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SÂNKHẤYANA-GRIHYA-SOTRA.
4. The animal (offered) to the teacher is sacred to Agni;
5. If offered to an officiating priest, to Brihaspati ; 6. If to the father-in-law, to Pragâpati ; 7. If to a king, to Indra; 8. If to a friend, to Mitra; 9. If to a Snâtaka, to Indra and Agni;
10. Even if he performs more than one Soma sacrifice during a year, let only priests who have received (from him) the Arghya reception officiate for him, not such who have not received it.
11. Here it is said also:
Sūtra 10. Probably Paraskara here represents the text which both Sätrakâras follow, more exactly, and the enumeration given by Sânkhâyana in Sūtras 4-9 of the different categories of Arghyas with the corresponding deities, is an addition to that original stock of rules.
Apparently the two Sätras 2 and 3 stand in contradiction to each other, as Sūtra 2 seems to prescribe that at the Argha meal in every case flesh should be given to the guest, and Satra 3 specifies only two occasions on which the killing of the Argha cow cannot be dispensed with. Perhaps the meaning is this, that it is not necessary, except in the cases of a sacrifice and of a wedding, to kill a cow expressly for that purpose, but that in any case, even if the cow offered to the guest be declined by him, the host should take care that some flesh be served at that meal. So says Narayana in his note on Asvalâyana-Grihya I, 24, 33, Pasukaranapakshe tanmâmsena bhoganam, utsarganapakshe mâmsântarena.' Similarly the Buddhists distinguish between eating flesh and eating the flesh of an animal expressly killed in order to entertain that very guest.
6. The literal translation of vaivahya would be 'a person related by marriage.' But comp. the note on Sūtra 1.
8. Priya of course does not mean gâmâtar, as is stated in a number of commentaries. Gobhila says, priyostithih.
11. Other persons, for instance a king, can claim the Argha reception not more than once a year. Comp. Apastamba II, 8, 7; Gautama V, 28, 29, &c.
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