Hymn to Agni
Rigveda X.140 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.
1. O Agni, your fame and your vigor are great; your flames blaze out, O bearer of shining treasure. O far-shining one, with your might you grant praiseworthy strength to the one who offers, O sage.
2. With purifying splendor, with bright splendor, with undiminished splendor, you rise up in radiance. Moving like a son between his two mothers, you stay close to them; you fill both worlds.
3. O child of strength, O Jātavedas, take delight in the good praises, gladdened by the devotions offered to you. In you they have set their offerings — many-formed, bright in their favor, born of what is good.
4. Ruling, O Agni, spread yourself out among living creatures; let wealth be with us, O immortal one. You shine forth in your visible, beautiful form; you grant the gain-winning power.
5. The arranger of the rite, the far-seeing one, the master of great bounty — you grant the great, fortunate gift of good things, the great refreshment, the gain-winning wealth.
6. The people have set Agni in front, the truthful one, the mighty one, seen by all, for their favor — you of attentive ears, most far-reaching one, the divine, whom the generations of men praise with song.
Translator's note: verse 5 shifts from accusative epithets describing Agni to a direct "you grant" — the Sanskrit likely continues an implied act of praise or offering from verse 4; rendered here without adding a verb not present in the source. "vibhāvaso" (v.1) and "ūrjo napāt" (v.3) are fixed epithets of Agni ("possessing shining wealth," "child of strength") kept close to their literal sense rather than smoothed into English titles.
Colophon
Rigveda X.140 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.140
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.
agne tava śravo vayo mahi bhrājante arcayo vibhāvaso |
bṛhadbhāno śavasā vājam ukthya1ṁ dadhāsi dāśuṣe kave || 1 ||
pāvakavarcāḥ śukravarcā anūnavarcā ud iyarṣi bhānunā |
putro mātarā vicarann upāvasi pṛṇakṣi rodasī ubhe || 2 ||
ūrjo napāj jātavedaḥ suśastibhir mandasva dhītibhir hitaḥ |
tve iṣaḥ saṁ dadhur bhūrivarpasaś citrotayo vāmajātāḥ || 3 ||
irajyann agne prathayasva jantubhir asme rāyo amartya |
sa darśatasya vapuṣo vi rājasi pṛṇakṣi sānasiṁ kratum || 4 ||
iṣkartāram adhvarasya pracetasaṁ kṣayantaṁ rādhaso mahaḥ |
rātiṁ vāmasya subhagām mahīm iṣaṁ dadhāsi sānasiṁ rayim || 5 ||
ṛtāvānam mahiṣaṁ viśvadarśatam agniṁ sumnāya dadhire puro janāḥ |
śrutkarṇaṁ saprathastamaṁ tvā girā daivyam mānuṣā yugā || 6 ||
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).