Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 42.djvu/37

 INTRODUCTION. XXXlll

��beings, whose office is entirely non-Atharvanic. But on the other hand the Atharvans appear at IV, 37, 1 as slayers of the Rakshas (similarly IV, 3, 7) ; the Atharvans and Aiigiras fasten amulets, and consequently slay the Dasyus, at X, 6, 20 ; and the name Bhr/gu appears at V, 19, i (cf. TS. I, 8, 18, I ; TB. I, 8, 2, 5) as the typical designation of a Brahma7/a, i.e. here, of an Atharvan priest. Such specialisations of these names are unknown in the RV. Especially noteworthy is the evident beginning of the asso- ciation of the name atigirasa with aggressive witchcraft or spells, and the somewhat less clear corresponding correla- tion of the stem atharva;-?a with auspicious charms (see above, p. xviii ff.). Altogether the impression arises that the names Atharvan, Arigiras, and Bhr/gu, connected with the redaction of the AV., have in the text of that Veda assumed, or commenced to assume, the office which the diaskeuast and the ritualistic texts of the Atharvan have definitely and permanently bestowed upon them.

In the domain of the sruti, exclusive of the Rig-veda, i. e.

in the Ya^s-sa;;/hitas, and the Brahma;zas., the position

of the Atharvan is on the whole defined with

Position of -^. , ^, , , ,

the AV. in surhcient clearness. It depends altogether on

��the rest of ^j-^g practical character of these texts as ex- Ihe smti. ^

ponents of the great Vedic sacrifices, the

jrauta-performances : these, by their very nature, exclude any very direct interest in the systematic charms of the bhesha^ani and abhi/{'arika;^i. Such sorcery as is inter- woven with the j-rauta-performances has acquired inde- pendent expression in the metrical and prose formulas the Ya^us-sa?;/hitas ; it figures in the form and by the name of sacrificial formulas (ya^"u;;/shi) as part of the threefold Veda (trayi vidya). Thus the subject-matter of formulas like the following : ' I dig (pits) that slay the Rakshas, destroy the spells that belong to Vish//u ; that spell here which my equal or unequal has dug into (the ground) do I cast out ; I make subject here my equal or my unequal that plans hostile schemes against me ' (Tait. S. I, 3, 2, I ; VI, 2, II, 1. 2; Maitr. S. I, 2, 10. 11 ; Va^. S. V, 23 ff. ; vSat. Br. Ill, 5, 4, 8 ff.), is by its very terms [42] c

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