Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 42.djvu/26

 XXll HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.

cious side of the holy texts, and naturally chooses the auspicious aspect of the Atharvan also. Its precise com- plement is 5at. Br. X, 5, 2, 20. Here, after correlating the adhvaryu-priests with the ya^na//, the -^/-andoga-priests with the saman, the bahvr//^as with the uktha (rik), the author presents yatu, 'sorcery,' and the yatuvida/^, 'those skilled in sorcery,' as representatives of the fourth Veda. The bhesha^a of the Atharvan passage, and the yatu of the present passage, make up together what is embraced in the name atharvahgirasa/^ (AV. X, 7, 20). Moreover, the Sam- hita exhibits a decided predilection, bordering on rigorous distinction, for associating the term ^ngirasa with aggressive witchcraft, or the practice of spells (krztya). Thus VIII, 5, 9, kr/tya ahgirasi'/^ ; X, i, 6, pratiKna ahgirasa//. . . pra- tUik kntya akr/tya-mun kr/tyakr/to <^ahi ; XII, 5, 52, adadanam ^hgirasi brahma.^am upa d^saya ; cf. also VI, 45, 3 = RV. X, 164, 4. In XI, 4, 16 (cf. also VIII, 7, 17) the distinction between Atharvanic and Ahgirasic plants appears again, not, however, in any connection which con- veys of necessity the contrast between 'holy' and 'witch- craft ' plants. But it may do so. This, it will be remem- bered, is made in Vait. Su. 5, 10 ; it formed the starting point for the present enquiry, and the chain of evidence extending through the Atharvanic and Brahmanical litera- ture seems thus to be linked. We may add finally that the late Parij-ish/a hymns, AV. XIX, 22 and 23, which are repeated in the tract entitled Vedavratasya^dej-anavidhi, Ath. Parii". 46, 9 and 10, deal with and state subdivisions of angirasa and atharva;/a-texts, each separately \ The statements are but faintly applicable to the existing redac- tions of the Atharvan, the ^aunakiya, and Paippalada- .yakhas ^, but we should be slow to condemn them as wholly apocryphal. The Gop. Br. I, i, 5 and 8 also narrates in its own style of unbridled Brahmanical fancy the separate creation by Brahman of the ^z'shis Atharvan and Ahgiras,

' angiras^nam adyai/i pa«,^anuvakai/i svaha (XIX, 22, i); sarvebhyo ifigirobhyo vidagawebhya/i svaha (XIX, 22, 18) ; a{ha.rva?iS.n3Lm katmrikebhya/i svi'ha XIX, 23, i).

- Cf. Weber, Lid. Stud. IV, 433 ff.

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