Satapatha Bramhana Part 03

SR No.: 007679
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1894
Total Pages: 2382
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 45 MB

Page 386

VII KÂNDA, 3 ADHYÂYA, 2 BRAHMANA, 7.
357
thus indeed that whole fire-altar of his comes to be sprinkled, and led forward on the skin, and led forward by the horse. They lift up this (first) layer?
5. He (the Adhvaryu) then says (to the Hotri), 'Recite to the fires being led forward !' For at that time when the gods were setting out to spread the sacrifice, the Rakshas, the fiends, sought to smite them, saying, 'Ye shall not sacrifice! ye shall not spread the sacrifice!' Having made those fires, those bricks, to be sharp-edged thunderbolts, they hurled these at them, and laid them low thereby; and having laid them low, they spread that sacrifice in a place free from danger and devilry.
6. Now, what the gods did is done here,-even now those Rakshas are indeed smitten by the gods themselves; and when he nevertheless does this, it is because he thinks, 'I must do what the gods did.' And so, having made those fires, those bricks, to be sharp-edged thunderbolts, he hurls them at whatever Rakshas, whatever evildoers there may be, and lays them low thereby; and having laid them low, he spreads the sacrifice in a place free from danger and devilry.
7. And as to why (he recites) to the fires,-it is because there are here many fires, to wit, those layers; and as to his reciting) to them being led forward (pra-har), it is because he hurls (pra-har) them forward (as thunderbolts).
perhaps this is merely a wrong interpretation of this passage of the Brâhmana; though the three 'naturally-perforated' bricks are probably placed together.
The Adhvaryu's attendants take up the ox-skin with the bricks for the first layer lying on it.
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