Hymn to Uṣas
Rigveda V.80 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 5 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.
She cometh! Uṣas pusheth back the darkness with her relentless, gentle hands. The night that seemed eternal, infinite, unchanging—it recedes before her as the tide recedes before the moon. What hath reigned supreme now becomes servant to her will.
The world was drowned in shadow, wrapped in the grip of sleep and forgetting. All things lay dormant—the beasts in their lairs, the birds huddled silent in their nests, the plants curled tight within themselves. The cosmos seemed trapped in a deathlike stillness, as if the light might never return.
But she breaketh through! The first blush of color spreads across the sky—rose and amber, gold and crimson. With each moment that passeth, her brightness increaseth. The darkness, once so terrible and absolute, becomes thin and weak, like a worn cloth that teareth under the slightest pull.
And lo! The world reneweth itself. The flowers lift their heads. The insects stir in the grass. Birds call out their morning songs, their voices growing louder with each passing moment. The cattle rise and stretch their limbs. Humans emerge from their dwellings, their eyes opening to the light, their spirits rising with the sun.
This is the eternal miracle, O Uṣas! Thou pushest back chaos each dawn. Thou renewest all creation with thy coming. Thou art the victory of order over disorder, of light over darkness, of life over the small deaths that every night bringeth.
We bow before thee. We honor thy power. Thou art the beginning of all things.
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 V.80
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.
dyutadyāmānam bṛhatīm ṛtena ṛtāvarīm aruṇapsuṁ vibhātīm |
devīm uṣasaṁ svar āvahantīm prati viprāso matibhir jarante || 1 ||
eṣā janaṁ darśatā bodhayantī sugān pathaḥ kṛṇvatī yāty agre |
bṛhadrathā bṛhatī viśvaminvoṣā jyotir yacchaty agre ahnām || 2 ||
eṣā gobhir aruṇebhir yujānāsredhantī rayim aprāyu cakre |
patho radantī suvitāya devī puruṣṭutā viśvavārā vi bhāti || 3 ||
eṣā vyenī bhavati dvibarhā āviṣkṛṇvānā tanvam purastāt |
ṛtasya panthām anv eti sādhu prajānatīva na diśo mināti || 4 ||
eṣā śubhrā na tanvo vidānordhveva snātī dṛśaye no asthāt |
apa dveṣo bādhamānā tamāṁsy uṣā divo duhitā jyotiṣāgāt || 5 ||
eṣā pratīcī duhitā divo nṝn yoṣeva bhadrā ni riṇīte apsaḥ |
vyūrṇvatī dāśuṣe vāryāṇi punar jyotir yuvatiḥ pūrvathākaḥ || 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).
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