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Some of the cases of revolted common-sense are worth citing. Conspicuous as an authority on the sacrifice, and at the same time as a somewhat recalcitrant priest, is Y[=a]j[.n]avalkya, author and critic, one of the greatest names in Hindu ecclesiastical history. It was he who, apropos of the new rule in ethics, so strongly insisted upon after the Vedic age and already beginning to obtain, the rule that no one should eat the flesh of the (sacred) cow ('Let no one eat beef.... Whoever eats it would be reborn (on earth) as a man of ill fame') said bluntly: 'As for me I eat (beef) if it is good (firm).[17] It certainly required courage to say this, with the especial warning against beef, the meat of an animal peculiarly holy (Çat. Br. III. I. 2. 21). It was, again, Y[=aljñavalkya (Çat. Br., 1. 3. I. 26), who protested against the priests' new demand that the benefit of the sacrifice should accrue in part to the priest; whereas it had previously been understood that not the sacrificial priest but the sacrificer (the worshipper, the man who hired the priest and paid the expenses) got all the benefit of the ceremony. Against the priests' novel and unjustifiable claim Y[=aljñavalkya exclaims: 'How can people have faith in this? Whatever be the blessing for which the priests pray, this blessing is for the worshipper (sacrificer) alone.[18] It was Y[ra]jñavalkya, too, who rebutted some new superstition involving the sacrificer's wife, with the sneer, 'who cares whether the wife,' etc. (kas tad (=aldriyeta, ib. 21). These protestations are naïvely recorded, though it is once suggested that in some of his utterances Y[=aljñavalkya was not in earnest (ib. IV. 2. 1. 7). The high mind of this great priest is contrasted with the mundane views of his contemporaries in the prayers of himself and of another priest; for it is recorded that whereas Y[=aljñavalkya's prayer to the Sun was 'give me light' (or 'glory,' varco me dehi), that of [FA]upoditeya was 'give me cows' (ib. I. 9. 3. 16). The chronicler adds, after citing these prayers, that one obtains whatever he prays for, either illumination or wealth.[19] Y[=aljñavalkya, however, is not the only protestant. In another passage, ib. ii. 6. 3. 14-17, the sacrificer is told to shave his head all around, so as to be like the sun; this will ensure his being able to 'consume (his foes) on all sides like the sun,' and it is added: But [=A]suri said, 'What on earth has it to do with his head? Let him not shave. [20]
