Camakam, anuvāka 1 — the body, asked for piece by piece
The popular claimThe Camakam's first request is not wealth. It is speech, mind, eye, ear, strength, life — and bones.
After the Namakam has bowed to Rudra three hundred times, the Camakam asks. Ca me — and for me — is the refrain; every item in the eleven anuvākas is followed by it. The first anuvāka asks for the body and its faculties, in an order that runs from the outside in and then out again.
Food and effort
Vājaś ca me prasavaś ca me. — Food, and the impulse. Vāja — strength-giving food, and the vigour it gives; prasava — Sāyaṇa: the urging, the permission to begin; the god's sanction that sets an act in motion.
Prayatiś ca me prasitiś ca me. — Effort, and its extension. Prayati — the exertion; prasiti — Sāyaṇa: the reach of the effort, how far it goes.
Dhītiś ca me kratuś ca me. — Thought, and will. Dhīti — the meditative thought; kratu — the resolve, the intention behind a rite. The Camakam asks for the capacity to intend before it asks for anything intended.
The faculties
Vācaś ca me manaś ca me cakṣuś ca me śrotraṁ ca me. — Speech, mind, eye, ear. The four faculties in the order the Upaniṣads will use for them.
Dakṣaś ca me balaṁ ca ma ojaś ca me sahaś ca me. — Skill, strength, vigour, force. Dakṣa — dexterity, the ability to do; bala — strength; ojas — the vital energy, the word Āyurveda later takes for the body's essence; sahas — the power to overcome, to endure.
Life and body
Āyuś ca me jarā ca ma ātmā ca me tanūś ca me. — Life, old age, self, body. Jarā — old age — is asked for; a long life includes it, and the text does not pretend otherwise. Ātmā here is the self in the plain sense, the person; tanū the body.
Śarma ca me varma ca me. — Shelter, and armour. Śarma — the protection of a roof; varma — the protection of mail.
Aṅgāni ca me'sthāni ca me parūṁṣi ca me śarīrāṇi ca me. — Limbs, bones, joints, bodies. The anuvāka ends inside the body: the limbs, the bones under them, the joints between them, and śarīrāṇi in the plural — the bodies, which Sāyaṇa reads as the several sheaths and a plainer reading takes as the whole frame, in every part.
What the first anuvāka asks
Nothing outside the person. Food, yes — but as vāja, the strength food gives. Then intention, faculties, capacities, life, age, self, body, and the body's parts down to the joints. The Vedic petition begins by asking to be a whole person, and only in the second anuvāka does it ask for rank, and only in the fourth for grain.
The form
Ca me after every noun; the noun in the nominative. It is not "give me"; there is no verb. The commentators supply kalpatām — "may it be fit for me, may it be arranged for me" — from the fifth anuvāka, where it appears. The petition is a list of what one hopes will be in order, set before the fire.
The chant
In the Ekādaśinī, the Camakam's first anuvāka is chanted after the first full Namakam, the second after the second, and so on — eleven Namakams, one Camakam anuvāka each. In a single Rudram, the whole Camakam follows the whole Namakam. Chanters take the ca me on a fixed pitch and the nouns on their accents; the sound is a walk.
What this page does not say
It does not claim that asking for ojas produces it, and it does not turn the list into a doctrine of the person — it is a list, in an order, and the order is what this page reports. It opens the thirty-six items so that a listener who knows vājaś ca me prasavaś ca me as the Camakam's beginning knows what was asked for first.
Source — Taittiriya Samhita 4.7.1 (Camakam, first anuvaka), Krishna Yajurveda; Sayana's bhashya on the Taittiriya; Bhattabhaskara's commentary on the Camakam
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