A glorification of the sacrificial gharma or milk caldron

Hymns of the Atharva Veda, by Ralph T.H. Griffith, [1895], at sacred-texts.com

p. a116

HYMN XI

A glorification of the sacrificial gharma or milk caldron

1The Bull supports the wide-spread earth and heaven, the Bull
   supports the spacious air between them.
  The Bull supports the sky's six spacious regions: the universal
   world hath he pervaded.
2The Bull is Indra o'er the beasts he watches. He, Sakra
   measures out three several pathways.
  He, milking out the worlds, the past, the future, discharges all
   the Gods' eternal duties.
3Being produced among mankind as Indra, the Caldron works
   heated and brightly glowing.
  Let him not, with good sons, pass off in vapour who hath not
   eaten of the Ox with knowledge.
4The Ox pours milk out in the world of virtue: in earliest time,
   he, Pavam5na, swells it.
  Parjanya is the stream, Maruts his udder, sacrifice is the milk,
   the meed his milking.
5That which not sacrifice nor sacrificer, not giver nor receiver
   rules and governs,
  All-winning, all-supporting, all-effecting,—which of all quadru-
   peds, tell us! is the Caldron?
6May we, fame-seekers, reach the world of virtue by service of
   the Gharma and through fervour,
  Whereby the Gods went up to heaven, the centre of life eternal,
   having left the body.
7Prajāpati, supreme and sovran ruler, Indra by form and by his
   shoulder Agni,
  Came to Visvānara, came to all men's Bullock: he firmly forti-
   fied and held securely. p. a117
8The middle of the Bullock's neck, there where the shoulder-bar
   is placed,
  Extends as far to east of him as that is settled to the west.
9He whosoever knows the seven exhaustless pourings of the Ox,
  Wins himself offspring and the world: the great Seven Rishis
   know this well.
10With feet subduing weariness, with legs extracting freshening
   draughts,
  Through toil the plougher and the Ox approach the honeyed
   beverage.
11Assigned are these twelve nights, they say, as holy to Prajāpati:
  Whoever knows their proper prayer performs the service of the
  Ox.
12At evening he is milked, is milked at early morn, is milked at
   noon.
  We know that streams of milk that flow from him are in-
   exhaustible.