అశ్వమేధ యాగం: కూర్పుల మధ్య తేడాలు

[[All World Gayatri Pariwar]] since 1991 has organized performances of a "modern version" of the Ashvamedha where a statue is used in place of a real horse, according to Hinduism Today with a million participants in [[Chitrakoot]], [[Madhya Pradesh]] on April 16 to 20, 1994.<ref>[http://www.hinduismtoday.com/archives/1994/6/1994-6-04.shtml Hinduism Today, June 1994]</ref> Such modern performances are [[sattvika]] [[Yajna]]s where the animal is worshipped without killing it,<ref>[http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/13/stories/2005101316990400.htm Ashwamedha Yagam in city],'''The Hindu'''</ref>, the religious motivation being prayer for overcoming enemies, the facilitation of child welfare and development, and clearance of debt,<ref>[http://www.ashwamedhayaagam.org/whyamy.html Ashwamedhayagnam.org]</ref> entirely within the allegorical interpretation of the ritual, and with no actual sacrifice of any animal, nor any sexual connotations.

 

 

The mock [[bestiality]] and [[necrophilia]] involved in the ritual caused considerable consternation among the scholars first editing the [[Yajurveda]]. [[Ralph T.H. Griffith|Griffith]] (1899) omits verses VSM 23.20&ndash;31 (the ritual obscenities), protesting that they are "not reproducible even in the semi-obscurity of a learned European language" (alluding to other instances where he renders explicit scenes in Latin rather than English). A. B. Keith's 1914 translation<ref>Keith, Arthur Berridale (trans), ''The Veda of the black Yajus school entitled Taittiriya sanhita'', Oxford, 1914, pp. 615-16</ref> also omits verses.