Fetching
One moment.
Fetching
One moment.
Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
195. * Cf. Max Miiller, History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 108 ff. ; M. Haug, Aitareya-brahmana, II, p. 460 ff.; R. Roth, Weber’s Ind. Stud. J, 475 ff.; Ul, 11a ff INTRODUCTION. “XXXV the second boy, called Sunadsepa. Rohita now returns to his father who, having been told of the transaction, then Proposes to Varuza to offer the Brahman youth in lieu of his son; and the god, deeming a Brahman better than a Kshatriya, consents to the exchange, and orders the king to perform the Ragasdya sacrifice, and to make the youth the chief victim on the Abhishe#antya, or day of consecration. Four renowned Xishis officiate as offering-priests ; but when the human sacrifice is to be consummated, no one will undertake to bind the victim. The boy's own father, Agigarta, then volunteers to do so for another hundred cows; and subsequently he even undertakes to slay his son for a similar reward. But when the poor lad sees his own father coming towards him, whetting his knife, and becomes aware that he is really to be slain, ‘as if he were not a man,’ he bethinks himself of calling upon the gods for help; and by them he is successively referred from _ one to another, till by uttering three verses in praise of Ushas, the Dawn, he is released from his fetters, whilst the king is freed from his malady. Subsequently one of the four priests, the royal sage Visvamitra, receives Sunadsepa as his son, conferring upon him the name of Devarata (Theodotos), and refuses to give him up to Agigarta ; and when the latter calls on his son to return to him, and not to desert his ancestral race, he replies, ‘ What has never been found even amongst Sidras, thou hast been seen with a knife in thy hand, and hast taken three hundred cows for me, O Angiras!’ And on his father avowing his guilt, and promising to make over the cattle to him, he again replies, ‘He who has once done wrong will commit another sin; thou hast not abandoned the ways of a Sidra: what thou hast done is irremediable’; and ‘is irremediable, echoes Visvamitra, who then formally adopts him as his son. This legend ', so far from bearing witness to the existence 1 The earliest reference to the myth or story of Sunasepa is in Xzg-veda I, 24, 11-13; V, 2, 7, where he is apparently alluded to as having been actually C2 XXXVI SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
2This legend ', so far from bearing witness to the existence 1 The earliest reference to the myth or story of Sunasepa is in Xzg-veda I, 24, 11-13; V, 2, 7, where he is apparently alluded to as having been actually C2 XXXVI SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA. of human sacrifices as a generally recognised practice, at the time when it originated, would rather seem to mark: this particular case as an exceptional one. For, if it were not so, how comes it that the king’s four high-priests—who, if any, must have been looked upon as thorough masters of the sacrificial science—should have refused to assist in the immolation of the human victim ordered by the deity, leaving it to be accomplished by the sullied hands of the wretched father? But there is another feature of the story which cannot but strike one as very peculiar. Why should the childless king pray for the birth of a son only to make a sacrifice of him? He has been told to do so by the holy sage Narada: is one then to understand that the sage’s advice, as well as Varuza’s consent, is given merely to try the king's faith and truthfulness? If so, the case is similar to that of Abraham’s sacrifice in the land of Moriah, only that the king’s faith proves less intense and exalted—perhaps more humanly faint-hearted—than that of the Jewish patriarch. _ But the most striking feature of the legend doubtless is the part played in it by the unnatural father; and this feature seems indeed to impart to the tale something of the character of an allegorical representation of the contrast between a barbarous (and perhaps earlier) and a more civilised phase of life and moral feeling’. In this respect two points deserve to be noticed, viz. the coarseness of the synonymous names (‘dog’s tail’) of the three sons of the Brahman ?; and the fact that the latter belongs to the Angiras stock, a name intimately associated with super- rescued from the stake, or from (three) stakes to which he was bound either for sacrifice, or, as Roth prefers, for torture. 1 In the Sabhaparvan of the Mahabharata (II, 6275 seqq.), as was first pointed out by Lassen, Krishna accuses Gardsandha, king of Magadha and Kedi, residing at Mathur, of having carried off numerous vanquished kings and princes to his city, and keeping them confined in his mountain stronghold with a view to afterwards sacrificing them (at his RAgasflya) to the lord of Um (Rudra) ; adding subsequently (v. 864) that ‘the immolation of men was never seen at any time.’ * His own name ‘ Agigarta,’ on the other hand, is taken by the St. Petersburg Dictionary to mean ‘one who has nothing to swallow,’ and would thus be merely descriptive of his condition of life. INTRODUCTION, XXXVIL stitious rites’ on the one hand, and with the ritual of the fire-altar ? on the other.
3Petersburg Dictionary to mean ‘one who has nothing to swallow,’ and would thus be merely descriptive of his condition of life. INTRODUCTION, XXXVIL stitious rites’ on the one hand, and with the ritual of the fire-altar ? on the other. Now, it is exactly in connection with the building of the fire-altar that the clearest, and most unmistakable trace of an old practice of human sacrifices—or rather of the slaying of men for sacrificial purposes—occurs. In laying down the bottom layer of the altar, the pan which had been used by the Sacrificer for carrying about the sacred fire for a year is built into this layer, with heads of the five recognised sacrificial animals >—man, horse, ox, sheep, and goat—put therein, in order to impart stability to the altar (Sat. Br. VII, 5, 2, 1 seqq.). In a previous passage of the Brahmaza * (I, 2, 3, 6 seq.) where the relative value of non-animal offering-materials and the five sacrificial animals is discussed, it was stated that, whilst the gods were making use of one after another of these animals, the sacrificial essence gradually passed from one to the other, thus rendering the previous one useless for sacrifice, until it finally passed into the earth whence it entered the rice and barley afterwards used for sacrificial dishes. The general purport of this passage would seem to be to indicate a gradual tendency towards substituting the lower for the higher animals, and ultimately vegetable for animal offerings; though, as a matter of fact, animals continued of Viz. in their connection with the Atharva-veda, In Mah4bh. V, 548-51 Aagiras praises Indra by means of ‘ Atharvavedamantraid.’ Cf. Weber, Ind. Stud. I, p. 297. 2 Both in making the fire-pan (ukh4) and in laying down the bricks of the fire-altar, the expression ‘ aigirasvat’ (as in the case of Angiras) frequently occurs in the formulas; cf. VI, 1, 2, 38; 3, 1, 38 ff.; 4, 1,1 ff. 3 All that is said in the Brahmana regarding the headless bodies of the five victims is (VI, 2, 1, 7 seqq.) that Pragapati, having cut off the heads, and put them on (the altar, i.e. on himself), plunged four of the trunks into the water, and brought the sacrifice to a completion by (offering) the he-goat (not a hegoat, as translated), and that he subsequently gathered up the water and mud ~ \clay) in which those corpses had lain, and used them for making bricks for the altar. The view that the other four bodies should likewise be offered is rejected by the author, who rather seems to suggest that they should be allowed to float away on the water, * A very similar passage occurs in Ait. Br. VI, 8, on which cp. Max Miiller, History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 420. XXXVili SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
195. * Cf. Max Miiller, History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 108 ff. ; M. Haug, Aitareya-brahmana, II, p. 460 ff.; R. Roth, Weber’s Ind. Stud. J, 475 ff.; Ul, 11a ff INTRODUCTION. “XXXV the second boy, called Sunadsepa. Rohita now returns to his father who, having been told of the transaction, then Proposes to Varuza to offer the Brahman youth in lieu of his son; and the god, deeming a Brahman better than a Kshatriya, consents to the exchange, and orders the king to perform the Ragasdya sacrifice, and to make the youth the chief victim on the Abhishe#antya, or day of consecration. Four renowned Xishis officiate as offering-priests ; but when the human sacrifice is to be consummated, no one will undertake to bind the victim. The boy's own father, Agigarta, then volunteers to do so for another hundred cows; and subsequently he even undertakes to slay his son for a similar reward. But when the poor lad sees his own father coming towards him, whetting his knife, and becomes aware that he is really to be slain, ‘as if he were not a man,’ he bethinks himself of calling upon the gods for help; and by them he is successively referred from _ one to another, till by uttering three verses in praise of Ushas, the Dawn, he is released from his fetters, whilst the king is freed from his malady. Subsequently one of the four priests, the royal sage Visvamitra, receives Sunadsepa as his son, conferring upon him the name of Devarata (Theodotos), and refuses to give him up to Agigarta ; and when the latter calls on his son to return to him, and not to desert his ancestral race, he replies, ‘ What has never been found even amongst Sidras, thou hast been seen with a knife in thy hand, and hast taken three hundred cows for me, O Angiras!’ And on his father avowing his guilt, and promising to make over the cattle to him, he again replies, ‘He who has once done wrong will commit another sin; thou hast not abandoned the ways of a Sidra: what thou hast done is irremediable’; and ‘is irremediable, echoes Visvamitra, who then formally adopts him as his son. This legend ', so far from bearing witness to the existence 1 The earliest reference to the myth or story of Sunasepa is in Xzg-veda I, 24, 11-13; V, 2, 7, where he is apparently alluded to as having been actually C2 XXXVI SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
2This legend ', so far from bearing witness to the existence 1 The earliest reference to the myth or story of Sunasepa is in Xzg-veda I, 24, 11-13; V, 2, 7, where he is apparently alluded to as having been actually C2 XXXVI SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA. of human sacrifices as a generally recognised practice, at the time when it originated, would rather seem to mark: this particular case as an exceptional one. For, if it were not so, how comes it that the king’s four high-priests—who, if any, must have been looked upon as thorough masters of the sacrificial science—should have refused to assist in the immolation of the human victim ordered by the deity, leaving it to be accomplished by the sullied hands of the wretched father? But there is another feature of the story which cannot but strike one as very peculiar. Why should the childless king pray for the birth of a son only to make a sacrifice of him? He has been told to do so by the holy sage Narada: is one then to understand that the sage’s advice, as well as Varuza’s consent, is given merely to try the king's faith and truthfulness? If so, the case is similar to that of Abraham’s sacrifice in the land of Moriah, only that the king’s faith proves less intense and exalted—perhaps more humanly faint-hearted—than that of the Jewish patriarch. _ But the most striking feature of the legend doubtless is the part played in it by the unnatural father; and this feature seems indeed to impart to the tale something of the character of an allegorical representation of the contrast between a barbarous (and perhaps earlier) and a more civilised phase of life and moral feeling’. In this respect two points deserve to be noticed, viz. the coarseness of the synonymous names (‘dog’s tail’) of the three sons of the Brahman ?; and the fact that the latter belongs to the Angiras stock, a name intimately associated with super- rescued from the stake, or from (three) stakes to which he was bound either for sacrifice, or, as Roth prefers, for torture. 1 In the Sabhaparvan of the Mahabharata (II, 6275 seqq.), as was first pointed out by Lassen, Krishna accuses Gardsandha, king of Magadha and Kedi, residing at Mathur, of having carried off numerous vanquished kings and princes to his city, and keeping them confined in his mountain stronghold with a view to afterwards sacrificing them (at his RAgasflya) to the lord of Um (Rudra) ; adding subsequently (v. 864) that ‘the immolation of men was never seen at any time.’ * His own name ‘ Agigarta,’ on the other hand, is taken by the St. Petersburg Dictionary to mean ‘one who has nothing to swallow,’ and would thus be merely descriptive of his condition of life. INTRODUCTION, XXXVIL stitious rites’ on the one hand, and with the ritual of the fire-altar ? on the other.
3Petersburg Dictionary to mean ‘one who has nothing to swallow,’ and would thus be merely descriptive of his condition of life. INTRODUCTION, XXXVIL stitious rites’ on the one hand, and with the ritual of the fire-altar ? on the other. Now, it is exactly in connection with the building of the fire-altar that the clearest, and most unmistakable trace of an old practice of human sacrifices—or rather of the slaying of men for sacrificial purposes—occurs. In laying down the bottom layer of the altar, the pan which had been used by the Sacrificer for carrying about the sacred fire for a year is built into this layer, with heads of the five recognised sacrificial animals >—man, horse, ox, sheep, and goat—put therein, in order to impart stability to the altar (Sat. Br. VII, 5, 2, 1 seqq.). In a previous passage of the Brahmaza * (I, 2, 3, 6 seq.) where the relative value of non-animal offering-materials and the five sacrificial animals is discussed, it was stated that, whilst the gods were making use of one after another of these animals, the sacrificial essence gradually passed from one to the other, thus rendering the previous one useless for sacrifice, until it finally passed into the earth whence it entered the rice and barley afterwards used for sacrificial dishes. The general purport of this passage would seem to be to indicate a gradual tendency towards substituting the lower for the higher animals, and ultimately vegetable for animal offerings; though, as a matter of fact, animals continued of Viz. in their connection with the Atharva-veda, In Mah4bh. V, 548-51 Aagiras praises Indra by means of ‘ Atharvavedamantraid.’ Cf. Weber, Ind. Stud. I, p. 297. 2 Both in making the fire-pan (ukh4) and in laying down the bricks of the fire-altar, the expression ‘ aigirasvat’ (as in the case of Angiras) frequently occurs in the formulas; cf. VI, 1, 2, 38; 3, 1, 38 ff.; 4, 1,1 ff. 3 All that is said in the Brahmana regarding the headless bodies of the five victims is (VI, 2, 1, 7 seqq.) that Pragapati, having cut off the heads, and put them on (the altar, i.e. on himself), plunged four of the trunks into the water, and brought the sacrifice to a completion by (offering) the he-goat (not a hegoat, as translated), and that he subsequently gathered up the water and mud ~ \clay) in which those corpses had lain, and used them for making bricks for the altar. The view that the other four bodies should likewise be offered is rejected by the author, who rather seems to suggest that they should be allowed to float away on the water, * A very similar passage occurs in Ait. Br. VI, 8, on which cp. Max Miiller, History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 420. XXXVili SATAPATHA-BRAHMANA.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
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