The Vishnu Purana: Book III: Chapter V | Internet Sacred Text Archive

CHAP. V.

Divisions of the Yajur-veda. Story of Yájnawalkya: forced to give up what he has learned: picked up by others, forming the Taittiríya-yajush. Yájnawalkya worships the sun, who communicates to him the Vájasneyí-yajush.

PARÁŚARA.--Of the tree of the Yajur-veda there are twenty-seven branches, which Vaiśampáyana, the pupil of Vyása, compiled, and taught to as many disciples 1. Amongst these, Yájnawalkya, the son of Brahmaráta, was distinguished for piety and obedience to his preceptor.

It had been formerly agreed by the Munis, that any one of them who, at a certain time, did not join an assembly held on mount Meru should incur the guilt of killing a Brahman, within a period of seven nights 2. Vaiśampáyana alone failed to keep the appointment, and consequently killed, by an accidental kick with his foot, the child of his sister. He then addressed his scholars, and desired them to perform the penance expiatory of Brahmanicide on his behalf. Without any hesitation Yájnawalkya refused, and said, "How shall I engage in penance with these miserable and inefficient Brahmans?" On which his Guru, being incensed, commanded him to relinquish all that he had learnt from him. "You speak contemptuously," he observed, "of these young Brahmans, but of what use is a disciple who disobeys my commands?" "I spoke," replied Yájnawalkya, "in perfect faith; but as to what I have read from you, I have had enough: it is no more than this--" (acting as if he would eject it from his stomach); when he brought up the texts of the Yajush in substance stained with blood. He then departed. The other scholars of Vaiśampáyana, transforming themselves to partridges (Tittiri), picked

up the texts which he had disgorged, and which from that circumstance were called Taittiríya 3; and the disciples were called the Charaka professors of the Yajush, from Charańa, 'going through' or 'performing' the expiatory rites enjoined by their master 4.

Yájnawalkya, who was perfect in ascetic practices, addressed himself strenuously to the sun, being anxious to recover possession of the texts of the Yajush. "Glory to the sun," he exclaimed, "the gate of liberation, the fountain of bright radiance, the triple source of splendour, as the Rig, the Yajur, and the Sáma Vedas. Glory to him, who, as fire and the moon, is one with the cause of the universe: to the sun, that is charged with radiant heat, and with the Sushumna ray (by which the moon is fed with light): to him who is one with the notion of time, and all its divisions of hours, minutes, and seconds: to him who is to be