98 - Teachings of Yajnavalkya

Yajnavalkya said: 

1-2. I shall now expound the process of making gifts. Please listen, O noble sirs of excellent rites. Brahmins are superior to others and those who regularly observe rituals are still better. The person who has realised Brahman is superior to them. Know him to be the deserving person as he is endowed with penance. Cows, plots of land, gold, etc. should be given to deserving persons after duly honouring them. 

3. A gift should never be taken by a person devoid of learning and austerity. By taking it, he degrades the giver as well as himself. 

4. Every day, gifts should be given to deserving persons particularly on festive or special occasions; when request is made, a gift should be given with reverence and according to one's ability. 

5. A milch cow with its horns cased in gold, hoofs in silver, should be given along with clothes, a bell-metal vessel and sufficient money. 

6. Each horn is to be cased in a pala weight of gold; and each of the hoofs in seven pala weights of silver; the bell-metal vessel should be fifty palas in weight. The details of the calf are as mentioned before. 

7. The calf may be a bull or a cow-calf. It should be given with a gold or silver vessel. The calf should be that of the cow itself and free from sickness. 

8. The giver remains in heaven for as many years as there are hairs on the body of that cow. If the cow is tawny, it enables his seven generations to cross hell. 

9. A cow in the act of delivery with two feet and the face of the calf protruding from the vagina is on a par with Earth. 

10. A person who gives a cow free from sickness whether yielding milk or not, with or without the articles, should be honoured in heaven. 

11. The massaging of the feet of a weary wayfarer, nursing a sick person, worship of god, washing the feet of brahmins, and scrubbing the place where brahmins have taken food-all these are on a par with the gift of a cow. 

12. By giving a brahmin what he desires one attains heaven. By giving grounds, lamps, food, raiments and butter one attains prosperity. 

13. By giving house, -grains, umbrella, necklace, trees, carts, butter, cool water, bed, and unguents, one is honoured in heaven. 

14. The giver of the Vedas (in Manuscript) attains the region of Brahma not accessible even to the gods. Those who transcribe the Vedas with meanings, yajna shastras, Dharma Shastras, on payment, also, attain the region of Brahmi. 

15. Since God has created the universe with Vedas as the basis, collection of Vedic texts with bhashyas (commentories) should be done with effort. 

16. He who transcribes Itihasas¹ (Epics) or Puranas or makes a gift of them.

1. The term is especially applied to the Mahabharata. CDHM, p. 128.

17. Attains merit equal to that of gifting Vedic text or even twice the fruit. 

18. A twice-born shall never listen to materialistic discourses, false arguments, speeches in prakrit² or foreign³ tongues, since these degrade him.

2. Prakrutas generally meant the regional dialects.

3. The reference is perhaps to the foreign languages.

19. A deserving person who desists from accepting gifts attains the world of the giver of gifts. An offering of Kusha grass, water, vegetables, milk and fragrant unguents shall never be refused. 

20. For the propitiation of gods or guests or the manes whatever one gets without solicitation should be accepted even from a man of evil deeds except a prostitute, an impotent person, a fallen man or an enemy.