Hymn to Indra
Rigveda VIII.36 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 8 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. You are the protector of the one who presses the soma and has laid out the sacred grass. Drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
2. Help forward your praiser, bounteous one; drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
3. With vigor you aid the gods, with your own strength; drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
4. Begetter of heaven, begetter of earth; drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
5. You are the begetter of horses, the begetter of cattle; drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
6. Make great the praise-song of the Atris, wielder of the pressing-stone; drink the soma, for exhilaration, hundred-powered one — the share that every people held in store for you, you who overcome the battles, wide-striding, all-victorious amid the waters, accompanied by the Maruts, Indra, true lord.
7. Hear now the pressing offered by Śyāvāśva, just as you heard the deeds of Atri as he performed them. You alone helped Trasadasyu forward, Indra, in the conquest led by men, strengthening the sacred words.
Translator's note: the recurring refrain "yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate" (verses 1–6) is dense and compressed; "sam apsujin" ("all-victorious amid the waters") and "uru jrayaḥ" ("wide-striding/of wide course") are rendered conservatively as descriptive epithets rather than resolved into a fuller narrative claim. "Śatakrato" (verses 1–6) is kept close to its literal sense, "hundred-powered one," rather than translated as "of a hundred sacrifices," since both readings are attested for the epithet.
Colophon
Rigveda VIII.36 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.
🌲
Source Text: ṛgveda VIII.36
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.
avitāsi sunvato vṛktabarhiṣaḥ pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 1 ||
prāva stotāram maghavann ava tvām pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 2 ||
ūrjā devām̐ avasy ojasā tvām pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 3 ||
janitā divo janitā pṛthivyāḥ pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 4 ||
janitāśvānāṁ janitā gavām asi pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 5 ||
atrīṇāṁ stomam adrivo mahas kṛdhi pibā somam madāya kaṁ śatakrato |
yaṁ te bhāgam adhārayan viśvāḥ sehānaḥ pṛtanā uru jrayaḥ sam apsujin marutvām̐ indra satpate || 6 ||
śyāvāśvasya sunvatas tathā śṛṇu yathāśṛṇor atreḥ karmāṇi kṛṇvataḥ |
pra trasadasyum āvitha tvam eka in nṛṣāhya indra brahmāṇi vardhayan || 7 ||
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).