Hymn to Soma Pavamāna
Rigveda IX.19 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 9 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 Soma, whatever wondrous, praiseworthy good there is, in heaven or on earth — bring that to us, as you purify yourself.
2. For you two, Soma and Indra, are the lords of the sunlight and the lords of the cattle. As rulers, make our insights swell.
3. The bull, purifying himself among living beings, thundering over the sacred grass — golden, he has settled into his womb.
4. Our far-seeing songs have cried out over the seed of the bull, as mothers cry over their son, their calf.
5. Will he indeed, purifying himself, place his seed in those who long for the bull — those who yield bright milk?
6. Favor those who have drawn near to you; set fear upon our enemies. O self-purifying one, find us wealth.
7. Beat down the enemy's bull-strength, Soma — beat down his fury, beat down his vigor — whether he is far off or near.
Translator's note: "yonim āsadat" (v.3) — "has settled into his womb/place" — refers to Soma, pressed and strained, settling into the vat; "womb" (yoni) is the vessel/receptacle image, not a claim about the addressee's own body. Verse 5's "garbham ādadhat" ("place his seed/embryo") preserves the hymn's bull-and-cows fertility imagery for the pressed Soma stalks and the waters/milk mixed with them, as is conventional in Pavamāna hymns; it is translated literally rather than softened.
Colophon
Rigveda IX.19 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 IX.19
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.
yat soma citram ukthyaṁ divyam pārthivaṁ vasu |
tan naḥ punāna ā bhara || 1 ||
yuvaṁ hi sthaḥ svarpatī indraś ca soma gopatī |
īśānā pipyataṁ dhiyaḥ || 2 ||
vṛṣā punāna āyuṣu stanayann adhi barhiṣi |
hariḥ san yonim āsadat || 3 ||
avāvaśanta dhītayo vṛṣabhasyādhi retasi |
sūnor vatsasya mātaraḥ || 4 ||
kuvid vṛṣaṇyantībhyaḥ punāno garbham ādadhat |
yāḥ śukraṁ duhate payaḥ || 5 ||
upa śikṣāpatasthuṣo bhiyasam ā dhehi śatruṣu |
pavamāna vidā rayim || 6 ||
ni śatroḥ soma vṛṣṇyaṁ ni śuṣmaṁ ni vayas tira |
dūre vā sato anti vā || 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).