Question : bind permissions problem

I am trying to get bind 9 working on a Centos 5 machine.
When I try to start named, it fails with no error message.
I look at /var/log/messages and there is an error that says:

could not configure root hints from 'named.root': permission denied

The directory option in /etc/named.conf is set to /var/named
The file /var/named/named.root has permissions 777 and is owned by root:named

Where else should I look for this permissions issue?

Thanks in advance.

Answer : bind permissions problem

Sounds like you are trying to start the process as the root user.

Try this command:
named -u named

This will start named as the named user and you should not get the permissions problem