VI, 26. Charm to avert evil.
1. Let me go, O evil; being powerful, take thou
pity on us! Set me, O evil, unharmed, into the
world of happiness!
2. If, O evil, thou dost not abandon us, then do
we abandon thee at the fork of the road. May evil
follow after another (man) !
3. Away from us may thousand-eyed, immortal
(evil) dwell! Him whom we hate may it strike, and
him whom we hate do thou surely smite!
164 HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
eee ine we a OS
VI, 114. Expiatory formula for imperfections in the sacrifice.
1. The god-angering (deed), O ye gods, that we,
the (Brahman) gods, have committed, from that do
ye, O Adityas, release us, by virtue of the order of
the universe !
2. By virtue of the order of the universe do ye,
O reverend Adityas, release us here, if, O ye carriers
of the sacrifice, though desirous of accomplishing
(the sacrifice), we did not accomplish (it) !—
3. (If), when sacrificing with the fat (animal), when
offering oblations of ghee with the spoon, when
desiring to benefit you, O all ye gods, we have
contrary to desire, not succeeded!
VI, 115. Expiatory formulas for sins.
1. From the sins which knowingly or unknowingly
we have committed, do ye, all gods, of one accord,
release us!
2. If awake, or if asleep, to sin inclined, I have
committed a sin, may what has been, and what shall
be, as if from a wooden post, release me!
3. As one released from a wooden post, as one in a sweat by bathing (is cleansed) of filth, as ghee is
clarified by the sieve, may all (the gods) clear me from sin!
VI, 112. Expiation for the precedence of a younger brother over an older.
1. May this (younger brother) not slay the oldest
one of them, O Agni; protect him that he be not
torn out by the root! Do thou here cunningly
Viii. Charms in Expiation of Sin Etc. 165
loosen the fetter of Grahi (attack of disease); may all the gods give thee leave!
2. Free these three, O Agni, from the three fetters
with which they have been shackled! Do thou
cunningly loosen the fetters of Grahi; release them
all, father, sons, and mother !
3. The fetters with which the older brother, whose
younger brother has married beforé him, has been
bound, with which he has been encumbered and
shackled limb by limb, may they be loosened; since
fit for loosening they are! Wipe off, O Pdshan, the
misdeeds upon him that practiseth abortion!
VI, 113. Expiation for certain heinous crimes.
1. On Trzta the gods wiped off this sin, Tvzta
wiped it off on human beings; hence if Grahi (attack
of disease) has seized thee, may these gods remove
her by means of their charm!
2. Enter into the rays, into smoke, O sin; go into
the vapours, and into the fog! Lose thyself on
the foam of the river! Wipe off, O Pidshan, the
misdeeds upon him that practiseth abortion!
3. Deposited in twelve places is that which has
been wiped off Tvzta, the sins belonging to humanity.
Hence if Grahi has seized thee, may these gods
remove her by means of their charm!
VI, 120. Prayer for heaven after remission of sins,
1. If air, or earth and heaven, if mother or father,
we have injured, may this Agni Garhapatya (house-
hold fire) without fail lead us out from this (crime)
to the world of well-doing !
166 HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
2. The earth is our mother, Aditi (the universe)
our kin, the air our protector from hostile schemes.
May father sky bring prosperity to us from the world
of the Fathers; may I come to my (departed) kin,
and not lose heaven!
3. In that bright world where our pious friends live
in joy, having cast aside the ailments of their own
bodies, free from lameness, not deformed in limb,
there may we behold our parents and our children!
VI, 27. Charm against pigeons regarded as ominous birds.
1. O ye gods, if the pigeon, despatched as the
messenger of Nirvzti (the goddess of destruction),
hath come here seeking (us out), we shall sing his
praises, and prepare (our) ransom. May our two-
footed and four-footed creatures be prosperous!
2. Auspicious to us shall be the pigeon that has
been despatched; harmless, ye gods, the bird shall
be to our house! The sage Agni shall verily take
pleasure in our oblation; the winged missile shall
avoid us!
3. The winged missile shall not do us injury:
upon our hearth, our fireplace he (the pigeon) takes
his steps! Propitious he shall be to our cattle and
our domestics; may not, ye gods, the pigeon here
do harm to us!
VI, 29. Charm against ominous pigeons and owls.
1. Upon those persons yonder the winged missile
shall fall! If the owl shrieks, futile shall this be, or
if the pigeon takes his steps upon the fire!
Viii. Charms in Expiation of Sin Etc. 167
2. To thy two messengers, O Nirvzti, who come
here, despatched or not despatched, to our house, to
the pigeon and to the owl, this shall be no place to
step upon!
3. He shall not fly hither to slaughter (our) men;
to keep (our) men sound he shall settle here! Charm
him very far away unto a distant region, that (people)
shall behold you (i.e. him) in Yama’s house devoid of
strength, that they shall behold you bereft of power!
VII, 64. Expiation when one is defiled by a black bird of omen.
1. What this black bird flying forth towards (me)
has dropped here—may the waters protect me from
all that misfortune and evil !
2. What this black bird has brushed here with thy
mouth, O Nirvzti (goddess of misfortune)—may Agni
Garhapatya (the god of the household fire) free me
from this sin!
VI, 46. Exorcism of evil dreams.
1. Thou who art neither alive nor dead, the
immortal child of the gods art thou, O Sleep!
Varuzani is thy mother, Yama (death) thy father,
Araru is thy name.
2. We know, O Sleep, thy birth, thou art the son
of the divine women-folk, the instrument of Yama
(death)! Thou art the ender, thou art death! Thus
do we know thee, O Sleep: do thou, O Sleep, protect
us from evil dreams!
3. As one pays off a sixteenth, an eighth, or an
(entire) debt, thus do we transfer every evil dream
upon our enemy.
168 HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
VII, 115. Charm for the removal of evil character- istics, and the acquisition of auspicious ones.
1. Fly forth from here, O evil mark, vanish from
here, fly forth to yonder place! Upon him that
hates us do we fasten thee with a brazen hook.
2. The unsavoury mark which flying has alighted ©
upon me, as a creeper upon a tree, that mayest thou
put away from us, away from here, O golden-handed
(golden-rayed) Savitar (the sun), bestowing goods
upon us!
3. Together with the body of the mortal, from
his birth, one and a hundred marks are born.
Those that are most foul do we drive away from
here; the auspicious ones, O Gatavedas (Agni), do
thou hold fast for us!
4. These (marks) here I have separated, as cows
scattered upon the heather. The pure marks shall
remain, the foul ones I have made to disappear!
PRAYERS AND IMPRECATIONS IN. THE INTEREST OF THE BRAHMANS.
V, 18. Imprecation against the oppressors of Brahmans.
1. The gods, O king, did not give to thee this
(cow) to eat. Do not, O prince, seek to devour the
cow of the Brahmaza, which is unfit to be eaten!
2. The prince, beguiled by dice, the wretched
one who has lost as a stake his own person, he may,
perchance, eat the cow of the Brahmama, (thinking),
‘let me live to-day (if) not to-morrow’!
3. Enveloped (is she) in her skin, as an adder
with evil poison; do not, O prince, (eat the cow)
of the Brahmaza: sapless, unfit to be eaten, is
that cow!
4. Away does (the Brahmaza) take regal power,
destroys vigour; like fire which has caught does
he burn away everything. He that regards the
Brahmamza as fit food drinks of the poison of the
taimata-serpent.
5. He who thinks him (the Brahman) mild, and
slays him, he who reviles the gods, lusts after
wealth, without thought, in his heart Indra kindles
a fire; him both heaven and earth hate while he
lives.
6. The Brahmama must not be encroached upon,
170 HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
any more than fire, by him that regards his own body!
For Soma is his (the Brahmava’s) heir, Indra protects
him from hostile plots. |
7. He swallows her (the cow), bristling with a
hundred hooks, (but) is unable to digest her, he,
the fool who, devouring the food of the Brahmans,
thinks, ‘I am eating a luscious (morsel).’
8. (The Brahman’s) tongue turns into a bow-
string, his voice into the neck of an arrow; his
-windpipe, his teeth are bedaubed with holy fire:
with these the Brahman strikes those who revile
the gods, by means of bows that have the strength
to reach the heart, discharged by the gods.
9. The Brahmazas have sharp arrows, are armed
with missiles, the arrow which they hurl goes not
in vain; pursuing him with their holy fire and their
wrath, even from afar, do they pierce him.
10. They who ruled over a thousand, and were
themselves ten hundred, the Vaitahavya, when they
devoured the cow of the Brahmaza, perished.
11. The cow herself, when slaughtered, came
down upon the Vaitahavyas, who had roasted for
themselves the last she-goat of Kesaraprabandha.
12. The one hundred and one persons whom the
earth did cast off, because they had injured the
offspring of a Brahmavza, were ruined irretrievably.
13. As areviler of the gods does he live among
mortals, having swallowed poison, he becomes more
bone (than flesh). He that injureth a Brahmaza,
whose kin are the gods, does not reach heaven by
the road of the Fathers.
14. Agni is called our guide, Soma our heir,
Indra slays those who curse (us): that the strong
(sages) know.
Ix. Prayers and Imprecations for Brahmans. I7i
15. Like a poisoned arrow, O king, like an
adder, O lord of cattle, is the terrible arrow of the
Brahmaza: with that he smites those who revile
(the gods).
V,19. Imprecation against the oppressors of Brahmans.
1. Beyond measure they waxed strong, just fell
short of touching the heavens. When they in-
fringed upon Bhvzgu they perished, the Svz#gaya
Vaitahavyas.
2. The persons who pierced Bvzhatsiman, the
descendant of Angiras, the Brahmaza—a ram with
two rows of teeth, a sheep devoured their offspring.
3. They who spat upon the Brahmaza, who desired
tribute from him, they sit in the middle of a pool of
blood, chewing hair. |
4. The cow of the Brahman, when roasted, as far
as she reaches does she destroy the lustre of the
kingdom ; no lusty hero is born (there).
5. A cruel (sacrilegious) deed is her slaughter,
her meat, when eaten, is sapless; when her milk
is drunk, that surely is accounted a crime against
the Fathers.
6. When the king, weening himself mighty, de-
sires to destroy the Brahmavza, then royal power is
dissipated, where the Brahmawa is oppressed.
7. Becoming eight-footed, four-eyed, four-eared,
four-jawed, two-mouthed, two-tongued, she dispels
the rule of the oppressor of the Brahman.
8. That (kingdom) surely she swamps, as water
a leaking ship; misfortune strikes that kingdom, in
which they injure a Brahmaza.
g. The trees chase away with the words: ‘do not
172 HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
come within our shade,’ him who covets the wealth that belongs to a Brahmaza, O Narada!
10. King Varuza pronounced this (to be) poison,
prepared by the gods: no one who has devoured
the cow of a Brahmawa retains the charge of a
kingdom.
11. Those full nine and ninety whom the earth
did cast off, because they had injured the offspring
of a Brahmava, were ruined irretrievably.
12. The kddi-plant (Christ’s thorn) that wipes
away the track (of death), which they fasten to the
dead, that very one, O oppressor of Brahmans, the
gods did declare (to be) thy couch.
13. The tears which have rolled from (the eyes
of) the oppressed (Brahman), as he laments, these
very ones, O oppressor of Brahmans, the gods did
assign to thee as thy share of water.
14. The water with which they bathe the dead,
with which they moisten his beard, that very one,
O oppressor of Brahmans, the gods did assign to
thee as thy share of water.
15. [The rain of Mitra and Varuza does not
moisten the oppressor of Brahmans; the assembly
is not complacent for him, he does not guide his
friend according to his will.
V, 7. Prayer to appease Arati, the demon of grudge and avarice.
1. Bring (wealth) to us, do not stand in our way,
O Arati; do not keep from us the sacrificial reward
as it is being taken (to us)! Adoration be to the
power of grudge, the power of failure, adoration to
Arati!