On other occasions, however, Yājñavalkya would use the most obscure and unfamiliar words as if they were perfectly common. And some would immediately be convinced of the poverty of their learning, since it didn’t include the meaning of these words. Nothing dumbfounded his listeners so much as the formula they heard him come out with one day, speaking in a whisper, as if trying to hide what he was saying. The subtle Śākalya had been asking him how many gods there were. Patiently — and this in itself was surprising — Yājñavalkya had brought the number down from three thousand, three hundred and six to one. But Śākalya still pressed him. So Yājñavalkya said: “There is a divinity that lies beyond all questioning.” Then in a fierce hiss he added that one day pillagers would steal Śākalya’s bones by mistake and scatter them in contempt. Which came to pass. But it wasn’t this that so impressed itself on the minds of those present so much as the words “There is a divinity that lies beyond all questioning.” They had never heard anything like this before. What were the gods, if not the object of their questioning? Now it seemed that something gave way, went deeper. But how much deeper? Though nobody could claim to understand them, the words passed from mouth to mouth, like a proverb.
Yājñavalkya was also famous for certain irreverent remarks about women. About certain women in particular, but also about women in general. Yet none of Yājñavalkya’s disputes was so intense, almost unbearably so, as the one he had with a woman, the proud Gārgi. Never had he answered another brahman with such ferocity. Those listening felt they were being annihilated. Every scrap of air had been appropriated by those two overwhelmingly sovereign beings. They battled together — and perhaps something else was going on between them too, something no one could follow, at once evident and ciphered. Somebody recalled, on that occasion, another of Yājñavalkya’s engmatic remarks, about man being composed of himself and a void. “Hence that void is filled by woman,” he had said. Now it seemed — and it was almost a hallucination — that Gārgī’s shape was superimposed over that void, and that she was making herself at home there, taking on the outline defined by its boundaries, as the dispute went on, sharp and cutting.
Yājñavalkya had two wives, Maitreyī and Kātyāyanī. No one had ever seen them quarrel. And this alone would have been enough to unsettle people, since it ran contrary to everybody’s experience. They rarely appeared in public together. And when they did so, they treated each other with affectionate circumspection. Kātyāyanī had a soft, inexhaustible beauty. Even in lands far-flung, people would say that no beauty could rival Kātyāyanī’s. Few could claim to have heard the sound of her laughter, but they said it was a wonder, like the sudden flowering of the udumbara. Maitreyī on the other hand was often present at the brahmans’ disputes. Indeed, the brahmans were afraid of her, knowing that she was capable of spotting where their doctrine was weak. And they envied her, because they also knew that Yājñavalkya spoke to her about brahman. Nothing worked so fiercely on their imaginations as the thought of those conversations, of which they would never know so much as a syllable.
Yājñavalkya had no children. He traveled from place to place with his two wives and a considerable retinue, like a tribe. There were those who waited years for him to visit. Generally they would prepare a list of questions. One day Yājñvalkya said the same words, at two different moments, to his two wives: “I shall shortly be leaving this stage of life. Make haste, I want to settle your affairs first.” Maitreyī and Kātyāyanī immediately understood what these words meant: they were never to see him again, he was going into the forest. Kātyāyanī said nothing and stroked his hand. Maitreyī asked a question she had asked him many times before, as if this were a day like any other: — Master, if I possessed the earth and all its riches, would that make me immortal?” Yājñavalkya smiled, in memory of their talks together. He gave an answer Maitreyī already knew: “You would simply lead the life of the rich.” As though following a liturgy, Maitreyī replied: “What can something matter to me, if it does not give me immortality? Yājñavalkya looked at her, holding her hands on his shoulders. “You are dear to me and say things that are dear to me. Now sit down and I shall teach you. But you must give me all your attention.” After a moment, he said: “The bride does not desire her husband because he is dear to her, but for love of self.” This was a new formula. How was it to be understood? Everything turned on one word: “self,” ātman. Was “for love of self” to be taken as meaning “for love of one’s own person”—something with a name — or as “for love of Self,” of the ātman, for love of something that stands above the ego and absorbs it into itself? Was it another of those fearfully harsh and true observations Yājñavalkya would use to crush the claims of the sentiments — and above all the noble sentiments? Or was it the last word on things as they are? Maitreyi was of two minds, she hesitated. Yājnāavalkya watched her with a sweetness no one was to witness. He went on talking about the ātman, he told her secrets he had never told before. But already he knew that Maitreyī could no longer hear him, for a veil of tears was falling on her heart. Pulling herself together, Maitreyī caught only the last two things Yājñavalkya said by way of farewelclass="underline" “How to know the one who knows?… That is the secret of immortality.” Maitreyi caught the cadence of the words but not their import. More than immortality, what mattered to her was that voice, which she would never hear again.
Kaśyapa said: “You are continually finding the word ‘sacrifice’ in the texts and you ask yourselves: why this word, this obscure act, and why so soon? Why does it come before all others? Why doesn’t it appear, if appear it must, after the completion of the more basic actions? To know the answer, you must first remember. See the beginning. ‘With the eye that is mind, in thought I see those who were the first to offer this sacrifice.’ So say the texts. Who were the first to offer the sacrifice? What was there to see?
“The sky was empty. On the earth but two groups of beings, gods and ṛṣis—those gods and those ṛṣis who were called Ádityas and Aṇ Watching the sky, they wandered around the earth, and desired. They desired the sky. Each group knew the other harbored the same desire. They watched each other from a distance. Each wanted to make their move before the other. Canny and deceitful, the gods managed to sacrifice first. No sooner had they conquered the sky than they asked themselves: ‘How may this celestial region be made unattainable by men?” Immediately a thought came to them: ‘Wipe out the trail.’ They sucked the essence from the sacrifice until it was quite dry. Then they decided to hide the essence, the way bees hide honey. Down below, on earth, they could still see the sacrificial clearing: ashes, sticks, heaps of stones, grass, logs. It looked like an abandoned bonfire. But you could sense that something had happened there. So the gods took the sacrificial pole, the yūpa to which the victim was tied, and used it like a broom to smooth over the earth, cover up and confuse. That’s why the pole is called yūpa, because the gods used it to wipe something out, ayopayan. Soon enough the Aṅgiras turned up. They suspected a trick, because the gods had slid off. They looked around, in that speechless clearing. They sang and kindled their inner fires. They said: ‘There must be some telltale sign, something must be peeping out in this clearing.’ All they could hear was a rustle of ferns. The Añgiras prowled around, cautiously, silently, taking care where they put their feet. A turtle popped up out of the grass. The Añgiras exchanged glances. ‘It must be this, then, the sacrifice…,’ they said. ‘Let’s stop it.’ As it turned out, the turtle was indeed the sacrificial cake. They surrounded it. They invoked the names of many gods, to stop it. The turtle paid no attention and went right on walking. They pronounced the name of Agni. At that the turtle stopped. It drew in its legs. They picked it up, heaped together some wood, lit the fire. They wrapped the turtle in Agni. It was their offering to the gods. Thus the Añgiras too conquered the sky. From that day on they have plied back and forth between earth and sky.