The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c6.s5.3

c6.s5.3

As to the modes of the life in the forest and the life of the mendicant, the ritual texts contain some interesting information. At the *abhijit* and the *viśvajit* sacrifices, the sacrifier spends all his possessions in dakṣiṇās or he gives a thousand cows, which is tantamount to giving all, as *Kauṣītaki Brāhmaṇa* 25. 14 declares. The number thousand being fairly ubiquitous as the number of dakṣiṇās to be given at various types of sacrifices, we may assume that the idea of giving one's all, either symbolically or in reality, in dakṣiṇās, underlies much of the śrauta ritual. Having given away his possessions, the sacrificer then retires with his wife, in a kind of renewed dīkṣā, to the forest. According to the prescription in the *Jaiminīya Brāhmaṇa*, this period lasts twelve days.⁸⁰ During three days, he and his wife live on roots and fruits they collect in the forest; then they stay for three days in a tribal (*niṣāda*) settlement; next they resort for three days to alien people (*jana*), explained as either a vaiśya or a rival (*bhrātṛvya*);⁸¹ and the last three days they stay with their own relatives (*sajana*), explained as a kṣatriya. In this way, the sacrificer obtains the various types of food associated with his hosts and in the end becomes (re)established in śrī, good fortune.