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The Sama-veda also contains a detailed account of the soma rites. It indicates the ‘tunes’ to which the sacred hymns are to be sung, by showing the prolongation, the repetition and interpolation of syllables required in the singing. The samhita of this Veda served as a textbook for the priests who officiated at the Soma sacrifices. The Sama-veda embodies the knowledge of melodies and chants. The stanzas are arranged in two books or collections of verses. Its samhita or principal part is wholly metrical, consisting of 1549 verses, of which only 75 are not traceable to the Rig-veda. Besides it, it says that Yajurveda was later on named as “Taitareya Samhita”. It further says that there are many branches of Yajurveda but two branches, namely, Krishna and Shukla Yajurveda have gained relatively more prominence, i.e., Krishna Yajurveda and Shukla Yajurveda. The essence of the Yajurveda lies in those mantras (incantations) that inspire people to initiate action. In the book titled Sacred Scriptures of India it says that Yajurveda inspires humans to walk on the path of Karma and that is why it is also referred to as Karma-Veda. It has a much more methodical arrangement and brings order and light, as opposed to the confusion and darkness of the Black Yajur-veda. The Vajasaneyi Samhita, or the White Yajur-veda, was communicated to the sage Yajasaneti Samhita by the Sun God in his equine form. In this samhita the distinction between the Mantra and the Brahmana portions is not as clear as in the other Vedas. It has been described as an ‘undigested jumble of different pieces’, and as having ‘a motley character’. The Taittiriya Samhita, commonly called the Black Yajur-veda for its obscurity of meaning, was known in the third century BC, and is the older of the two. Both the samhitas contain almost the same subject matter but differently arranged. The Yajur-veda now consists of two samhitas, which once existed in one hundred and one recensions. The priest especially associated with the Yajur-vedic ceremonial was the adhvaryu. Its under-lying principles were so ridden with superstition and belief in the power of the priests to do and undo the cosmic order itself that critics have likened their formulas to the ravings of mental delirium. Religion becomes a mechanical ritual in which crowds of priests conduct vast and complicated ceremonies whose effects are believed to be felt in the farthermost heavens. In the Yajur-veda the sacrifice becomes so important that even the gods are compelled to do the will of the brahimns. Much of the sakha literature grew up out of variants of the Yajur-vedic texts. Strict observance of the ceremonial in every detail was insisted upon, and deviations led to the formation of new schools, there being over one hundred Yajur-vedic schools at the time of Patanjali (200 BC). It embodies the sacrificial formulas in their entirety, prescribes rules for the construction of altars, for the new and full-moon sacrifices, the rajasuya, the asvamedha, and the soma sacrifices.
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It is a priestly handbook, arranged in liturgical form for the performance of sacrifices (yaja), as its name implies. The Yajur-veda represents a transition between the spontaneous, free-worshipping period of the Rig-veda and the later brahmanical period when ritualism had become firmly established. It is not so much the Indus and its tributaries any more, but the areas of the Satlej, Jamna and Ganges rivers. The Yajur-veda, like the Sama-veda samhita (collection), introduces a geographical milieu different from that of the Rig-veda. It also has prose passages of a later date. Yajurveda (700-300 BC) has been dealt with in a treatise called Hindu World where it is described as the second Veda, compiled mainly from Rig-vedic hymns, but showing considerable deviation from the original Rig-vedic text.