Atharva-Veda Samhita/Book XIX/Hymn 64

64. To Agni: with fuel.

[Brahman.—caturṛcam. āgneyam. ānuṣṭubham.]

Not found in Pāipp. Used in Kāuç. (57. 26) in the ceremony of initiation of a Vedic student, to accompany the laying of four sticks of fuel on the fire—the schol. say, one at each verse. ⌊With regard to the ritual use, see the table on p. 896, and p. 897, l. 9.⌋

Translated: Griffith, ii. 318; vs. 1 also by Ludwig, p. 265.

1. O Agni, I have taken fuel for the great Jātavedas; let that Jātavedas extend to me both faith and wisdom.

The whole verse is found in ÇGS. ii. 10, the only variant being agnaye at the beginning; ⌊Oldenberg's text (cf. his note, p. 139) should read āhārṣam, with his codex F.⌋; the first half-verse occurs in several other Sūtras (AGS. i. 21. 1; PCS. ii. 4. 3; HGS. i. 7. 2; MB. i. 6. 32), with a very different latter half, but all reading agnaye; ⌊and we find agnáye at MP. ii. 6. 2; and again at GGS. ii. 10. 46, where the pratīka is cited⌋. The comm. also has agnaye, with one of SPP's reciters. The Atharvan reading is plainly ágne, apparently a metrical emendation, and the translation follows it, rather than our unnecessary conjecture, ágre. ⌊In this case, as the meter clearly shows, we must allow that the AV. has the better reading ágne as against the agnaye of a whole series of Sūtra-texts. Their inferior reading is of course not to be changed; but still less should the AV. be changed to agnáye, as Oldenberg, note to ÇGS., p. 139, overlooking the meter, suggests.⌋

2. With firing, O Jātavedas, with fuel do we increase thee; so do thou increase us, both with progeny and with riches.

The ⌊text and explanation of the⌋ comm. add ⌊as does the Daça Karmāṇi: see Kāuç. 57. 26 note⌋ the further pāda dīrgham āyuḥ kṛṇotu me, and two or three of SPP's authorities give it or have traces of it.

3. In that, O Agni, we put on for thee any pieces of wood whatever, be all that propitious to me; enjoy thou that, O youngest one.

The first two pādas and the fourth are RV. viii. 91 (or 102). 20, which reads kā́ni kā́ni cid in a ⌊and tā́ for the tád of our d⌋. The Yajus-texts, VS. xi. 73, MS. (in ii. 7. 7), TS. (in iv. 1. 10¹), all have the inserted pāda c: VS. MS. end it with te ghṛtám instead of our me çivám, while TS. makes it read tád astu túbhyam íd ghṛtám. VS. reads a as does RV., but TS.MS. have yā́ni kā́ni ca. Nearly all the authorities have dā́ruṇi ⌊only W's P.M. have dā́rūṇi⌋; and all have dadhmasi, without accent: SPP. emends both words to accordance with RV., as we had done. Part of the mss. ⌊and the comm.⌋ have in d yaviṣṭha. The verse is used by Vāit. (28. 14) in the agnicayana ceremony. ⌊Cf. p. 898, line 1.⌋

4. These pieces of fuel are for thee, O Agni; with them, O burning one, become thou united; put in us [long] life-time; put immortality in the Āryan.

The second and fourth pādas are wholly corrupt; the translation follows in part our emended text. ⌊For b, the translation implies tā́bhir dhakṣo (cf. RV. x. 115. 4; ii. 4. 4, where the saṁhitā has dákṣoḥ; RV. Prāt. iv. 41 end) sám íd bhava;⌋ and for d, it implies amṛtatváṁ cā́ ”rye. For b, the general reading of the authorities is tvā́m íd dhaṅsó (p. haṅsáḥ) samíd (p. sam॰ít) bhava; one or two have dhaso or vāṅso, one tvā́v íd dhaṅsó, three bhavaḥ. SPP. conjectures that the original reading may have been tā́bhir vaso samíd bhava; he adopts as his text, from the comm., tvám iddháḥ samíd bhava. In c, the ā́ before dhehi is not found in the mss.; a less correction, with better meter, would have been dhehy ā́. For d, the mss., the comm., and SPP., give amṛtatvám ācāryā̀ya (p. amṛta॰tvám: ā॰cāryā̀ya).

⌊The Daç. Kar., as reported by Bloomfield on Kāuç. 57. 26, also gives ācāryāya; moreover, the passage in PCS. (ii. 4. 3), which treats of the ceremony of initiation to which (see introd., above) these verses belong, contains in fact a prayer of the student on behalf of his teacher or initiator: jīvaputro mamā ”cāryo medhāvy aham asāni etc.; and the AV. comm. explains ācāryāya accordingly by upanayanakartre gāyatrīpradātre etc. This all makes against W's cā́ ”rye and in favor of the ms.-reading ācāryā̀ya: this dative, no less than the locative asmā́su, goes easily with dhehy ā́⌋.