सः अकामयत मेध्यम् मे इदम् स्यात् आत्मन्वी अनेन स्याम् इति ततः अश्वः समभवत् यद् अश्वत् तत् मेध्यम् अभूत् इति तद् एव अश्वमेधस्य अश्वमेधत्वम् एषः ह वा अश्वमेधम् वेद यः एनम् एवम् वेद तम् अनवरुध्य एव अमन्यत तम् संवत्सरस्य परस्तात् आत्मनः आलभत पशून् देवताभ्यः प्रत्यौहत् तस्मात् सर्वदेवत्यम् प्रोक्षितम् प्राजापत्यम् आलभन्ते एषः वा अश्वमेधः यः एषः तपति तस्य संवत्सरः आत्मा अयम् अग्निः अर्कः तस्य इमे लोकाः आत्मानः ताव् एतौ अर्काश्वमेधौ सः पुनः एका एव देवता भवति मृत्युः एव अप पुनर्मृत्युम् जयति न एनम् मृत्युः आप्नोति मृत्युः अस्य आत्मा भवति सर्वम् आयुः एति एतासाम् देवतानाम् एकः भवति
saḥ akāmayata medhyam me idam syāt ātmanvī anena syām iti tataḥ aśvaḥ samabhavat yad aśvat tat medhyam abhūt iti tad eva aśvamedhasya aśvamedhatvam eṣaḥ ha vā aśvamedham veda yaḥ enam evam veda tam anavarudhya eva amanyata tam saṃvatsarasya parastāt ātmanaḥ ālabhata paśūn devatābhyaḥ pratyauhat tasmāt sarvadevatyam prokṣitam prājāpatyam ālabhante eṣaḥ vā aśvamedhaḥ yaḥ eṣaḥ tapati tasya saṃvatsaraḥ ātmā ayam agniḥ arkaḥ tasya ime lokāḥ ātmānaḥ tāv etau arkāśvamedhau saḥ punaḥ ekā eva devatā bhavati mṛtyuḥ eva apa punarmṛtyum jayati na enam mṛtyuḥ āpnoti mṛtyuḥ asya ātmā bhavati sarvam āyuḥ eti etāsām devatānām ekaḥ bhavati
He desired: "Let this become fit for sacrifice (medhya), let me obtain a body through it!" — and there arose the horse (aśva): what had swelled (aśvat) became fit for sacrifice. This is the nature of the aśvamedha. He truly knows the aśvamedha who knows it thus… He offers the horse in sacrifice to himself and makes over the other animals to the deities… The aśvamedha is that [sun] which gives heat; the year is its body. This fire is the arka; the worlds are its bodies. These two are the arka and the aśvamedha, and yet they are one deity — Death itself. [He who knows this] wards off repeated death: death does not overtake him, death becomes his own self, and he becomes one of these deities.
1a932e34463a · published Jul 27, 2026, 12:37:41 AM UTC
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The denouement of the cosmogony: out of the swollen (aśvat) body of the dead creator comes the horse (aśva), and in that etymology lies the whole secret of the aśvamedha: the sacrificial horse is the body of Death itself, offered by Death to Death. Sacrificer, horse and receiver are one person; the great rite proves to be the self-sacrifice of the First Principle, played out anew at every royal aśvamedha.
The arka (fire) and the aśvamedha (sun-and-year) are two faces of one deity: the heat of the altar below and the heat of the heavens above. And the reward of the knower is stated in the words for whose sake the whole section was written: apa punar-mṛtyuṁ jayati — "he wards off repeated death". Punar-mṛtyu, death after death, a dying in every new body, is the real horror of saṁsāra, and the Bṛhadāraṇyaka is the first book to set it at the centre. To die once is not terrible; to die without end is.
How is this overcome? "Death becomes his own self" — the knower does not run from death but comes to know it from within as a form of the One, and ceases to be its prey by becoming its possessor. For bhakti this knot will be untied more brightly still: with the Lord, death is a servant — "I am both immortality and death" (BG 9.19); one who has surrendered to him passes through the maw as a master passes through his own gate.