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 192

FARGARD VIII.
97
water? How far from the consecrated bundles of Baresma? How far from the faithful?
7 (17). Ahura Mazda answered: Thirty paces from the fire ; thirty paces from the water ; thirty paces from the consecrated bundles of Baresma ; three paces from the faithful;—
8 (18). “On that place they shall dig a grave, half a foot deep if the earth be hard, half the height of a man if it be soft ; [they shall cover the surface of the grave with ashes or cowdung] ; they shall cover the surface of it with dust of bricks, of stones, or of dry earth 4
9 (21)*. 'And they shall let the lifeless body lie there, for two nights, or 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.
10 (23). “And when the birds begin to fly, the plants to grow, the hidden floods to flow, and the wind to dry up the earth, then the worshippers of Mazda shall make a breach in the wall of the house,
1 This is the case when the house is too small for containing a special chamber for the dead (as prescribed Farg. V, 10). Nowadays they dispense even with that grave: the corpse is laid on the door, on a slab of marble, by which it is sufficiently isolated from the ground to prevent its being defiled.
* Soft earth, being not impervious to liquids, lets contagion through more easily. • Vendîdad Sada.
· Substances more impervious. o $$ 9-10; cf. Farg. V, 13-13.
• The master and mistress of the house are carried away through a breach (made in the wall of the house); others through the door' (Comm.) The more scrupulous parties have it (the body] removed by a side, in preference to the usual general entrance' (H. G. Briggs, The Parsis, 1852, p. 50).
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