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410
SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
for (religious) toil (he seizes) a Sadra, for the Sadra is toil : he thus joins toil to toil ;-according to their particular form he thus supplies these divinities with victims, and, thus supplied, they supply him with all his objects of desire.
11. He makes offering with ghee, for ghee is fiery mettle: by means of fiery mettle he thus endows him (the Sacrificer) with fiery mettle. He makes offering with ghee, for that—to wit, ghee is the dear resource of the gods: he thus supplies them with their dear resource, and, thus supplied, they supply him with all his objects of desire.
12. By means of the Purusha Narayana (litany), the Brahman priest (seated) to the right (south) of them, praises the men bound (to the stakes) with this sixteen-versed (hymn, Rig-v. X, 90, Våg. S. XXXI, 1-16), 'The thousand-headed Purusha, thousand-eyed, thousand-footed? ...;'-thus (he does) for the obtainment and the securing of everything, for everything here consists of sixteen parts, and the Purushamedha is everything: in thus saying, 'So and so thou art, so and so thou art,' he praises and thereby indeed magnifies him (Purusha); but he also thereby speaks of him, such as he is. Now, the victims had had the fire carried round them, but they were not yet slaughtered,
13. Then a voice ? said to him, ' Purusha, do not
For a complete translation of this hymn, the Purusha-säkta, see J. Muir, Orig. Sanskrit Texts, vol. i, p. 9 seqq. Çp. also part iv, introduction, p. xiv.
3. A bodiless voice,' comm.; cf. XI, 4, 2, 16 where likewise 'an invisible voice' is introduced censuring the priest who burns the oblations. Perhaps, however, Våk may be intended from whom Pragâpati, in the beginning, produced the waters ; cf. VI, 1, 1, 4.
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