Sacred Texts  Hinduism 

The Texts of the White Yajurveda

translated by Ralph T.H. Griffith

[1899]


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By rule the Sacred Grass is scattered eastward, a robe to clothe the earth when dawns are breaking.
Widely it spreads around and far extended, fair for the Gods and bringing peace and freedom.
Let the expansive Doors be widely opened, like wives who deck their beauty for their husbands.
Lofty, celestial, all-impelling Portals, admit the Gods and give them easy access.
     --29:29-30.

The Yajur Veda is one of the four Vedas. It contains liturgical texts used during various important Hindu rituals. There are two major samhitas, or collections, the Black and White. The White Yajurveda, translated here, focuses on the liturgy, whereas the Black Yajurveda includes more explanatory material about the rituals.

This is the last of the Griffith Veda translations to be digitized. We worked from a somewhat problematic 1976 photographic reprint of the first edition, printed in Victorian India. As with the other volumes, footnotes and indexes are omitted for technical reasons. Long vowels are indicated, but not 'dotted' consonants; this is because Unicode was not available when we started this project. We hope to revisit all of the Griffith texts before too long.


Title Page
Contents
Preface
Book I
Book II
Book III
Book IV
Book V
Book VI
Book VII
Book VIII
Book IX
Book X
Book XI
Book XII
Book XIII
Book XIV
Book XV
Book XVI
Book XVII
Book XVIII
Book XIX
Book XX
Book XXI
Book XXII
Book XXIII
Book XXIV
Book XXV
Book XXVI
Book XXVII
Book XXVIII
Book XXIX
Book XXX
Book XXXI
Book XXXII
Book XXXIII
Book XXXIV
Book XXXV
Book XXXVI
Book XXXVII
Book XXXVIII
Book XXXIX
Book XL
Index of Hymns and Verses Taken from the Rigveda and the Atharva-veda
Corrigenda