Hymn to Brahmaṇaspati
Rigveda I.40 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) addressed to Brahmaṇaspati, the lord of sacred speech and prayer, invoked here alongside Indra, the Maruts, and the wider circle of gods to come forward and lead the sacrifice. It is one of the 1,028 hymns of the Rigveda organized within Maṇḍala 1, the first of ten books. The ṛṣi (seer) to whom this hymn is attributed and its precise liturgical context are recorded in the traditional Śākalya Anukramaṇī.
The Rigveda is the oldest of the four Vedas and one of the oldest surviving religious texts in the world, composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE in the Vedic Sanskrit of the Indus-Sarasvatī region. Its hymns were preserved through oral transmission across millennia before being committed to writing. This is a Good Works Translation produced for the Good Works Library from the Sanskrit of the Śākala recension.
1. Arise, Brahmaṇaspati! We who long for the gods call upon you. Let the generous Maruts come forward; Indra, be swift, be with us.
2. You, son of strength, the mortal calls upon when a prize is at stake. O Maruts, let the one who longs for you gain good heroism and good horses.
3. Let Brahmaṇaspati come forward; let the goddess Sūnṛtā, bounteous speech, come forward. Let the gods lead our sacrifice to the manly hero whose gifts are given in full measure.
4. He who gives excellent wealth to the singer holds fame that does not perish. For him we offer this refreshment, rich in good heroes, victorious, unfailing.
5. Now indeed Brahmaṇaspati speaks the mantra worthy of praise — the mantra in which Indra, Varuṇa, Mitra, and Aryaman, the gods, have made their dwelling place.
6. May we speak that beneficial, unfailing mantra of the gods in the assemblies. And may you, the leading men, delight in this speech; may he obtain all good things from you.
7. Who could reach the man devoted to the gods? Who could reach the one who has laid out the sacred grass? The devoted giver has stood forth with his household; he holds his dwelling amid abundance.
8. He joins himself to power; with kings he strikes down. Even in danger he secures a good dwelling. Of the mace-bearer there is no obstructer, no conqueror, neither in the great contest nor in the small.
Translator's note: verses 7 and 8 are among the more compressed and syntactically difficult in this hymn — the referent of "he" (the patron, or Brahmaṇaspati/Indra acting through him) is not made explicit by the Sanskrit itself, and terms like antarvāvat ("amid abundance") and vṛktabarhis ("one who has laid out the sacred grass") are rendered here conservatively, keeping close to the literal sense rather than resolving the ambiguity.
Colophon
Rigveda I.40 is drawn from the Śākala recension of the Rigveda, composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE. This is a Good Works Translation rendered verse by verse from the Sanskrit text printed below. Prepared for the Good Work Library by the Tianmu Anglican Church with AI-assisted translation.
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Source Text: ṛgveda I.40
ut tiṣṭha brahmaṇas pate devayantas tvemahe |
upa pra yantu marutaḥ sudānava indra prāśūr bhavā sacā || 1 ||
tvām id dhi sahasas putra martya upabrūte dhane hite |
suvīryam maruta ā svaśvyaṁ dadhīta yo va ācake || 2 ||
praitu brahmaṇas patiḥ pra devy etu sūnṛtā |
acchā vīraṁ naryam paṅktirādhasaṁ devā yajñaṁ nayantu naḥ || 3 ||
yo vāghate dadāti sūnaraṁ vasu sa dhatte akṣiti śravaḥ |
tasmā iḻāṁ suvīrām ā yajāmahe supratūrtim anehasam || 4 ||
pra nūnam brahmaṇas patir mantraṁ vadaty ukthyam |
yasminn indro varuṇo mitro aryamā devā okāṁsi cakrire || 5 ||
tam id vocemā vidatheṣu śambhuvam mantraṁ devā anehasam |
imāṁ ca vācam pratiharyathā naro viśved vāmā vo aśnavat || 6 ||
ko devayantam aśnavaj janaṁ ko vṛktabarhiṣam |
pra-pra dāśvān pastyābhir asthitāntarvāvat kṣayaṁ dadhe || 7 ||
upa kṣatram pṛñcīta hanti rājabhir bhaye cit sukṣitiṁ dadhe |
nāsya vartā na tarutā mahādhane nārbhe asti vajriṇaḥ || 8 ||
Source Colophon
Sanskrit text of the Rigveda, Śākala recension. The standard scholarly edition is the Bombay Oriental (Vishva Bandhu, 5 vols., 1963–66). IAST transliteration available from GRETIL (Göttingen Register of Electronic Texts in Indian Languages) and Vedaweb (University of Cologne). Both sources are open access. IAST transliteration from the Aufrecht edition (1877) via GRETIL (Van Nooten & Holland input, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).