Hymn for the Return of the Mind
Rigveda X.57 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. The hymn belongs to a small group (X.57–60) concerned with calling a person's mind — their vital consciousness — back when it has strayed or been lost.
1. Let us not stray from the path, nor from the sacrifice, O Indra who holds the soma. Let no hostility stand among us.
2. The thread that furthers the sacrifice, stretched out among the gods — may we, duly offering, reach it.
3. Now we call the mind here, with the soma set apart for Naraśaṃsa, and with the hymns of the fathers.
4. May your mind come back again — for resolve, for skill, for life, and to see the sun for a long time yet.
5. May the fathers, the divine kindred, give our mind back to us. May we join the company of the living.
6. O Soma, may we, bearing the mind within our bodies under your ordinance, join it together with our offspring.
Translator's note: "Naraśaṃsa" (verse 3) is a Vedic figure/epithet, sometimes treated as a name for Agni or Pūṣan in his role as praiser of men; it is left untranslated as a proper name. "Prasādhanas tantuḥ" (verse 2), literally "the thread that accomplishes/furthers," is rendered as "the thread that furthers the sacrifice" — an image of the sacrificial order stretched taut between earth and the gods.
Colophon
Rigveda X.57 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.57
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.
mā pra gāma patho vayam mā yajñād indra sominaḥ |
māntaḥ sthur no arātayaḥ || 1 ||
yo yajñasya prasādhanas tantur deveṣv ātataḥ |
tam āhutaṁ naśīmahi || 2 ||
mano nv ā huvāmahe nārāśaṁsena somena |
pitṝṇāṁ ca manmabhiḥ || 3 ||
ā ta etu manaḥ punaḥ kratve dakṣāya jīvase |
jyok ca sūryaṁ dṛśe || 4 ||
punar naḥ pitaro mano dadātu daivyo janaḥ |
jīvaṁ vrātaṁ sacemahi || 5 ||
vayaṁ soma vrate tava manas tanūṣu bibhrataḥ |
prajāvantaḥ sacemahi || 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).