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CHAPTER XII, 23–28.
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care he is thus done; for in the periodic interval many secret? kinds of pollution are produced. 26. Of the celebrators of the Vendidad the good are they who shall again perform the Navashâdar rite; for, on account of the same nicety (nâzâkih) which is written above by me, and on account of much also that is secret, which has happened and mostly arises about it, there is no harm from performing it. 27. And any one of those who shall receive the water and bull's urine it is very important to wash beforehand (pavan pês) 3; because, if there be impurity about him , and he puts a hand to the cup (gâmak), the water, and the bull's urine, they are unclean (a pâdâvo)*; when it is so that there be some one, when so, it is better that they always wash his eyelids (môyak gâs), and to wash them by the clean is good.
28. The rule is this, that thou shouldst not consider even any one hopeless (anâimêd) of heaven,
* Reading nihân, but we might perhaps read causes (vahân) of pollution of many kinds.' The meaning of the section is, that it is necessary for the purifying priest to maintain his own purity by frequently undergoing the Bareshnům ceremony himself.
9 Yast-i Navashadar in all MSS., but the latter word is most probably a corruption of Av. navakhsha para, 'a period of nine nights,' for which length of time the Bareshnům ceremony must be continued (see Vend. IX, 144, XIX, 80). The · Navashâdar rite' is, therefore, the ceremony of the nine nights,' which should be frequently undergone by the priests who celebrate the Vendidad ceremonial.
3 M6 has pavan pisak, with ceremony.' • M6 has 'them.'
M6 has one knows it is unto the cup and bull's urine;' but as M6 was evidently copied from a MS. already nearly illegible in some places, it is generally safer to follow K20, except when M6 supplies words omitted by the more careless writer of K20,
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