Hymn to Soma Pavamana
Rigveda IX.45 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. Purify yourself for exhilaration, you who watch over men, for the feast of the gods — O drop, for Indra's drinking.
2. Flow to us on your errand; you pour yourself out for Indra; bring the gods, the best gift, to your friends.
3. And we anoint you, ruddy one, with milk, for exhilaration; throw open the doors for us, toward wealth.
4. He has strode beyond the filter, the prize-steed, as one at the yoke on its course; the drop is lord among the gods.
5. His companions have cried out together to him as he sports in the wooden vat, beyond the sheep's fleece; they have hailed the drop.
6. Flow with that stream, by which, once drunk, you come into view, O drop — granting heroic strength to your singer.
Translator's note: verse 5's "nāvā" (rendered here plainly as "hailed") is a difficult form — it may carry a sense of loud or fresh acclaim that plain English does not capture precisely. Rendered conservatively.
Colophon
Rigveda IX.45 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.45
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.
sa pavasva madāya kaṁ nṛcakṣā devavītaye |
indav indrāya pītaye || 1 ||
sa no arṣābhi dūtya1ṁ tvam indrāya tośase |
devān sakhibhya ā varam || 2 ||
uta tvām aruṇaṁ vayaṁ gobhir añjmo madāya kam |
vi no rāye duro vṛdhi || 3 ||
aty ū pavitram akramīd vājī dhuraṁ na yāmani |
indur deveṣu patyate || 4 ||
sam ī sakhāyo asvaran vane krīḻantam atyavim |
induṁ nāvā anūṣata || 5 ||
tayā pavasva dhārayā yayā pīto vicakṣase |
indo stotre suvīryam || 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).