Hymn to the Maruts
Rigveda I.86 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) addressed to the Maruts, the storm-gods, companions of Indra who ride out together in their war-bands. 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. Maruts — in whose house are the paths of the mighty heaven, that man is the best guarded of all men.
2. O Maruts, bearers of the sacrifice, hear the call — whether it comes through offerings or through the poet's own thoughts.
3. And he whose strong steeds have shaped their course to favor the poet — he is the one who goes to the pen rich in cattle.
4. On this hero's sacred grass the soma is pressed at the rites that seek the gods; the hymn and its exhilaration are proclaimed.
5. May all creatures hear this — his, who goes out toward every people — the flowing offerings, even to the sun.
6. For many autumns now, O Maruts, we have honored you with offerings, through the favor you have shown to the peoples.
7. O eager Maruts, blessed be that mortal whose offerings you carry safely through.
8. O men of true strength, know the desire of the one who toils and sweats and yearns.
9. You, O truly mighty ones, make that known by your greatness; pierce the demon with your lightning.
10. Hide the hidden darkness, drive off every devouring demon, make the light that we long for.
Translator's note: verse 5 is syntactically compressed in the Sanskrit (a string of accusatives and a participle with no explicit main verb linking them); the rendering above keeps the images — "hearing," "every people," "flowing offerings," "the sun" — in the same relation the Sanskrit gives them, without supplying content the text does not state. Verse 3's "atakṣata" (literally "they fashioned/shaped") is rendered as "shaped their course to favor," a conservative reading of a verb that more literally describes carving or forming.
Colophon
Rigveda I.86 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.86
maruto yasya hi kṣaye pāthā divo vimahasaḥ |
sa sugopātamo janaḥ || 1 ||
yajñair vā yajñavāhaso viprasya vā matīnām |
marutaḥ śṛṇutā havam || 2 ||
uta vā yasya vājino 'nu vipram atakṣata |
sa gantā gomati vraje || 3 ||
asya vīrasya barhiṣi sutaḥ somo diviṣṭiṣu |
uktham madaś ca śasyate || 4 ||
asya śroṣantv ā bhuvo viśvā yaś carṣaṇīr abhi |
sūraṁ cit sasruṣīr iṣaḥ || 5 ||
pūrvībhir hi dadāśima śaradbhir maruto vayam |
avobhiś carṣaṇīnām || 6 ||
subhagaḥ sa prayajyavo maruto astu martyaḥ |
yasya prayāṁsi parṣatha || 7 ||
śaśamānasya vā naraḥ svedasya satyaśavasaḥ |
vidā kāmasya venataḥ || 8 ||
yūyaṁ tat satyaśavasa āviṣ karta mahitvanā |
vidhyatā vidyutā rakṣaḥ || 9 ||
gūhatā guhyaṁ tamo vi yāta viśvam atriṇam |
jyotiṣ kartā yad uśmasi || 10 ||
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).