Hymn to a Divine Pair (the Two Havirdhānas)
Rigveda X.13 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 10 of the Rigveda, one of the 1,028 hymns organized within the ten books of the oldest Veda. The Rigveda was composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE in Vedic Sanskrit and preserved through oral transmission across millennia.
This is a Good Works Translation produced for the Good Works Library from the Sanskrit of the Śākala recension. Every verse in this hymn addresses a pair — "you two" — asked to take their seats and receive the Soma; the Anukramaṇī tradition identifies this pair as the Havirdhāne, the two cart-frames that hold the Soma stalks during the ritual.
1. With homage I yoke for you two the ancient sacred formula. Let the resounding call go forth like a path — the call of the patron. Let all the sons of the immortal listen, they who have taken their stand in the heavenly realms.
2. When you two came, contending like twins, god-seeking men carried you forward. Sit down now in your own place, knowing it well; be good seats for our soma-drop.
3. I climbed the five steps of the ram; I follow the four-footed path by my vow. With the syllable I measure this out; upon the navel of truth I purify it thoroughly.
4. For the gods' sake he chose death; for the sake of offspring he did not choose immortality. They made Bṛhaspati the seer into a sacrifice; Yama gave up his own dear body.
5. The seven streams flow for the child who has the Maruts with him, for the father; the sons have won truth as their kin. These two indeed rule over both of it; the two strive, the two thrive on both.
Translator's note: this hymn is unusually compressed and its ritual vocabulary is obscure in places. In verse 3, "rupaḥ" (rendered "ram") is a rare word whose exact referent — an animal, a ritual implement, or a proper name — is uncertain; the "five steps" and "four-footed path" likely describe a priest's ritual movements but the precise rite is not recoverable from the verse alone. In verse 5, "avīvatan" (rendered "have won") could equally mean "have caused to sound forth"; both senses are attested for its root. Verse 4 shifts abruptly to speak of Yama giving up his body and Bṛhaspati being made an offering — the connection to the surrounding verses about the seated pair is not made explicit in the Sanskrit, and no content has been added to bridge it.
Colophon
Rigveda X.13 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 X.13
Sanskrit source text from the Aufrecht edition (1877) via GRETIL (Van Nooten & Holland input). Presented here for reference, study, and verification alongside the English translation above.
yuje vām brahma pūrvyaṁ namobhir vi śloka etu pathyeva sūreḥ |
śṛṇvantu viśve amṛtasya putrā ā ye dhāmāni divyāni tasthuḥ || 1 ||
yame iva yatamāne yad aitam pra vām bharan mānuṣā devayantaḥ |
ā sīdataṁ svam u lokaṁ vidāne svāsasthe bhavatam indave naḥ || 2 ||
pañca padāni rupo anv arohaṁ catuṣpadīm anv emi vratena |
akṣareṇa prati mima etām ṛtasya nābhāv adhi sam punāmi || 3 ||
devebhyaḥ kam avṛṇīta mṛtyum prajāyai kam amṛtaṁ nāvṛṇīta |
bṛhaspatiṁ yajñam akṛṇvata ṛṣim priyāṁ yamas tanva1m prārirecīt || 4 ||
sapta kṣaranti śiśave marutvate pitre putrāso apy avīvatann ṛtam |
ubhe id asyobhayasya rājata ubhe yatete ubhayasya puṣyataḥ || 5 ||
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).