Hymn to the Viśvedevas
Rigveda VII.43 is a sūkta (hymn of praise) from Maṇḍala 7 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 Viśvedevas, we do sing unto thee! Hear the voices of thy servants! We praise thee with all our hearts!
Thou art mighty and thou art merciful. Thou art just and thou art kind. In thee are combined all the virtues that we do strive to achieve. In thee is the perfection that we do seek.
Help us to become like thee, O gods! Give us wisdom that we might think as ye think. Give us courage that we might act as ye would have us act. Give us compassion that we might love as ye love.
And when we fail, as surely we shall, forgive us! Do not cast us away; do not turn thy face from us. Help us to rise again. Help us to try once more.
We shall worship thee forever. We shall make offerings unto thee all the days of our lives. And we shall teach our children to honor the gods, so that the worship of the Viśvedevas shall never cease.
Accept our prayer! Accept our hymn! Accept the devotion of our hearts!
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 VII.43
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.
pra vo yajñeṣu devayanto arcan dyāvā namobhiḥ pṛthivī iṣadhyai |
yeṣām brahmāṇy asamāni viprā viṣvag viyanti vanino na śākhāḥ || 1 ||
pra yajña etu hetvo na saptir ud yacchadhvaṁ samanaso ghṛtācīḥ |
stṛṇīta barhir adhvarāya sādhūrdhvā śocīṁṣi devayūny asthuḥ || 2 ||
ā putrāso na mātaraṁ vibhṛtrāḥ sānau devāso barhiṣaḥ sadantu |
ā viśvācī vidathyām anaktv agne mā no devatātā mṛdhas kaḥ || 3 ||
te sīṣapanta joṣam ā yajatrā ṛtasya dhārāḥ sudughā duhānāḥ |
jyeṣṭhaṁ vo adya maha ā vasūnām ā gantana samanaso yati ṣṭha || 4 ||
evā no agne vikṣv ā daśasya tvayā vayaṁ sahasāvann āskrāḥ |
rāyā yujā sadhamādo ariṣṭā yūyam pāta svastibhiḥ sadā naḥ || 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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