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THE GÂTHAS.
YASNA XXXIV.
1. A tone of thankfulness continues. As if in gratitude for better fortunes, the prophet declares that he will bestow upon Ahura with the foremost, according to the measure of the gifts which he has received. Those gifts were the secured Immortality (not mere temporal deathlessness'), the Righteous Order, and the Sovereign Power established in holiness and bestowing the Universal Weal.
2. The kind of gifts which are proposed for offerings are not sacrificial beasts or fruits, but the actions of the truly pious citizen whose soul is intimately united with Righteousness, the homage of prayer, and the songs of praise. As no piety could exist without strict ecclesiastical regularity, so no ceremonial punctuality was conceived of apart from honour and charity (see verse 5 and Yast XXII).
3. Accordingly the meat-offering, the mention of which immediately follows, is spoken of as offered with homage to the Righteous Order and to the Divine Sovereignty for the benefit of all the sacred settlements, in order to equip the wise man fully, and as a helpful blessing among the Immortals themselves and their adherents.
4. And the Fire is likewise mentioned, which was worshipped not so much like Agni as the friendly god of the hearth and the altar, but more and chiefly like Agni as the priest of the church.
Not unlike Agni, it is called upon both for inward spiritual strength and for temporal blessings in various forms, together with vengeance hurled very much as if in the form of a thunderbolt (zasta-istâis derestî-aênanghem). 5. To explain what he means by his supplications for the coming of the Kingdom, and for holy actions (that is, to make it certain that he does not mean punctilious ritualism apart from the noblest charity), he rhetorically asks:
And what is Your Kingdom, that which Zarathustra establishes and offers to You? (XXXIII, 14). What is the kind of prayer (comp. XLVIII, 8, and LIII, 1) which I must use, so that I may become Yours (Your property) in my actions, not to load Your priesthood with sacrifices, nor to fatten Your princes with booty (as too often in the Riks), nor yet to secure a heavy gift to the poe nourish Your poor?' This was the essence of the desired Sanctity and the Sovereign Authority. The Kingdom of God, exalted
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