Anandakanda 2.5

Ānandakanda, 2.5 / The venerable Bhairava: / <Origin of iron> / The origin of iron known as magnetic iron, wrought iron, and cast iron is now spoken of. / When the great ocean was being churned by the hosts of gods and asuras,

nectar, the sustainer of the gods, arose in it long ago. / While being drunk by the gods, small drops fell from it.

Knowing they had reached the earth, the maintainer, Dhūrjaṭi, concealed them, / having transformed them into the form of iron ore on the surface of the earth,

so that mortals overcome by sinful diseases might not obtain them. / Thus, those drops of nectar that were hidden by Śiva long ago—

their preparation is distinctly told by me in summary / for the destruction of diseases such as skin disease, according to the measure of my intellect.

<Iron: subtypes> / Iron is thus three-fold: known as magnetic iron, wrought iron, and cast iron. / One should know it to be a hundred times superior to all rejuvenating agents.

<Loadstone: synonyms> / Ayaskānta, kāntaloha, kānta, kṛṣṇalohaka, / kāntāyasa, mahāloha, and kālaloha: [these are its] seven [names].

<Defects arising from the ingestion of unpurified loadstone> / From consuming unpurified and unkilled iron, / it produces heart pain, digestive weakness, severe diseases, and death.

<Method of collecting loadstone> / Therefore the thorough purification and killing of loadstone is prescribed. / Quicksilver is an intoxicated elephant; loadstone is said to be the goad.

Knowing the ore field, it must be gathered with great effort. / One should avoid that which is exposed to wind and sun, O celestial beauty.

And the loadstone situated in the ground one should macerate with goat's blood; / one should wrap it with skin smeared with goat's blood.

Having wrapped it in goat hide, one should place it in the earth as before. / Taken out after seven months, one should cast it into a jar of water.

It must always be worshiped with red flowers and ointments of red fragrant sandalwood paste; / saturated with liquor and meat, it should be employed in mercurial rejuvenation therapy.

Treated with goat's blood, it becomes a bhrāmaka or a cumbaka [magnet]; / through this systematic procedure it becomes a drāvaka [magnet], O beloved.

Without loadstone, quicksilver never acts upon the body; / quicksilver is nothing without loadstone, and loadstone is nothing without quicksilver.

A formulation combining loadstone and quicksilver maintains the body. / Previously, the essence of loadstone was fully explained by me according to rule.

Now I will expound the refinements of loadstone and their properties. / <Purification of loadstone: innate defect> / A sheet of loadstone coated with hare's blood, thoroughly heated,

three times with fire, O goddess, sheds its innate defect. / <Purification of loadstone: mountain-born defect> / In water measuring eight times the weight of triphalā, with sixteen palas of triphalā,

that decoction is reduced to one-fourth; and having heated sheets / made of five palas of loadstone, one should quench them seven times.

Thus the mountain-born defect originating in iron is destroyed. / One should boil powder made of loadstone in eight times its quantity of cow's urine;

washed repeatedly with sour gruel and dried, it attains purity. / Ratnamālā, haṃsapādī, gojihvā, triphalā, amṛtā,

gopālī, tumburu, and dantī: one should grind these in cow's urine. / Heated again and again, twice seven times, the sheet of loadstone

should be quenched in their paste, to dispel all defects from the loadstone. / <Procedure for perfecting loadstone> / The procedure for the perfection of loadstone must be performed with mantra.

There should be the words 'udbhava-udbhava' in the dative case after 'amṛta', / ending with 'svāhā' and with the praṇava (Oṃ) at the beginning; this mantra is established for grinding.

For the protection of iron and mercury, this very [mantra], but omitting one / 'udbhava' and 'svāhā', one should append with 'phaṭ' at the end, O beloved.

After the praṇava, 'namaś caṇḍa-vajrapāṣāṇāya', / followed by 'mahāvajrasenādhipataye namaḥ',

the word 'saru' spoken twice, and 'mahāvidyābalāya ca', / and then 'svāhā'—this mantra is revered in the performance of oblations.

Having offered an oblation with this very [mantra], one should perform the prescribed rite. / <Method 1 for iron calx> / Then, one should grind five palas of cinnabar with breast milk.

With that, one should coat a sheet of loadstone weighing five palas. / Sealed, it must be incinerated in an elephant pit (gajapuṭa); then again with triphalā decoction,

or with limes or fermented gruel, grinding cinnabar in a twentieth part [of the iron], / coating it, sealing it in a roasting crucible, one should cook that iron again.

Sealed, one should roast and cook it by night, and in the morning triturate it with juices; / one should do this for eight days, and verily the three kinds of iron are killed.

<Method 2 for iron calx> / One should make loadstone, cast iron, and wrought iron [thin] like tamarind leaves, / place them in an earthen vessel in the sun, and fill it with juices of dantī.

The sheet [is immersed] repeatedly, until it floats on its own; / it is killed by the intense heat of the sun; having powdered it, one should use it.

<Method 3 for iron calx> / Powder of loadstone, cast iron, and wrought iron should be triturated in the sun / for three days with juices from matsyākṣī, for three days with citraka juices,

for three days with trikaṇṭaka juices, for one day with sahadevī juices, / and for three days each with cow's urine and triphalā decoctions.

Then it must be ground with the stated juices and successively given roasting after roasting; / sealed and [calcined] in elephant pits in this manner, the killed [iron] should be used in formulations.

<Method 4 for iron calx> / Either in an earthen pot or in an iron vessel, stirring with an iron ladle, / one should cook the iron powder for a day with triphalā decoction.

Grinding that lump with triphalā water and sealing it, one should cook it in a pit; / inside a sixteen-aṅgula pit, free of draft, one should cook it day and night.

Cooking in a pot followed by roasting should be done thus three times. / Bhṛṅga, ginger, tālamūla, hastikarṇī root,

and the root of śatāvarī and vidārī—grinding these in triphalā water, / it should be cooked in a pot as before and ground, [subjected to] three roastings.

Then it must be cooked with decoctions of punarnavā and daśamūla, / with decoction of bṛhatī, and with juices of citron,

with juices of brahmabīja, horse-radish tree decoctions, and cow's milk: / grinding thoroughly with each one first, one should cook it in a pit in the aforesaid pit.

At the end of the roasting, one should triturate it with that very juice for just one yāma; / grinding with each one thus, one should roast and triturate in succession.

Loadstone, cast iron, and wrought iron are killed, of this there is no doubt. / <Method 5 for iron calx> / Having made black sulphide of mercury (kajjalī) in a mortar from pure quicksilver and two parts of sulphur,

one should grind loadstone powder equal to both of them with juices of aloe; / after two yāmas, having removed that ball, placing it in a copper vessel,

and covering it with castor leaves, when it becomes extremely hot within half a yāma, / one should then place it in a heap of grain and take it out at the end of three days.

Grinding it thoroughly, one should sift it through cloth; truly it becomes water-floating; / loadstone, cast iron, and wrought iron become dead and incapable of reviving.

One may kill gold and the like in this manner, and powder them like iron. / This perfected formula, handed down directly from the Adepts, is thus expounded.

Experienced by me, O goddess, it cures all diseases. / One should not cook iron less than five palas in measure, nor above thirty.

<Method 6 for iron calx> / The bark of arjuna should be ground and well stirred with sour gruel; / into that, one should throw the loadstone powder in a bell-metal vessel.

One should keep it in the sun for one day, filling it repeatedly with the juices, / with arjuna or with fermented gruel; thus one kills the three types of iron.

One should grind loadstone powder with juices extracted from kukkuṭapatra; / and for a day in the intense sun, it must be ground with juices from trikaṇṭa,

and again for a day with vandhyākārkoṭakī, bhṛṅga, and punarnavā along with cow's urine. / Triphalā should be boiled with cow's urine, and one should triturate it with that decoction

carefully for three weeks; then one should grind it for one day; / sealing it, one should cook it in an elephant pit; for a day one should grind it with the decoction.

One should grind by day and roast by night up to twenty-one days; / by twenty-one roastings, the three kinds of iron are verily killed.

<Method 8 for iron calx> / Pyrites and realgar with sours, turmeric, and pepper root: / grinding these, one should coat the loadstone sheet, and heat and quench it repeatedly.

Seven times into a decoction of triphalā; he should wash it again with water. / He should pound it with an iron rod, [and] grind it in water of triphalā.

Mākṣika and realgar are to be added in one-sixteenth proportion of the iron. / Ground with sour [gruel], sealed, he should cook it in a single elephant-pit furnace.

It becomes unrevivable ash: kānta, tīkṣṇa, and muṇḍaka [iron].
<Iron-ash method (9)>
Having smeared [a sheet of] sword[-iron] with the pulp of tindu fruit, in fierce sunlight,

he should keep it inside a bronze vessel; in a single day it splits completely. / He should apply the coating again and again; at the end of the day he should grind it thoroughly.

Combined with triphalā decoction, in a single day it becomes dead. / With one-eighth part of water remaining, five palas of triphalā,

ghee should be equal to the decoction, [and] dead iron equal to the ghee. / He should cook it in a copper vessel, stirring it with an iron ladle,

he should cook it with a mild fire until that liquid is digested. / Sugar equal to the iron is to be added; he should take down the well-cooked [mixture].

This is known as a carrier vehicle; dead iron is a great ambrosia. / In this way, this method applies to kānta, tīkṣṇa, and muṇḍa as well.

He should cook dead iron equal to ghee, placed in an iron vessel. / When the ghee is consumed, he should take it and employ it in all formulations.

Oṃ oṃ, O king of ambrosia, I consume [you], obeisance! / In whichever vessel [it is placed], entering water, a drop of oil does not spread; asafoetida abandons its odor, neem paste its own bitterness; / upon cooking milk does not take a peaked form upon the ground: that is said to be kānta iron, stated by its characteristics and not otherwise.

<Nature of the cooking of iron>
The cooking of iron is declared to be threefold: mild, medium, and harsh. / The first is like a mass of mud, but medium is cooking into a lump;

the third is harsh cooking, resembling sand, O beloved.
<Testing of unrevivable ash>
Having known the stage of cooking, color, and likewise smell of the iron from the fire,

having taken it off, he should then place the purified [iron] inside an iron vessel. / Iron, lion-to-elephants (mercury), sulfur, mākṣika, [and] cinnabar:

<Iron: checking the water-floating state>
All this dead iron is to be blown with the five friends [of metals]. / If it thus has no revivability, floating on water, it should be consumed as beneficial.

Combined with honey and ghee, iron joined with silver, / placed in a blind crucible and blown, he should take when cold of itself.

If the silver situated inside the iron is of its previous measure, / then the iron is unrevivable; otherwise he should process it again.

He should grind sulfur and the revived iron in equal parts in a mortar / for one day with aloe juice, seal it, and cook it in an elephant-pit furnace.

In this way, unrevivability of all irons is to be performed thus.
<Properties of the ashes of kānta and the others>
Kānta-red-powder brings longevity, health, and bestows strength and virility;

it causes firmness of the body, is supreme, and brings sharpness to the sense organs. / It pacifies the three humors and destroys consumption disease;

it destroys fevers, intrinsic hemorrhage, jaundice and the rest, [and] the eight great diseases. / With whatever formulations destroy particular diseases, it destroys those very diseases.

<Tīkṣṇa iron: synonyms>
Tīkṣṇa, śastrāyasa, śastra, piṇḍa, piṇḍāyasa, śaṭha, / āyasa, niśita, tīvra, lohakhaḍga, and muṇḍaja;

it is called aya, citrāyasa, and cīnaja—in fifteen ways.
<Muṇḍa iron: synonyms>
Muṇḍa, muṇḍāyasa, loha, kṛṣṇalauha, [and] śilodbhava.

<Tīkṣṇa and muṇḍa iron: killing>
The killing of tīkṣṇa and muṇḍa is by the method of kānta iron.
<Tīkṣṇa iron: medicinal properties>
Tīkṣṇa iron is astringent, sour, bitter, pungent, [and] light;

it is cooling, scarifying, dry, and conquers kapha, pitta, blood [disorders], and jaundice. / It destroys urinary disorders and all colic; tīkṣṇa surpasses muṇḍa in qualities.

<Muṇḍa: medicinal properties>
Muṇḍa iron is beneficial for the eyes, astringent, sweet, bitter, / scarifying, removes vāta, cooling, and dispels worms, pitta, and kapha;

it conquers swelling, abdominal disease, colic, hemorrhoids, skin diseases, jaundice, and urinary disorders.