* Cf. also Kalpa-sitra, in Jacobi’s translation, Sacred Books, vol. xxii, p. 221.
INTRODUCTION. lvil
III. Tue ATHARVA-VEDA IN THE VIEW OF ITS RITUALISTIC LITERATURE.
It is but natural to expect, and the expectation nowhere
meets with disappointment, that the Atharvan texts in
general should allude with predilection, and
The normal .- ‘ ‘ ; ; estimateof in terms of praise, to their own kind of com- ce hee positions, to the mythical sages who are their reputed authors, and to the priests devoted to the practices that went hand in hand with the recitation of the Atharvans and Angiras. We found above, (pp. xxxii, xlii), a sufficiently marked tendency on the part of the Sazhita itself and the Atharvan Upanishads to do this; there was occasion to note, too, that this tendency was followed out naturally and with moderation. Certainly there is no indication in these texts of any systematic attempt to make battle against the ancient threefold Veda, or to enter into polemics against the priests devoted to their respective duties while reciting or chanting its mantras. Similarly the ritual texts of the AV. allude preferably, and yet incidentally, to their own Veda, and as occasion offers, bring to the front the priests schooled in it. Thus Kaus. 139, 6 an oblation is offered to Bhyzgu and Angiras along with other divinities, without mention, however, of any specific representatives of the other Vedas. The expression, Kaus. 125, 2, vedabhigupto brahmava parivrzto stharvabhiz santaz!, illustrates this passive preference for the Atharvan very well; cf. also 137, 25. Again, Kaus. 63, 3, four priests descended from Azshis, skilled in the bhrvzgvangirasaz, are employed very naturally, and simi- larly allusion is made to Atharvan priests and Atharvan schools, Kaus. 59, 25; 73,12; Vait. Sa.1, 5; Ath. Paris. 46,2; 73,13; 77,4. In the Atharva-parisish¢zas Bhrzgu, Angiras, and Atharvan figure more frequently than any
1 The passage reflects also the Atharvanic connection of their Veda with Brahman and the brahma; cf. Ath. Paris. 2, 1, brahmame brahmavedaya . . . namaskritya, ai | see below, p. Ixii ff.
lviti HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
other names: they have become the typical teachers of the trivialities which these texts profess. But over and above this the ritual texts raise certain special claims regarding the position of the Atharvan © among the Vedas, and they further make the Nature of the é : : : especial claims demand with strident voice and obvious of the ritual polemic intention that certain offices shall be reserved for the priests conversant with that Veda. The position of these texts may be stated under three heads. First, they are not content with the rather vacillating attitude of the non-Atharvanic texts which refer in general to a threefold Veda, reserving, as we have seen, the honorific mention of the fourth Veda to more or less well-defined occasions, especially to moods when it is felt desirable to call into requisition the entire range of Vedic literary composition in addition to the trayi vidya (e.g. itihasa, purava, gatha, &c.). Secondly, the office of the Brahman, the fourth priest at the srauta-ceremonies, who oversees and corrects by means of expiatory formulas (prayaskitta) the accidents and blunders of hotar, udgatar, and adhvaryu, is said to belong to an Atharvavedin, and the Vaitana-sitra in fact exhibits the bhzzgvangirovid in possession of that office. Thirdly, a similar claim is advanced in respect to the office of the purohita. Again and again it is stated that the purohita, guru, or brahman of a king, the chaplain or house-priest, shall be conversant with the Atharvan writings, shall be an Atharvan priest, and this claim, as we have seen above (p. xlvi), is supported to some extent by later Brahmanical treatises not derived from Atharvan schools. Cf. also below, p. Ixvii. The Gopatha-brahmava, in its opening chapters I, 1, 4— 1o, describes the cosmogonic origin of the universe and Exaltation the Vedas from the lone brahma. Unlike ofthe AV. other texts, which as a rule ignore the Athar- Bid aah PO os in these creative accounts, the atharvan and the angiras texts are placed at the head; the other Vedic texts (rzk, yagu/, and saman, I, 1, 6), as well as the subsidiary compositions (the five Vedas, called sarpaveda, pisa#aveda, asuraveda, itihdsaveda, and purawaveda, I, 1,
INTRODUCTION. lix
Io), are relegated to the rear. At Vait. Sd. 6, 1 the Atharvan is again placed at the head of the four Vedas. Gop. Br. I, 3, 4 lauds the Atharvan compositions as the greatest religious manifestation, etad vai bhtyishtham brahma yad bhv7gvangirasah#, and at I, 2, 16 (cf. I, 2, 18) the Atharvan figures as the fourth Veda by the name of Brahma-veda, being here correlated with the service of the Brahman-priest as the overseer at the srauta-ceremonies?. At I, 1, 9 there is quoted a stanza, thoroughly Upanishad in character, which shows that the Atharvanists correlated their Veda with the knowledge of brahma, the higher and subtler religious conception, which at all times is raised above any special knowledge of the constituent parts of the Vedic religion: ‘The highest Veda was born of tapas, it grew in the heart of those that know the brahma 7.’ The Atharvan ritual texts never cite the trayi vidya in formulary order without including the fourth Veda °, differ- ing in this regard even from the text of the Samzhita and the Atharvan Upanishads (see pp. xxxii, xliii). The first half of the Gop. Br. (I, 5, 25) ends with the assertion that they who study the trayi reach, to be sure, the highest heaven (trivish¢apam tridivasz ndkam uttamam), but yet the Athar- vans and Angiras go beyond to the great worlds of Brahma (ata uttare brahmaloka mahanta4). As regards the Brahman, the overseer at the srauta- performances, the Vait. Sd. 1, 1 states that he must be RP Se conversant with the Brahma-veda, and in he od of Brahman 18 this priest is described as the lord of beings, in yo aga lord of the world, &c. These expressions seem to indicate that he is the representa- tive at the sacrifice of the personified god Brahman. At 11, 2 (cf. Gop. Br. I, 2, 16) the Brahman is again ordered to be conversant with the atharvangirasa/, this time in
' katasro va ime hotra, hautram adhvaryavam audgatram brahmatvam.
* Thus according to the version of Sayavza, Introduction to the AV.,, p. 5, sreshtho hi vedas tapasosdhigato brahmagfanam hridaye sambabhiiva. Ragen- dralala:nitra’s edition, sresh¢/o ha vedas tapaso s dhigato brahmagyAnam kshitaye sambabbiiva, ‘it was created for the destruction of the oppressors of Brahmans.
* See especially Gop. br. I], 2, 14, where the atharvaigirasah are added every time in liturgical formulas to the r74ah, yagtimshi, and samani.
lx HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
expressed contrast with udgatar, hotar, and adhvaryu (simaveda, régveda, yagurveda). At Gop. Br. I, 2, 18 (end) the Brahman is described with the words, esha ha svai vidvan sarvavid brahma yad bhvigvangirovid. The last statement is of especial interest as indicating the identifi- cation of the Atharvan with the sarvavidya which stands above the trayi vidya (cf. below, p. Ixiii). Especially at Gop. I, 3, t. 2 the futility of the sacrifice without a Brah- man skilled in the bhrigvangirasa# is described vividly: a cow, a horse, a mule, a chariot cannot proceed with less than four feet, therefore the sacrifice, in order to succeed, must have four feet: the four Vedas, and the four priests. Especially characteristic is the following: At Tait. S. III, 5, 2, 1, &c. (cf. Ind. Stud. X, 34), the well-known legend is told, according to which Vasishz#a ‘saw Indra clearly, though the Azshis (in general) did not see him clearly.’ Indra makes Vasish¢a his Brahman (purohita), and con- fides to him moreover a mystery, the stomabhaga-verses. Since then men have Vasishz/a for their purohita: there- fore a descendant of Vasish¢ha is to be chosen as Brahman. The same legend is repeated almost verbatim Gop. Br. II, -2, 13, but the text demurs at the last clause. The Gop. Br. cannot say tasmad vasishz4o brahma karyaz, because it has previously stated emphatically that a bhyzgvangirovid is the only person fitted for that exalted office (I, 2, 18; 3, 1 ff.). At Vait. Si. 6,1 the garhapatya-fire is personified as a steed which is prepared by the four Vedas for the Brah- man, and by Pragapati for Atharvan: the equation brah- man=atharvan is implied. The passage, Vait. Sd. 37, 2, a brahmodya or theological contest between the Brahman and the Udgatar, betrays perhaps a certain insecurity and touchiness on the part of the Brahman in his assumed superiority to the other priests: ‘Not art thou superior, better than I, goest not before me. . . . Thou speakest these words that are worthy of being learned, (but) shalt not become equal to me.’ The superiority of the Brahman was occasionally disputed1, and possibly the Atharvanic
* See Haug, Brahma und die Brahmanen, p. Io.
INTRODUCTION. ixi
Brahman felt that he stood in special need of asserting his dignity.
Even more energetic are the demands of the liturgical texts in the matter of the office of purohita who is The ofice of KNOWN also by the name of brahman and purochita in the guru. ‘The king who rules the country shall ritual texts. eek a wise Brahman (brahmazam). He verily is wise that is skilled in the bhvzgu and angiras; for the bhvzgu and angiras act as a charm against all ominous occurrences, and protect everything’ (Kaus. 94, 2-4; cf. 126, 2). The equivalence of brahman, purohita, and guru is Suaranteed by comparing with this Ath. Paris. 3, t, kulinamz srotriyas bhrzgvangirovidam ... gurum vriniyad bhaipatizZ; and 3, 3, tasmad bhvzgvangirovidazz ... kury&t purohitam. Cf. also 2, 2, brahma tasmad atharvavit. Conversely, ‘The gods, the Fathers, and the twice-born (priests) do not receive the oblation of the king in whose house there is no guru that is skilled in the Atharvan’ (2, 3). Cf. Weber, Omina und Portenta, p. 346 ff.; Ind. Stud. X, 138; Sayaza, Introduction to the AV., p. 6. In Kaus. 17, 4 ff. the king and the purohita (Darila: raga, purodhaz) are seen in active co-operative practice at the consecration of the king; and again (brahma raga fa) in 140, 4 ff. at the indramahotsava- festival.
The Atharva-parisishZas are not content with these strong recommendations of their own adherents, but they would have the adherents of the other Vedas, yea even of certain branches (sakha) of the Atharvan itself, excluded from the purohiti: ‘The Atharvan keeps off terrible occurrences, and acts as a charm against portentous ones... not the adhvaryu, not the £/andoga, and not the bahvrzka... . The bahvrzka destroys the kingdom, the adhvaryu destroys sons, the £Aandoga dissipates wealth; hence the guru must
be an Atharvava. .. . A Paippalada as guru increases hap-
piness, sovereignty, and health, and so does a Saunakin
who understands the gods and the mantras. . . . The king
whose purodha is in any way a Galada or a Mauda is deposed from his kingdom within the year’ (Ath. Paris.
xii HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
2, 2-5)'. The Paippaladas, Saunakins, Galadas, and Maudas are alike representatives of Atharvan schools (see Kausika, Introduction, p. xxxiii ff.): the passage shows how eager the scramble for the office of purohita had become. That the Atharvans finally succeeded in making heard their clamorous demand for this office (see below, p. Ixvii) is probably due, as we shall see, to their superior, if not exclusive knowledge of witchcraft, which was doubtless regarded in the long run as the most prac- tical and trenchant instrument for the defence of king and people. In order to estimate at its correct value the claims of the Atharvanists that their own Veda is entitled to the name Brahma-veda, and that the so-called ai ricci to Brahman-priests and the Purohitas must be be one adherents of the AV., we need to premise certain considerations of a more general nature. In the Vedic religious system, or we might say more cautiously religious evolution, three literary forms and correspondingly three liturgical meznods of application of these forms to the sacrifice were evolved at a time prior to the reco.ded history of Hindu religious thought and action. They are the rvikah, sdmani, and yagdmshi, known also by a variety of other designations, and characterised to a con- siderable extent by special verbs expressing the act of reciting or chanting them’. Correspondingly the priests who had learned one of these varieties of religious expres- sion and its mode of application to the sacrifice appear, again for aught we know from prehistoric times as indi- vidual actors (hotar, udgatar, adhvaryu), in no wise qualified each by himself to shoulder the burden of literary know- ledge or liturgic technique. The Hindus were at all times well aware that these religious forms are fragmentary and parts of a whole. The Rig-veda contains countless expres- sions indicating the insufficiency of the rzka% to fulfil alone
* Cf. Weber, Ind. Stud. I, 296; the author, Journ. Amer. Or. Soc. XI, 378, note,