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Art. III.—Legends chiefly from the Śatapatha Brāhmana
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 March 2011
Extract
The Brāhmanas may be generally described as occupying an intermediate position, both as regards chronology, character, language, and mythology, between the Vedic hymns, and the Indian epic poems and Purānas. They are liturgical works, connected with the different Sanhitās, or collections of hymns, and having it for their object to explain the application of those hymns to the different parts of the Brahmanical ritual, as practised at the period when they were compiled. In these works we encounter a great many legends of greater or less extent, which are introduced with the view of showing the occasion on which some particular hymn was first uttered, or of accounting for the origin, and enforcing the efficacy, of some particular ceremony, or for some other such purpose. Many of these stories have their germ in some brief notice or allusion in the hymns of the Rig Veda, while they occur in a greatly developed form in the epic poems and Purānas. The shape in which these legends occur in the Brāhmanas is thus an intermediate one between that in which they appear in the hymns, and that which they subsequently assume in mythological works of a later date. Of this description is the story of Śunahśepha in the Aitareya Brāhmana, which appeared about the same time in the 1st and 2nd vols. of Weber's “Indische Studien”, in the German translation of Professor R. Roth, and in the Journal of this Society, vol. xiii., pp. 96 ff., translated into English by the late Professor Wilson, and which has subsequently been given by Professor Max Müller, in his “History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature”, pp. 408 ff. In this story the author of the Brāhmana quotes various hymns from the first Mandala of the Rig Veda, which he considers to have been uttered by Śunahśepha, at the time when he was in danger of being immolated. The legend was, at a later period, introduced into the Rāmāyana, Book i., sections 61, 62.
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References
page 31 note 1 For a detailed account of these works, Professor Max Müller's well known “History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature” may be consulted.
page 32 note 1 One of these stories has been subsequently quoted by Professor Müller, Max in his “Anc. Ind. Lit.” p. 425 (along with some others from the other Brāhmanas), and both have appeared in the 2nd vol. of my Sanskrit Texts, pp. 325 ff., and 420 ffGoogle Scholar.
page 32 note 2 Vana-parva, vv. 12746—12804.
page 33 note 1 Compare with this legend the similar one quoted by Sāyana in his note on R. V. vi., 69, 8, from the Aitareya Brāhmaṉa, 6, 15:—“Indra and Vishṉu fought with the Asuras. Having conquered them, they Baid, ‘let us divide [the world]’. The Asuras said, ‘be it so’. Indra said, ‘As much as thia Vishṉu strides over in three strides, so much is ours; the rest is yours’. He strode over these worlds, then the Vedas, then speech”.
page 34 note 1 On this the commentator remarks:—“Pānchi thought that the altar for the soma sacrifice also should have a trench three fingers deep”. Pānchi is again mentioned in the Śatapatha Brāhmaṉa 2, 1, 4, 27 (p. 143), along with Āsuri and Mādhuki, where the commentator speaks of them as three munis (Asuriprabhritayas trayo munayah). See Weber's Ind. Stud. i. 192. 434.
page 34 note 2 It seems as if there were a play of words here, the word yaśah, “fame”, having reference to the words sa yah sa Vishṉuh, etc., ea yah sa yajñah, etc. “He who [is] this Vishṉu,”, etc. “He who [is] this sacrifice,”, etc.
page 35 note 1 A long account is given of the gharma, pravargya, and mahavīra in Kātyāyāna's Srauta Sūtras, xxvi.
page 38 note 1 This is illustrated by another passage in the Śatapatha Brāhmana, vii., 5, 2, 21 (617), which says: vāg vā ajo vācho vai prajā Visvaharmā jajāna | “Speech is the mover [or, the unborn]. It was from speech that Viśvakarman produced creatures”. And in the Brihad Aranyaka (p. 290 of Bibl. Ind.) it is said | trayo lokā ete eva | vāg evāyā loko mano 'ntarixa-lokah prāno 'sau lohah | “It is they which are the three worlds. Speech is this world, mind is the aerial world, and breath is that world (the sky)”.
page 38 note 2 Śatapatha Brāhmana, vi., 7, 1, 17.—Tasydpa eva pratishhā | apsu hi ime lokāh pratishthitāh| “Waters are its support; for these worlds are based upon the waters”. Śatapatha Brāhmana, xiv., 8, 6, 1 (= Bṛihad Araṉyaka Upanishad, p. 974). — Āpa eredam agre āsuh | tā āpah satyam asṛijanta satyam Brahma Brahma Prajāpatim Prajāpatir devān| “In the beginning waters alone formed this universe. These waters created Truth, Truth created Brahma, Brahma created Prajāpati, and Prajāpati the gods”.
page 39 note 1 Tasya Prajāpater āspadam kimapi na babhũva sa cha nirādhāratvāt sthātum aśaknuvunn idam, eva bhinnam hiranmayāniam punah samvatsaraparyantam bibhrad dhārayan tāsv evāpsu paryasravat| “There was no resting place for Prajāpati; and he, being unable to stand, from the want of any support, occupying this divided golden egg for a year, floated about on these waters”. Comm.
page 39 note 2 Compare Śatapatha Brāhmaṉa, p. 141.
page 40 note 1 See R.V. viii., 66, 10.
page 40 note 2 See R.V. x., 72, 4, 5.
page 40 note 3 In R.V. i., 96, 3, the epithet Bharata is applied to Agni. The commentator there quotes another text, no doubt from a Brāhmaṉa, esha prdno bhulvd praja bibhartti tasmād esha bharatah| “He becoming breath, sustains all creatures; hence he is the sustainer”.
page 41 note 1 See Vol. xix. of this Journal, p. 307, note.
page 42 note 1 This seems to be a polemical hit aimed by the author of the Brāhmana at some contemporaries who followed a different ritual from himself.
page 43 note 1 See Śatapatha Brāhmaṉa, ii., 2, 2, 8 (p. 146), quoted in Part II. of my Sanskrit Texts, p. 388, note 36, for another legend on this same subject, in which the gods are said to have become immortal by another means.
page 44 note 1 By this name are called “three particular grahas, or sacrificial vessels, with which libations were made in the Jyotishtoma sacrifice to Agni, Indra, and Sūrya”. Prof. Goldstticker's Diet. The word is explained by Boehtlingk and Both, as meaning “haustus insuper hauriendus”, a draught to be drunk over and above; the designation of three fillings of the cup, which are drawn at the Soma offering.
page 45 note 1 I am unable to explain how Ushas, the dawn, is here identified with her own offspring, Aushasi.
page 46 note 1 The origin of this name may perhaps be found in Rig Veda x, 61, 19, where these words occur, “This is my centre, here is my abode, these are my gods, this is I Sarva (or All), &c”.
page 47 note 1 Pratihitābhih. This word (as I learn from the Indische Studien) is explained by the commentator, Vināyaka Bhaṭṭa, as equivalent to pravṭittibhih “energies”. Weber renders it by “arms”. Dr. Aufrecht informs me that the word has in the Rig Veda the sense of “arrows”.