Zend Avesta Part 01

SR No.: 007671
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: James Darmesteter
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1895
Total Pages: 2695
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 49 MB

Page 148

FARGARD V.
53
III. 10 (34). O Maker of the material world, thou Holy One! If the summer is past and the winter has come, what shall the worshippers of Mazda do'?
Ahura Mazda answered: 'In every house, in every borough, they shall raise three rooms for the dead?'
11 (37). O Maker of the material world, thou Holy One! How large shall be those rooms for the dead?
Ahura Mazda answered: Large enough not to strike the skull of the man, if he should stand erect, or his feet or his hands stretched out: such shall be, according to the law, the rooms for the dead.
12 (41). 'And they shall let the lifeless body lie there, for two nights, or for three nights, or a month long, until the birds begin to fly, the plants to grow, the hidden floods to flow, and the wind to dry up the earth.
In case a man dies during the snowy season, while it is difficult or impossible to take the corpse to the Dakhma, which usually stands far from inhabited places. The same case is treated again in Farg. VIII, 4 seq.
One for men, another for women, a third for children. As not every house is considerable or rich enough to have these three accommodations, there will be a common Zád-marg for the village. The Zad-marg is a small mud house where the corpse is laid, to lie there till it can be taken to the Dakhma (Anquetil, Zend-Avesta II, 583). The Zad-marg is still used in Persia, and in the Gugarati provinces (where it is called Naså - khâna, 'house for corpses'). In Bombay they use the simpler and more economical method given in Farg. VIII, 8. Being in life' (Comm.)
• To come back. They were hidden under the earth. • Until the winter is past' (Comm.)
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