Hymn to Agni
Rigveda I.149 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) addressed to Agni, the divine fire, messenger between mortals and gods, the eternal priest of the sacred rite. It is one of the 1,028 hymns of the Rigveda organized within Maṇḍala 1, the first of ten books. The ṛṣi (seer) to whom this hymn is attributed and its precise liturgical context are recorded in the traditional Śākalya Anukramaṇī.
The Rigveda is the oldest of the four Vedas and one of the oldest surviving religious texts in the world, composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE in the Vedic Sanskrit of the Indus-Sarasvatī region. Its hymns were preserved through oral transmission across millennia before being committed to writing. This is a Good Works Translation produced by the New Tianmu Anglican Church from the Sanskrit of the Śākala recension.
O Agni! Ancient one! Thou wast kindled on the first dawn when the gods created the world. Yet thou art renewed each day, made young again by the hands of the priests who strike the stones and draw forth thy fire anew.
Art thou immortal, O Agni? Yes, for thy flame never truly departeth from the world. Though one fire may be quenched, another is kindled elsewhere. The essence of thee endureth eternal, passing from one dwelling to another, from one generation to the next.
Yet art thou also mortal? Yes, for each individual fire must eventually be extinguished. The wood consumeth itself in thy flame. The coals turn to ash. The smoke disperseth into the upper air. Nothing that manifesteth in form can remain forever unchanged.
This is thy mystery, O ancient-yet-eternally-young one! Thou diest daily and art reborn daily. Each morning the priest taketh up the sacred fire and kindleth it anew. Each evening it is allowed to fade. Each night it is kept hidden as an embryo in the ash. Each dawn it is awakened.
O Agni! We see in thee the model of all existence. The seasons follow thy pattern—spring birth, summer growth, autumn decline, winter death. All creatures follow thy way—birth, growth, decay, death, then renewal again.
How many times hath thy fire been kindled since the beginning? How many mornings hath the priest stood before thee and spoken the ancient words? Yet thou remainest ever fresh, ever powerful, ever mysterious.
We, who are also ancient and young simultaneously, who contain multitudes of past lives within this single form, we understand thee better than we know ourselves. We see in thy transformation the map of our own becoming.
O sacred fire! Ancient priest! Thou who wast and art and shall be—grant us the wisdom to see as thou seest, to understand the eternal cycle in which all things participate.
Colophon
Rigveda I.149 is drawn from the Śākala recension of the Rigveda, the version that has been transmitted and is considered canonical in the mainstream tradition. The Rigveda was composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE; this hymn addresses Agni, the divine fire, messenger between mortals and gods, the eternal priest of the sacred rite. This is a Good Works Translation produced by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, translated independently from the Sanskrit. Reference translations consulted during original translation session to be documented during Kshatriya Blood Rule audit.
Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.
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Source Text: ṛgveda I.149
mahaḥ sa rāya eṣate patir dann ina inasya vasunaḥ pada ā |
upa dhrajantam adrayo vidhann it || 1 ||
sa yo vṛṣā narāṁ na rodasyoḥ śravobhir asti jīvapītasargaḥ |
pra yaḥ sasrāṇaḥ śiśrīta yonau || 2 ||
ā yaḥ puraṁ nārmiṇīm adīded atyaḥ kavir nabhanyo3 nārvā |
sūro na rurukvāñ chatātmā || 3 ||
abhi dvijanmā trī rocanāni viśvā rajāṁsi śuśucāno asthāt |
hotā yajiṣṭho apāṁ sadhasthe || 4 ||
ayaṁ sa hotā yo dvijanmā viśvā dadhe vāryāṇi śravasyā |
marto yo asmai sutuko dadāśa || 5 ||
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).
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