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IX KÂNDA, 3 ADHYAYA, 2 BRÂHMANA, 2.
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26. He offers (the first Maruta cake), with (Vâg. S. XVII, 80), The clear-lighted, and the bright· lighted, and the true-lighted, and the light, and the clear, and the law-observing, and the sinless one!'—these are their names: having completed that disk (of the sun, in the shape of the Vaisvânara), he bestows those rays on it by calling them by their names.
SECOND BRAHMANA. THE SHOWER OF WEALTH AND OTHER OBLATIONS. 1. Thereupon he (the Sacrificer%) offers the Vasor dhârâ. That whole Agni has now been completed, and he is here the Vasu (good one): to that Vasu the gods offered this shower (dhâra), whence it is called “Vasor dhârâ 8;' and in like manner this (Sacrificer) offers to him this shower, and gratifies him thereby.
2. And, again, as to why he offers the 'Vasor dhârâ ;'--this is his (Agni’s) Abhisheka"; for the
1 That is, after offering all the seven Mâruta cakes, the formulas of the last six of which (Vág. S. XVII, 81-85; XXXIX, 7) are not given in the Brahmana. At the end the Adhvaryu mutters the verse XVII, 86, and thereupon he either makes the Sacrificer mutter (or mutters himself) verses 87-99 in praise of Agni. Käty. Sr. XVIII, 4, 25; 26.
9 Thus, according to Katy. XVIII, 5, 1 (the Adhvaryu, according to Weber, Ind. Stud. XIII, p. 283).
• It would rather seem to mean 'stream, or shower, of wealth ;' cf. paragraph 4.
• That is, the consecration ceremony, in which the king is sprinkled' with sacred water, or, so to speak, anointed. The Vasor dhârâ,' or 'shower of wealth,' consisting of an uninterrupted series of 401 libations to Agni (through which all the powers of the god are to be secured to the Sacrificer), is intended as the
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