________________
CHAPTER X, 25, 26.
327
not provided about everything whatever, but three times it has been done by Zaratūst about this duty, that is, so that the Avesta and Zand, when one has learned it thoroughly by heart", is for recitation, and is not to be mumbled ? (gûyisno), for in mumbling (gudano) the parts of the Ahunavars are more chattering“. 26. As it says in the Bagh Nask 6
and rewarding it, on the unjust judge and the sagacious one, on daughters given in marriage by mothers and brothers, on the disobedient son, &c. And one section on the spirits of the earthly existences, the merit of killing noxious water-creatures, the animal world proceeding from the primeval ox, the evil spirit not to be worshipped, and much other advice.
The passage mentioned in the text appears to have been in the first section of this Nask, as the Dînkard says it treated, among other matters, about a man's examining an action before doing it, and when he does not know whether it be a sin or a good work, when possible, he is to set it aside and not to do it.' But nothing is said there about Zaratûst, and what is said here seems to have very little connection with the 'rule' laid down in this section.
· Literally, 'made it quite easy.' . Literally, 'not to be devoured or gnawed.'
• The formula commencing with the words Yathå ahû vairyô (see Bund. I. 21): its parts or bagha are the phrases into which it may be divided (see Yas. XIX, 4, 6, 9, 12).
* Reading drâitar, more clamourous or chattering;' but the word is ambiguous, as it may be darâktar, more rending,' or girâîlar, ‘more weighty, more threatening,' &c.
o M6 has Bak. This was the third nask or 'book' of the complete Mazdayasnian literature, according to the Dinkard, which calls it Bako; but according to the Dînî-vagarkard and the Rivâyats it was the fourth nask. For its contents, as given by the Dînî-vagarkard, see Haug's Essays, p. 127. In the Dînkard, besides a very brief account of it, in the eighth book, which states that it was a treatise on the recitation of the revealed texts, there is, in the ninth book, a long description of the contents of each of its twenty-two fargards, occupying fifty quarto pages in the MSS. of the Dînkard. From this it appears that the passage quoted in our text probably occurred in the first
Digitized by Google
