The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c6.s1.6

c6.s1.6

In this light, the relationship between patron and officiant is of a nature diametrically opposed to what the classical theory of the pure ritual wants it to be. The function of the brahmin officiant is to take over the death impurity of the patron by eating from the offerings and by accepting the *dakṣiṇās*. By gifts and food, evil and impurity are transferred and purity attained, especially if the donee is a brahmin.⁹ It is no matter for surprise, then, that the acceptance of *dakṣiṇās* by the brahmin is surrounded with meticulous care. The need for such care is, moreover, reinforced by the fact that the brahmin is not allowed to refuse the *dakṣiṇā*; indeed *Manu* 4, 249 deprecates a brahmin who refuses a gift.¹⁰