The Philosophy of the Upanishads c12.s3.t3.47

c12.s3.t3.47

(4) *Food*. The Sannyâsin must live by begging,⁴ only bread given in charity and broken fruits are to be his food,⁵ or water, air and fruits.⁶ Food should be asked of all four castes,⁷ the distinctions of which have no longer any existence for the Sannyâsin. Âśr. 4 distinguishes here also four grades; the Kuṭîc'aras are to beg in the houses of their children, the Bahûdakas of well-to-do Brâhman families, and the Paramahaṃsas alone of all four castes. In begging the Sannyâsin is to employ a clay or wooden vessel, or a gourd,⁸ but elsewhere the rule is laid down that his belly should form his vessel,⁹ his hand,¹⁰ or his belly or hand.¹¹ He who has renounced the world "shall eat the bread of charity, but give no alms" (*bhikshâs'î na dadyât*, for which might be read with a very slight change *bhikshâs'î 'shad adyât*, "living on the bread of charity he shall eat little").¹² This would be in harmony with other passages, according to which he who has renounced the world should use his food only as medicine,¹ should avoid eating sufficient to put on fat, but should remain thin.² Nevertheless, should he feel weak, he should not pursue these and other abstinences so far as to give rise to disorder:³ if he is ill, he should practise self-mortification only in the spirit or by means of words.⁴ Elsewhere it is said, extending the theory of the Prāṇāgnihotra:⁵ “That which he eats in the evening is his evening sacrifice, in the morning his morning sacrifice, at the new month his new moon sacrifice, that at the full moon his full moon sacrifice, and when he cuts (afresh) in the spring the hair of his head, his beard, the hair of his body, and his nails, that is his agniṣṭoma (a kind of Soma sacrifice ”).⁶