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348
SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
restless, consumed as he is by his vital airs; and hence he who suffers from fever becomes very thin, for he is consumed by his vital airs.
19. Now for that seventeenfold Pragâpati they prepared this seventeenfold food, the Soma-sacrifice: those sixteen digits of his are these sixteen officiating priests, one should not, therefore, take a seventeenth priest lest one should do what is excessive;-and what vital sap there is here-the oblations that are offered that is the seventeenfold food.
20. And when they chant the hymn, and when he (the Hotri) afterwards recites (the sastra), he (the Adhvaryu) offers to him that food as the Vashatcall is uttered. Now 'vauk' is this (Agni), and 'shat' this sixfold food: having prepared it, he offers it to him as proportionate to his body; for food which is proportionate to the body satisfies, and does not injure it; but when there is too much it does injure it, and when there is too little, it does not satisfy it.
21. Now that Arka (flame) is this very fire-altar built here; and the Kya is this his food, to wit, the Soma-sacrifice that (combined) makes the Arkya in respect of the Yagus. And the Great one (mahân) is this (Agni), and this rite (vrata) is his food: that makes the Mahâvrata in respect of the Sâman. And 'uk' is this (Agni), and 'tha' his food: that makes the (Mahad) Uktha in respect of the Rik. Thus, whilst being only one, this is accounted threefold. With this food he went upwards; and he who
1 This prohibition is probably directed against the Kaushîtakins, who recognise a seventeenth officiating priest, the Sadasya, who seems to have taken no other part in the sacrificial performance except sitting in the Sadas as the permanent custodian thereof.
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