Hymn to Agni
Rigveda X.164 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 10 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 by the New Tianmu Anglican Church from the Sanskrit of the Śākala recension.
Go hence, O Lord of Thought—depart thou; take thy leave and wander far.
And when thou art gone afar, cry out unto Dissolving:
“Many are the stirrings of mind among the quick.”
“Fortunate is the lot they draw; fortunate the steed they bind to the yoke; fortunate the gaze they set upon the son of Vivasvant.
In many a place doth the mind of the living wander.”
Whatsoever way we have stumbled upon—by longing, by scorn, by ban or bane, whether in waking or in sleep— let Agni cast it off from us, and set it far away:
all misdeeds, all that displeaseth.
If we have dealt falsely, O Indra, thou who rulest holy speech, let the watchful ones of Āṅgiras keep us safe from the force of them that bear us spite.
This day we have prevailed; this day we have won our cause.
We stand without guilt.
The waking shade, the ill-wrought wish—
let it fall upon him we abhor;
let it fall upon him who doth abhor us.
Colophon
This hymn is drawn from the Śākala recension of the Rigveda, composed approximately 1700–1100 BCE. This is a Good Works Translation produced by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, translated independently from the Sanskrit. Reference translations consulted during original translation are to be documented during audit.
Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.
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Source Text: ṛgveda X.164
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.
apehi manasas pate 'pa krāma paraś cara |
paro nirṛtyā ā cakṣva bahudhā jīvato manaḥ || 1 ||
bhadraṁ vai varaṁ vṛṇate bhadraṁ yuñjanti dakṣiṇam |
bhadraṁ vaivasvate cakṣur bahutrā jīvato manaḥ || 2 ||
yad āśasā niḥśasābhiśasopārima jāgrato yat svapantaḥ |
agnir viśvāny apa duṣkṛtāny ajuṣṭāny āre asmad dadhātu || 3 ||
yad indra brahmaṇas pate 'bhidrohaṁ carāmasi |
pracetā na āṅgiraso dviṣatām pātv aṁhasaḥ || 4 ||
ajaiṣmādyāsanāma cābhūmānāgaso vayam |
jāgratsvapnaḥ saṁkalpaḥ pāpo yaṁ dviṣmas taṁ sa ṛcchatu yo no dveṣṭi tam ṛcchatu || 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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