Kāṇḍa 1 · Chapter Overview
From The Krishna Yajurveda — The Taittirīya Saṃhitā, taught by Acharya T Krishnatrey. This lesson is free to read.
<pre data-block="statement"> The first kāṇḍa opens the whole Yajurveda and sets out the regular rites: the New- and Full-Moon offerings (darśapūrṇamāsa), the purchase and pressing of Soma, the four-monthly seasonal rites (cāturmāsya), and the preliminaries of the royal consecration (rājasūya). Its mantras cluster in two places. Prapāṭhaka 1 gives the ritual's beginnings — the very first words of the Veda (iṣe tvā, 1.1.1), the blessing of the cows, the strewing of the sacred grass, and the great formula of Savitṛ's impulsion that prefaces every Vedic act. Prapāṭhaka 8 gives the seasonal rites and the Rudra material — the sweeping confession of sin (1.8.3), the calling-back of the mind (1.8.5), the astonishing declaration that Rudra is one alone (1.8.6), and the Tryambaka mantra (1.8.6) that the world knows as the Mahā-mṛtyuñjaya. Eleven of its mantras follow. They move from food and cattle to the sun, from the altar to the boundaries of death itself. </pre>