine for an older Indo-European language such a construction with a preposition governing genitive as is imagined above when one takes fräna to mean in spite of'. In Sanskrit one may think of the use of anadstya or the genitive absolute construction to express this meaning. Probably to obviate the difficulty of the use of preposition, GERSHEVITCH thought of the latter explanation mentioned above. But in that case he is required to take 'within the meaning despite which is not likely to meet with approval. If, on the other hand, we assume that avanam mąeranam is used as genitive absolute, then the idea of disregard having been conveyed by this constuction itself, frāna will remain hanging without any known purpose.
I am therefore now inclined to take frāna as instr. sg. of a stem in -a, the derivation and meaning being the same as suggested by BARTHOLOMAE. The passage will be accordingly translated as : “Back flies the spear which the Mithra-enemy throws together with the series of the evil spells which the Mithra-enemy sets into action". The spells were thus intended to go along with the spear, but both, the spear and the spells, turn back without causing any injury to the person against whom they were hurled. The same passage frāna avanam etc. occurs twice in section 21. We can interpret it in the same way as in section 20. The good throws of the Mithra-enemy, sent along with the evil spells, even if they reach the bodies of the pious, do not harm them. The wind, when it carries off the spear of the Mithra-enemy, carries off also the evil spells.
Madhu Vidyā/191