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SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
from accrue unto us?' and when the sons (wish to obtain anything) from the father, he says, 'So be it!' for in this way Pragâpati and the gods used of old to converse together. He lays down the Stomas: the stomas being the vital airs, and Pragâpati also being the vital airs, it is Pragâpati he thus lays down.
5. And, again, as to why he lays down the Stomas. Those vital airs, the Rishis', that saw this fourth layer, and who stepped nigh with that essential element (of the altar), are these (vital airs): it is them he now lays down. He lays down the Stomas: the stomas being the vital airs, and the Rishis also being the vital airs, it is the Rishis he thus lays down.
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6. And, again, as to why he lays down the Stomas. When Pragâpati had become relaxed (disjointed), the gods took him and went away. Vâyu, taking that (part) of him which was above the waist and below the head, kept going away from him, having become the deities and the forms of the year.
7. He spake to him, 'Come to me and restore to me that wherewith thou hast gone from me!''What will therefrom accrue unto me?'-' That part of my self shall be sacred unto thee!'-'So be it!' thus Vâyu restored that unto him.
8. Those eighteen (bricks) which there are at
1 See VI, I, I, 1; VII, 2, 3, 5.
See VI, 2, 3, 7. 8.
These eighteen bricks, representing the Stomas, or hymnforms, are laid down in the following order. At each end of the spine (running from west to east) one brick, of the size of the shank (from knee to ankle), is placed, with its line-marks running from west to east; the eastern one being placed north, and the western one south, of the spine. Thereupon an ordinary brick, a foot square, is placed
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