Hymn to Indra and Surya — The Eclipse of Svarbhanu
Rigveda V.40 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 5 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 opens as a soma-offering praise of Indra, then turns to tell of the demon Svarbhānu piercing the sun with darkness — an eclipse — and of the sage Atri who, through his fourth sacred formula, found the hidden sun and restored its light.
1. Come, drink the soma pressed with the stones, lord of soma. Bull Indra, with your bulls, best slayer of Vṛtra.
2. The pressing-stone is a bull, the rapture is a bull, this pressed soma here is a bull. Bull Indra, with your bulls, best slayer of Vṛtra.
3. As a bull I call you, the bull, thunderbolt-bearer, with your wondrous help. Bull Indra, with your bulls, best slayer of Vṛtra.
4. Drinker of the ṛjīṣa dregs, thunderbolt-bearer, bull, all-overpowering, fierce, king, slayer of Vṛtra, drinker of soma — having yoked his two bay horses, may he come this way; at the midday pressing may Indra rejoice.
5. When the demon Svarbhānu pierced you, Sūrya, with darkness, the worlds grew dazed and confused, like one bewildered who does not know the ground he stands on.
6. Then, Indra, when you struck down the magic tricks of Svarbhānu that were spreading down from heaven — Atri, by his fourth sacred formula, the one that undoes the lawless, found the sun hidden in darkness.
7. Let not the deceiver, through malice and through fear, swallow me down here, me who am yours. You are Mitra, of true bounty — may you and King Varuṇa both protect me here.
8. The formula-speaker, yoking the pressing-stones, honoring them, serving the gods with praise and homage — Atri set the eye of the sun back in the sky, and drove off the magic tricks of Svarbhānu.
9. That very sun whom the demon Svarbhānu had pierced with darkness — the Atris found him again, for no others were able to.
Translator's note: verse 7 is a plea whose speaker and addressee shift mid-verse (from a first-person cry for protection to an address to Mitra and Varuṇa); the referent of "the deceiver" is left as the Sanskrit leaves it, unnamed but understood as Svarbhānu or his agency. "Fourth sacred formula" (turīyeṇa brahmaṇā) in verse 6 is kept literal — its exact ritual meaning is not fully recoverable from the verse alone.
Colophon
Rigveda V.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 V.40
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.
ā yāhy adribhiḥ sutaṁ somaṁ somapate piba |
vṛṣann indra vṛṣabhir vṛtrahantama || 1 ||
vṛṣā grāvā vṛṣā mado vṛṣā somo ayaṁ sutaḥ |
vṛṣann indra vṛṣabhir vṛtrahantama || 2 ||
vṛṣā tvā vṛṣaṇaṁ huve vajriñ citrābhir ūtibhiḥ |
vṛṣann indra vṛṣabhir vṛtrahantama || 3 ||
ṛjīṣī vajrī vṛṣabhas turāṣāṭ chuṣmī rājā vṛtrahā somapāvā |
yuktvā haribhyām upa yāsad arvāṅ mādhyaṁdine savane matsad indraḥ || 4 ||
yat tvā sūrya svarbhānus tamasāvidhyad āsuraḥ |
akṣetravid yathā mugdho bhuvanāny adīdhayuḥ || 5 ||
svarbhānor adha yad indra māyā avo divo vartamānā avāhan |
gūḻhaṁ sūryaṁ tamasāpavratena turīyeṇa brahmaṇāvindad atriḥ || 6 ||
mā mām imaṁ tava santam atra irasyā drugdho bhiyasā ni gārīt |
tvam mitro asi satyarādhās tau mehāvataṁ varuṇaś ca rājā || 7 ||
grāvṇo brahmā yuyujānaḥ saparyan kīriṇā devān namasopaśikṣan |
atriḥ sūryasya divi cakṣur ādhāt svarbhānor apa māyā aghukṣat || 8 ||
yaṁ vai sūryaṁ svarbhānus tamasāvidhyad āsuraḥ |
atrayas tam anv avindan nahy a1nye aśaknuvan || 9 ||
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).