Note 86 — Chapter I
Reading edition
The Gāyatrī is the most sacred mantra in honour of the sun, containing, as it does, the highest laudations of him.85 A Brahman ought to recite this mantra 324 times every day. Otherwise he incurs a sin as great as the slaughter of a cow.86 Accordingly a Rudrākshmālā, or a rosary of 108 Rudrāksh beads, is used in connecting the number of Gāyatrīs recited.87 It is exclusively the right of the twice-born to recite the Gāyatrī. None else is authorised to recite or even to hear a word of it. Neither females nor Shūdras ought to catch an echo of even a single syllable of the Gāyatrī mantra88.