Agnipurana 173
English (machine translation) 173
- Language
- English
Contents
173.1
Agni said: / I shall state the expiation declared by Brahmā, which brings about the cessation of sins. / The activity whose consequence is the separation of life-breaths is remembered as killing.
173.2
Whether from passion, hatred, or negligence, directly by oneself or through another, / he who causes a brāhmaṇa to be slain is a slayer of a brāhmaṇa.
173.3
When many people have a single objective, all carrying weapons, / if one among them is the killer, all of them are remembered as killers.
173.4
Abused, beaten, or afflicted in terms of wealth,
173.4.p1
[Footnote]
173.4.p2
[Footnote:] 1 ‘tataḥ karmāṇi’ in manuscripts kha, ga, gha, and cha.
173.4_2
he on account of whom one gives up life-breaths is called the slayer of a brāhmaṇa.
173.5
When assistance through medicine and the like has been rendered and death occurs, there is no sin. / In the case of disciplining a son, a pupil, or a wife, if death occurs, there is indeed no guilt.
173.6
Having carefully examined the place, time, capability, and the sin, / an expiation should be assigned where no specific remedy has been stated.
173.7
For the sake of cows or for the sake of a brāhmaṇa, one should instantly surrender one's life, / or cast oneself into fire: one is freed from the killing of a brāhmaṇa.
173.8
Carrying a human skull, bearing a staff, eating begged food, proclaiming his deed, / eating moderately, a brāhmaṇa-slayer attains purity after twelve years.
173.9
Living purely for six years, a man who has slain a brāhmaṇa is purified. / That which is prescribed is for unintentional [killing]; but for intentional it is declared to be double.
173.10
The expiation for killing one who has undertaken [a sacrifice] is three years. / If a kṣatriya kills a brāhmaṇa, [the penance] is doubled; for a vaiśya or a śūdra, it is doubled threefold.
173.11
Elsewhere, in the case of a vipra, it is full; for a kṣatriya, it is considered one quarter less. / For a vaiśya, it is half a quarter; in the case of a kṣatriya [slaying] the aged, women, children, and the sick,
173.12
one fourth of [the penance for] killing a brāhmaṇa is remembered for slaying a kṣatriya; / for [slaying] an upright vaiśya, an eighth part; but for a śūdra, a sixteenth is to be known.
173.13
Having slain an uncorrupted woman, one should perform the observance for slaying a śūdra. / A cow-killer should drink pañcagavya and dwell restrained for a month.
173.14
Sleeping in a cowshed, following cows, he is purified by the gift of a cow. / [He performs] a kṛcchra or an atikṛcchra penance; there is a reduction of a quarter in the case of kings and others.
173.15
Having slain an extremely old, extremely emaciated, extremely young, or diseased [cow],
173.15.p1
[Footnote]
173.15.p2
[Footnote:] 1 ‘na saṃskṛtiḥ’ in manuscript cha.
173.15.p3
[Footnote:] 2 ‘badhe 'sya tu’ in manuscript cha.
173.15_2
a twice-born should perform half the observance according to the earlier rule.
173.16
He should feed brāhmaṇas according to his ability and give gold, sesame seeds, and the like. / By a fist, a slap, or a peg, as well as breaking a horn or the like,
173.17
[or] by a blow with a staff or the like, cow-killing should be declared in that case; / or by subjugation, in taming, and in yoking to a cart or the like,
173.18
or if it dies by a post, an iron chain, or ropes, one should observe three-fourths [of the penance]. / For [striking with] wood, one should perform a śāntapana; for a clod of earth, a prājāpatya.
173.19
For a stone, a taptakṛcchra; and for a weapon, an atikṛcchra. / Having killed a cat, an iguana, a mongoose, a frog, a dog, or a bird,
173.20
one should drink milk for three days, or perform a kṛcchra or a cāndrāyaṇa penance. / The observance for a secret [sin] is secret, and for a public [sin] it is public.
173.21
A hundred breath-controls should be performed for the removal of all sins. / Sweet liquor made from grapes, madhūka, dates, palmyra, sugarcane,
173.22
honey, wood-apple, madhvīka, maireya, or coconut-juice: / these are not non-intoxicants, but intoxicants; liquor made from grain is remembered as the chief liquor.
173.23
They are forbidden for the three classes; having drunk them, one becomes pure by burning [with hot water]. / Or he should eat grain-particles for a year, or oil-cake once at night.
173.24
To remove the sin of drinking liquor, wearing hair-cloth, matted hair, and carrying a staff, / or having consumed feces or urine out of ignorance, or food touched by liquor,
173.25
the three twice-born classes are fit for a fresh sacramental rite. / Having drunk water standing in an intoxicating liquor vessel, one should observe a vow for seven days.
173.26
Having drunk water belonging to an outcaste, one should observe a vow for six days. / Having drunk from wells or vessels of an outcaste, one should perform a śāntapana.
173.26.p1
[Page 186]
173.27
Having drunk water of the lowest outcaste, a twice-born, after drinking pañcagavya for three nights, / [and having drunk water with] fish-bones, snails, conches, mother-of-pearl, or cowrie-shells,
173.28
and also having drunk newly collected rainwater, is purified by pañcagavya. / Having drunk water from a well containing a corpse, he is purified in three nights.
173.29
Having eaten food of outcastes living at the edge of the settlement, one should perform a cāndrāyaṇa. / In a time of distress, in the house of a śūdra, one is purified by remorse.
173.30
A vipra who eats from a śūdra's vessel, having fasted, [is purified] by pañcagavya. / Food cooked in an iron pan, food cooked in oil, clarified butter, curd, and roasted barley meal:
173.31
these are irreproachable from a śūdra, as well as jaggery, milk, juices, and the like. / One who eats without bathing should fast, and at the end of the day he is purified by recitation.
173.32
Having eaten while impure with urine or feces, one is purified in three nights. / Food fallen into with hair or insects, intentionally touched by a foot,
173.33
viewed by a slayer of an embryo, touched by a menstruating woman, / licked by crows and the like, or touched by a dog,
173.34
having eaten food smelled by cows and the like, one should fast for three days. / One who consumes semen, feces, or urine, however, should perform a prājāpatya.
173.35
A cāndrāyaṇa [is prescribed for eating] in a newly performed ancestral rite; a parāka is considered [prescribed] in a monthly rite. / In one of three fortnights, it should be an atikṛcchra; in one of six months, a kṛcchra.
173.36
In an annual rite, it should be a quarter-kṛcchra; a one-day fast in a second annual rite. / On the preceding day is the annual ancestral rite; on the following day is the second annual rite.
173.37
When forbidden food is eaten, the expiation is fasting. / Having eaten bhūstṛṇa grass, garlic, or śiśuka, one should perform a kṛcchra.
173.37.p1
[Footnote]
173.37.p2
[Footnote:] 1 ‘laśunaṃ gṛñjanaṃ bhuktvā’ in manuscript ṅa.
173.37.p3
[Footnote:] 2 ‘śiśukṛcchraṃ samācaret’ in manuscript kha.
173.38
Having eaten the food of those whose food should not be eaten, or the remnants of women or śūdras, / and having eaten meat unfit to be eaten, one should drink milk for seven nights.
173.39
A student of the Veda, an ascetic, or one observing a votive observance who consumes honey or meat, / or [food associated with] impurity from death or birth, should perform the prājāpatya kṛcchra.
173.40
Unlawful seizure of another's property is called theft. / A thief of gold is purified when struck dead by the king with a club.
173.41
Sleeping on the ground, wearing matted hair, subsisting on leaves, roots, and fruits, / eating only once a day, one is purified in twelve years.
173.42
A thief of gold, a drinker of liquor, a killer of a Brahmin, and one who violates a guru's bed— / a man who commits theft or drinks liquor should observe a kṛcchra for a year.
173.43
[For the theft] of gems, pearls, coral, copper, or silver, / or iron, bronze, and stone, [one should fast] for twelve days, eating broken grains of rice.
173.44
In the case of stealing humans, women, fields, houses, / or cisterns, wells, and reservoirs, the cāndrāyaṇa is remembered as the purification.
173.45
In [the theft] of grass, wood, trees, dry food, and jaggery, / and of clothes, skins, or meat, there should be fasting for three nights.
173.47
Going to the father's wife, a sister, likewise a teacher's daughter, / the teacher's wife, or one's own daughter, one violates the guru's bed.
173.48
Having confessed the sin committed regarding the guru's bed, [he should lie] on a heated iron bed / and embrace a blazing iron pillar; through death he is purified.
173.49
Or, having performed the cāndrāyaṇa for three months, the violator of the guru's bed [is purified].
173.50
[Page 188]
173.50.p1
One should apply this very rule also in the case of fallen women.
173.50_2
Whatever votive observance is prescribed for a man regarding another's wife, one should make her perform that; / having emitted semen into maidens, Cāṇḍāla women, or daughters,
173.51
or into the wives of sapinda relatives or offspring, giving up one's life is prescribed. / If a twice-born man frequents a Śūdra woman for one night,
173.52
eating begged food [and] reciting daily, he removes that [sin] in three years. / In approaching the wife of a paternal uncle, or in approaching a brother's wife,
173.53
or a Cāṇḍāla woman, a Pukkasa woman, a daughter-in-law, a sister, a female friend, / a maternal aunt, a paternal aunt, a woman entrusted [for safekeeping], a woman who has sought refuge,
173.54
a maternal uncle's wife, a sister, a woman of the same lineage, one longing for another, / the wife of a disciple, or the wife of a guru—having approached [her], he should perform the cāndrāyaṇa.
173.55
Thus ends the one hundred seventy-third chapter, entitled 'Expiations', in the Mahāpurāṇa of Agni.
173.55.p1
Thus in the great Purāṇa of Agni, the one hundred and seventy-third chapter, entitled 'Expiations'.
173.55.p2
1 'Eating sacrificial food' in ga.. and ṭa..
173.55.p3
2 'In approaching a mother's co-wife' in ga.., cha.., and ṭa..
[Page 189]
173.55.p4
% Chapter
173.55.p6
Expiations
173.55.p7
Agni said: / The expiation for the omission of worship of the deity, the hermitage, and so forth [is now stated]: / when worship is omitted, one should recite [the mantra] one hundred and eight times, and perform twofold worship.
Other recensions (1)
- Agnipurāṇa (Nag Publishers edition, Delhi) — Sanskrit
Linked texts (1)
- Agnipurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit