ABSTRACT
The Śrauta, ritual rules of Āpastambha, correspond closely to the sūtras of the Mīmāṃsā. Other Śrauta manuals generally presuppose principles of interpretations evolved in Jaimini’s systematic treatment mantras and their precise recitations used in sacrifices, krama, that is, order of sacrificial procedure, and so on. Ontologically, it is the dravya (offering material) and devatā that constitute the yāga (sacrifice), and mantra is the conduit, in as much as mantra (from mana, to think) brings forth the deity as it were residing in the sūtric-threads of the mantras (say, Agni) to the mind upon recital and in the proper affectation of the yajñas as prescribed in the Brāhmanas and Śrauta manuals. And by its own inner propulsion, without an external agency intervening, a hitherto unprecedented result is achieved: although in deferral traces in some possible world, namely, apūrva, which remains adṛṣṭa (unseen) potential for future results and actions too. That is what there is essentially to the otherwise supposed “light-entity” (devatā) in the homa-kuṇḍa of the erstwhile Mīmāṃsakas – the original Vedic hermeneuticists. This is what is at the heart of the trope devatā: an effervescently efficacious symbol that has no substantive signified beyond its moment of iteration in the iniquitous mantra. What is substantive is the action, the act of sacrifice, the very originary or primal sacrificial act that gave emergence to the universe and sustains its ontic-ecology and order. Is this tantamount to “prayer” or “worship”? There might be a category mistake in thinking so, but we shall explore this trajectory as well, for in later and more contemporary times there is no gainsaying that there cannot be prayer or worship without devas, devatā-s, and mantra: however, the converse might just not be the case; which is to say that there is radical asymmetry here and we have remained honest to this bit of scholasticism or forsooth its legacy. Hence, divinity, the gods, the idea of authorship, human beings and their craving, the external world are simply qualia (qualities, properties, attributes, or guṇa) that are judged against another benchmark that has as its signified the sacrificial whole and dharma, the sum of all right rituals, ritual relations, and ordering of the universe as well as all right actions and practices.
