Aphorisms on Brahman 2.596.7

2.596.7

nanu manyanta ityapi samānaṃ vartamānāpadeśitvam /
satyamevametat /
avaśyavidheye tvanyatarasminvāsaḥkāryākhyānādapāṃ vāsaḥsaṃkalpanamevāpūrvaṃ vidhīyate nācamanaṃ pūrvavaddhi tadityupapāditam /
yadapyuktaṃ vispaṣṭā cācamane vidhivibhaktiriti tadapi pūrvavattvenaivācamanasya pratyuktam /
ata evācamanasyāvidhitsitatvādetameva tadanamanagnaṃ kurvanto manyanta ityatraiva kāṇvāḥ paryavasyanti nāmananti tasmādevaṃvidityādi /
tasmānmādhyandinānāmapi pāṭha ācamanānuvādenaivaṃvittvameva prakṛtaprāṇavāsovittvaṃ vidhīyata iti pratipattavyam /
yo 'pyayamabhyupagamaḥ kvacidācamanaṃ vidhīyate kvacidvāsovijñānamiti so 'pi na sādhuḥ /
āpo vāsa ityādikāyā vākyapravṛtteḥ sarvatraikarūpyāt tasmādvāsovijñānameveha vidhīyate nācamanamiti nyāyyam // 18 //

Moreover the mere present-form, 'they rinse the mouth with water,' has no enjoining force.--But also in the passage, 'They think that thereby they make the breath dressed,' we have a mere present-form without injunctive power (and yet you maintain that that passage conveys an injunction)!--True; but as necessarily one of the two must be enjoined, we assume, on the ground of what the text says about the making of a dress, that what is enjoined is the meditation on water being the dress of prâna; for this is something 'new,' i.e. not established by other means of knowledge. The rinsing of the mouth with water, on the other hand, is already established by other means (i.e. Smriti), and therefore need not be enjoined again.--The argument founded by the pûrvapakshin on the circumstance that, in the Bri. Up., the verb 'to rinse' is found in the injunctive form ('therefore a man, &c., is to rinse'), is already refuted by our showing that the act of rinsing the mouth is not a new one (and therefore requires no Vedic injunction).

For the very reason that the text does not aim at enjoining the rinsing of the mouth, the Kânvas (in their recension of the Bri. Up.) conclude the chapter with the clause, 'They think,' &c., and do not add the concluding clause of the Mâdhyandinas, 'Therefore a man,' &c. From this we have to conclude that what is enjoined in the text of the Mâdhyandinas also is 'the knowledge of that,' i.e. the knowledge of the water being the dress of the previously mentioned prâna.--Nor finally can it be maintained that in one place (i.e. the Madhyandina-sâkha) the rinsing of the mouth is enjoined, and in other places the knowledge of water as the dress of prâna; for the introductory passage, 'Water is the dress,' is the same everywhere.--We are therefore entitled to conclude that what is enjoined in all Sâkhâs is the cognition of water being the dress of the prâna.