Aitareya-Aranyaka: Third Aranyaka, Second Adhyâya, Third Khanda

1. Badhval says, there are four persons (to be meditated on and worshipped).

2. The person of the body, the person of the metres, the person of the Veda, and the Great person.

What we call the person of the body is this corporeal self. Its essence is the incorporeal conscious self.

4. What we call the person of the metres is this collection of letters (the Veda). Its essence is the vowel a.

5. What we call the person of the Veda is (the mind) by which we know the Vedas, the Rig-veda, Yagur-veda, and Sama-veda. Its essence is Brahman (m.)

6. Therefore let one chose a Brahman-priest who is full of Brahman (the Veda), and is able to see any flaw in the sacrifice.

7. What we call the Great person is the year, which causes some beings to fall together, and causes others to grow up. Its essence is yonder sun.

8. One should know that the incorporeal conscious self and yonder sun are both one and the same. Therefore the sun appears to every man singly (and differently).

9. This has also been declared by a Rishi (Rv. I, 115, 1):—

10. “The bright face of the gods arose, the eye of Mitra, Varuna, and Agni; it filled heaven and earth and the sky—the sun is the self of all that rests and moves.”

11. “This I think to be the regular Samhita as conceived by me,” thus said Badhva.

12. For the Bahvrikas consider him (the self) in the great hymn (mahad uktha), the Adhvaryus in the sacrificial fire, the Khandogas in the Mahâvrata ceremony. Him they see in this earth, in heaven, in the air, in the ether, in the water, in herbs, in trees, in the moon, in the stars, in all beings. Him alone they call Brahman.

13. That self which consists of sight, hearing, metre, mind, and speech is like unto the year.

14. He who recites to another that self which consists of sight, hearing, metre, mind, and speech, and is like unto the year,