Gomūtra
Gomūtra · go-mūtra, “cow’s urine”
Grammar: neuter noun; go (cow) and mūtra (urine).
Meaning: cow’s urine, taken for purity and used in medicine.
In the scriptures: The Mṛta-sañjīvinī that Rudra taught, against snake poison, is ground fine in cow’s urine and given to the bitten one (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Brahma Parva, Chapter 35).
In the Lalitā Tṛtīyā, gomūtra is the prāśana of the fourth month (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 21). In the Rambhā Tṛtīyā it is taken at night on the tṛtīyā of Pausha, with the fruit of the Vājapeya and Atirātra yajñas (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 24). In the Saubhāgyaśayana it is the prāśana of the ninth month from Caitra (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 25). In the Ananta-tṛtīyā it goes into the tilaka with gorocana, gomaya, curd and sandal, and it stands first in the list of monthly offerings that begins in Bhādrapada (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 26). In the monthly Kṛshṇāshṭamī, in Mārgaśīrsha, Śaṅkara is worshipped, the vratī drinks gomūtra and sleeps on the ground, and gains the fruit of the Atirātra yajña (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 57).
Śrī Kṛshṇa tells Yudhishṭhira that by the urine and dung of cows even the abodes of the devatās are made pure (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 159). Bhagavān Varāha tells Dharaṇī Devī that one keeping a pure vrata should bathe with the urine of a kapilā cow, and is as one who has bathed in all the tīrthas, Gaṅgā and the rest. By bathing once with devotion in the gomūtra of a kapilā, a person’s pāpas of a whole lifetime are destroyed. The milk, curd, ghee, gomūtra and gomaya of the cow are not to be made impure (Bhavishya Purāṇa, Uttara Parva, Chapter 161).
Related terms: Gomaya · Pañcagavya · Kapilā · Prāśana
Sources
- Bhavishya Purāṇa, Brahma Parva, Chapter 35; Uttara Parva, Chapters 21, 24–26, 57, 159, 161