The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c10.45

c10.45

The utter reduction of sacrifice in the prāṇāgnihotra is the end station of Vedic ritualism. All oppositions—dīkṣita and sacrificer, giver and recipient, world and transcendence—have been drawn together and fused in the single sacrificer. In the mythical language of Prajāpati's victory over Death, the sacrifice is now "one." Dualistic sacrifice has become monistic ritualism. It does not communicate or connect anymore but, by means of identification, posits the unification of opposite poles in the individual. This also means that the ritual has withdrawn into splendid isolation and requires its adherent to view himself as equally withdrawn. The prāṇāgnihotra is then either a meaningless complication of daily life, unthinkingly accepted, or a contradictory sign of transcendence. The important point is that out of the awesome violence of sacrifice a new and unique view of the transcendent has been won. It urges man to emancipate himself from his mundane bonds and to realize the transcendent exclusively by himself and in himself.