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On some Similes in the Jaiminīya Brāhmaṇa
Madhavi Kolhatkar
The similes play a very important role in literature. They are used primarily as a means to convey the intended meaning with clarity and ease through a known illustration and then also as a poetic embellishment. They are used as an aid for the better understanding of something unknown with the description of the already known.
The Brāhmana literature is also not an exception to this known fact. Similes are used profusely in them. They are more of an explanatory or illustrative nature rather than that of decorative. They are generally very simple, yet appealing. The similes in the Aitareya and the Taittirīya Brāhmana
have been studied before and discussed in details, but such is not the case :. regarding the similes in the Jaiminīya Brāhmaṇa (= JaimiBr.)
Compared to other Brāhmanas, it can be seen that JaimiBr. exuberantly employs this poetic device, the simile. There are not less than 45 similes only in the first part of it which describes the ritual of the Agnihotra and the Agnistoma. They are used mainly to explain the ritual procedure. They are mostly simple, easy and appealing, and can be characterised as explanatory. They provide the illustrations from the every day life and hence are, on the whole, very easy to understand. Bodewitz's translation of the JaimiBr. is of much help in comprehending those. (In some cases, however, one cannot totally agree to his translation or emendation.) The aim of this paper is to discuss two such similes.
toto11.
i) The simile at JaimiBr. 1. 250 reads; yathā vittam pravāham ksipras pravahet evam evai 'nam etā devatās svargāya lokāya pravahanti / "Just as a river may quickly transport goods, even so these deities transport him with a view to heaven.” (Bodewitz, 1990, P. 139).
