Satapatha Bramhana Part 02

SR No.: 007678
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1885
Total Pages: 2521
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 44 MB

Page 202

III KÂNDA, 7 ADHYAYA, I BRÂHMANA, 2.
167
fifteen-versed chant is a thunderbolt?, as the sacrificial stake is a thunderbolt: therefore he may cut it fifteen cubits long.
26. The sacrificial stake of the Vagapeya sacrifice is seventeen cubits long. Indeed, it may be unmeasured, for with that same unmeasured thunderbolt did the gods conquer the unmeasured; and in like manner does he now conquer the unmeasured with that unmeasured thunderbolt: therefore it may even be unmeasured.
27. It is (made to be) eight-cornered, for eight syllables has the Gayatri, and the Gayatri is the fore-part of the sacrifice, as this (stake) is the forepart of the sacrifice: therefore it is eight-cornered.
SEVENTH ADHVẬYA. First BRÂHMANA. 1. He takes the spade, with (Våg. S. VI, 1), I take thee, at the impulse of the divine Savitri, with the arms of the Asvins, with the hands of Pashan: thou art a woman.' The significance of that formula is the same (as before); and that spade (abhri, fem.) is indeed female : therefore he says 'thou art a woman.'
2. He thus draws the outline of the hole (for the stakes), with, 'Herewith I cut off the necks of
1 On the connection of the Pañkadasa-stoma with Indra, the wielder of the thunderbolt, see part i, introduction, p. xviii.
* The Kânva text leaves an option first between stakes six, eight, eleven, fifteen (and for the Vâgapeya seventeen) cubits long; and finally lays down the rule that no regard is to be had to any fixed measure.
• According to the Kanva text, one half of it is to be within, and one half outside of the altar. See Katy. VI, 2, 8.
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