Sarvasvara

Sacrificial rite found in the Vedas, the
oldest and most authoritative Hindu
religious texts. The most notable feature
of the sarvasvara is that it involved the
suicide of the sacrificer, who concluded
the rite by entering the sacrificial fire.
The sarvasvara is an extreme example
of the class of ritual actions known as
kamya karma, which consists of
action performed solely because of the
performer’s desire (kama) to obtain certain benefits. This element of desire
makes kamya karma different from the
other two classes of ritual action, nitya
karma and naimittika karma, which
were each in some way obligatory. The
sarvasvara could be undertaken to obtain
any outcome, such as birth in heaven as
a god, or rebirth in a royal family. The sacrificer declares the benefit in the part of
the rite called the samkalpa. Although
the sarvasvara had extreme elements, it
was completely voluntary.