Ahura Mazda answered:—
"It can, O holy Zarathustra! If it has been prepared for the sacrifice, there is to it no corruption, no death, no touch of any Nasu. If it has not been prepared for the sacrifice, the stem is defiled the length of four fingers: it shall be laid down on the ground, in the middle of the house, for a year long. When the year is past, the faithful may drink of its juice at their pleasure, as before."
O Maker of the material world, thou Holy One! Whither shall we bring, where shall we lay the bodies of the dead, O Ahura Mazda?
Ahura Mazda answered:—
"On the highest summits, where they know there are always corpse-eating dogs and corpse-eating birds, O holy Zarathustra! There shall the worshippers of Mazda fasten the corpse, by the feet and by the hair, with brass, stones, or clay, lest the corpse-eating dogs and the corpse-eating birds shall go and carry the bones to the water and to the trees."
If they shall not fasten the corpse, so that the corpse-eating dogs and the corpse-eating birds may go and carry the bones to the water and to the trees, what is the penalty that they shall pay?
Ahura Mazda answered:—
"They shall be Peshôtanus: two hundred stripes with the Aspahê-astra, two hundred stripes with the Sraoshô-karana."
O Maker of the material world, thou Holy One! Whither shall we bring, where shall we lay the bones of the dead, O Ahura Mazda?
Ahura Mazda answered:—