Hymn to Agni
Rigveda V.9 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.
O Agni, purifier and renewer!
All things pass through thy flames and are made clean.
What comes to thee as dross shall leave thee shining,
What enters thee as soiled shall emerge as pure.
Art thou not the purifier of all substances?
The wood that comes to thee is made to smoke,
The butter spattered in thy mouth doth vanish,
And yet through this, the world is made more sacred.
And so with all that beareth stain and sorrow—
Let it pass through the fire that burneth bright!
For in thy heat all impurities are burned away,
And only the true essence doth remain.
Cleanse us, O Agni, of our secret shames,
The hidden guilt that cleaveth to our spirits.
Let thy flames rise and burn away the dross
That maketh heavy all that should be light.
We come to thee besmirched with our transgressions,
Our hands have touched what should have been untouched,
Our words have uttered lies and harsh divisions,
Our hearts have harbored greed and jealous rage.
But thou art merciful, O flame eternal!
For thou acceptest all that burneth in thee,
Transforming even sin to sacred offering,
When offered up in honesty and faith.
The man who casteth all his taint before thee,
Who hideth nothing from thy searching fire,
Who surrendereth his very soul to burning,
Shall rise again most pure and bright and whole.
O Agni, take our impurities this morning!
Let nothing impure remain within us.
Burn through us with thy cleansing, righteous fire,
That we may walk before the gods most clean.
For blessed is the man whom thou hast purified,
Who hath been tested in thy sacred burning.
He shall not stumble, he shall not sin again,
Made whole and pure by thy transforming flame.
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.9
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.
tvām agne haviṣmanto devam martāsa īḻate |
manye tvā jātavedasaṁ sa havyā vakṣy ānuṣak || 1 ||
agnir hotā dāsvataḥ kṣayasya vṛktabarhiṣaḥ |
saṁ yajñāsaś caranti yaṁ saṁ vājāsaḥ śravasyavaḥ || 2 ||
uta sma yaṁ śiśuṁ yathā navaṁ janiṣṭāraṇī |
dhartāram mānuṣīṇāṁ viśām agniṁ svadhvaram || 3 ||
uta sma durgṛbhīyase putro na hvāryāṇām |
purū yo dagdhāsi vanāgne paśur na yavase || 4 ||
adha sma yasyārcayaḥ samyak saṁyanti dhūminaḥ |
yad īm aha trito divy upa dhmāteva dhamati śiśīte dhmātarī yathā || 5 ||
tavāham agna ūtibhir mitrasya ca praśastibhiḥ |
dveṣoyuto na duritā turyāma martyānām || 6 ||
taṁ no agne abhī naro rayiṁ sahasva ā bhara |
sa kṣepayat sa poṣayad bhuvad vājasya sātaya utaidhi pṛtsu no vṛdhe || 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).
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