Famous Sayings
A number of famous sayings originate from the verses of Dirghatamas.
Another one bites the dust The first time the phrase “bites the dust” appears is in the Rgveda (1.158.4-5) where the poet Dirgatama has a prayer to the divine doctors and says ‘may the turning of the days not tire me, may the fires not burn me, may the wood-pyre not eat the earth, may the waters not swallow me’. There are disputes on what “bites the dirt” means in sayana’s commentary in the 14th century- which means the phrase had gone out of style in India at this time as most people began to be cremated instead of buried. But reading the padbandha, it's very clear that it refers to the wood-pyre eating earth, not the deceased human.
mā mām edho daśatayaś cito dhāk pra yad vām baddhas tmani khādati kśāṃ
Note the use of 3rd person singular verb ending -ti for khād (to eat). Dirghatama is using it as a prayer from death - such as don’t let me die and be burned. If it were a prayer saying "let me not eat the earth", the 1st person singular, -mi or -āni ("Verb conjugation in Vedic Sanskrit". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedic_Sanskrit_grammar#Verbs.) would have been used. Here, eating of earth effect is produced by charring of earth by burnt wood-pyre.
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