GAYATRI, the holiest verse of the Vedas, not to be uttered to ears profane, but to be recited only mentally. It is a short prayer to the sun, identified with the supreme being, and occurs in the 10th hymn of the 4th section of the 3d ashtak of the Sanhitā of the Rigveda—Tat savi-
tur varenyam bhargo devasya dhiimahi dhiyo yo nah prachodayat, i.e. "We meditate on that excellent light of the divine sun; may he illuminate our minds."—Rigveda, iii. 4, 10. Such is the fear of profaning this text, that copyists of the Vedas often refrain from transcribing it both in the Sanhitā and the Bhāshya.—Wilson, Vishnu Purāna, p. 122, note 13. This hymn, ascribed to Vishwāmitra, is properly the only Gayatri; though, according to a system of the Tāntrikas, a number of mystical verses bear the same name. It is usually personified as a goddess, wife of Brahmā, and metaphorical mother of the first three castes.—Rosen's Rigvedæ Specimen, p. 13, London, 1830. [It appears to be the feminine of some obsolete word, gāyatra, derivable from gāt, "to sing."]