योषा वा आग्निर्गौतम; तस्या उपस्थ एव समित्, लोमानि धूमः, योनिरर्चिः, यदन्तः करोति तेऽङ्गाराः, अभिनन्दा विस्फुलिङ्गाः; तस्मिन्नेतस्मिन्नग्नौ देवा रेतो जुह्वति; तस्या आहुत्यै पुरुषः संभवति; स जीवति यावज्जीवति, अथ यदा म्रियते ॥ १३ ॥
yoṣā vā āgnirgautama; tasyā upastha eva samit, lomāni dhūmaḥ, yonirarciḥ, yadantaḥ karoti te’ṅgārāḥ, abhinandā visphuliṅgāḥ; tasminnetasminnagnau devā reto juhvati; tasyā āhutyai puruṣaḥ saṃbhavati; sa jīvati yāvajjīvati, atha yadā mriyate || 13 ||
13. Woman, O Gautama, is fire. In this fire the gods offer the seed. Out of that offering a man is born. He lives as long as he is destined to live. Then, when he dies—
Woman, O Gautama, is fire, the fifth one to serve as the receptacle of the sacrifice. In that fire the gods offer the seed. Out of that offering a man is born. Thus water (liquids), designated as ‘faith,’ being successively offered in the fires of heaven, rain-god, this world, man and woman, in the increasingly grosser forms of faith, moon, rain, food and seed respectively, produce what we call man. The fourth question, ‘Do you know after how many oblations are offered water rises up possessed of a human voice and speaks?’ (par. 2), has been thus answered, viz. that when the fifth oblation is offered in the fire of woman, water, transformed into the seed, becomes possessed of a human voice. He, that man, born in this order, lives. How long? As long as he is destined to live, i.e. as long as the resultant of his past work, which makes him stay in this body, lasts. Then, on the exhaustion of that, when he dies—