Vedic priesthood

Priests of the Vedic religion Priests of the Vedic religion are officiants of the yajna service. Yajna is an important part of Hinduism, especially the Vedas. Persons trained for the ritual and proficient in its practice were called r̥tvij (ऋत्विज् 'regularly-sacrificing').[citation needed] As members of a social class, they were generically known as vipra 'sage' or kavi 'seer'. Specialization of roles attended the elaboration and development of the ritual corpus over time. Eventually a full complement of sixteen ṛtvijas became the custom for major ceremonies. The sixteen consisted of four chief priests and their assistants.[citation needed] Chief priests The older references uniformly indicate hotṛ as the presiding priest, with perhaps only the adhvaryu as his assistant in the earliest times. The phrase "seven hotars" is found more than once in the Rigveda. Rigveda 2.1.2 states it as follows, The above verse enumerates the priests as the hōtr̥, pōtr̥, nēṣṭr̥, agnīdʰ, praśāstr̥ and adʰvaryu. Rigveda 10.71.11 describes the specialized tasks of the four types of 'companions' in a sacrifice: Vedic (Shrauta) yajnas are typically performed by four prie