Dhammapada

SR No.: 007674
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Max Muller
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1881
Total Pages: 2540
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 45 MB

Page 929

I KÂNDA, 3 ADHYAYA, 5 BRÂHMANA, 10.
97
and the thunderbolt means strength; so that he thereby converts the sâmidhenis into strength: hence, if he should hate any one, he may crush him with his great toes at the time when those (verses) are recited. By saying, 'I here crush so and so!' he crushes him with that thunderbolt.
8. Fifteen nights indeed there are in a halfmoon; and growing by half-moons the year passes: hence he thereby obtains the nights.
9. Now in the fifteen gâyatri verses there are indeed three hundred and sixty syllables ?; and three hundred and sixty days there are in a year : hence he thereby obtains the days, he thereby obtains the year.
10. For an ishti (which is performed in order to obtain the fulfilment of a special wish) let him recite seventeen sâmidheni verses; for in a low voice he sacrifices to the deity to which he offers an ishti.
i Or, with his thumbs (angushthâbhyâm). The Kânva text has padyabhyam angushthabhyâm;' but Kâty. III, 1, 7 has 'angushthâbhyam padyâbhyam va,' which would seem to leave a choice between the thumbs and the great toes; the commentator, however, takes vâ in a restrictive sense. The sacrificer is to press down the earth with his great toes (or thumbs) each time when a kindling verse is recited.
? The gayatri verse consists of three times eight syllables, and 24 X 15=360. In the place of the last sâmidheni (called paridhâniya), however, the Vâsishthas have a trishtubh stanza (4 X11 syllables), so that the above computation of syllables does not hold good in their case. One might be inclined to infer from this that the trish/ubh was the more original, a gâyatri being substituted later to yield the above symbolical number of syllables. Cf. Taitt. S. II, 5, 7 seg.; Taitt. Br. III, 5, 3.
* The kâmyeshlis, and ishtis generally, are performed with certain modifications, on the model of the new and full-moon sacrifice, of which they are therefore said to be vikritis or modifications.
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