A Hymn of Maṇḍala 7
Rigveda VII.47 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 sacred waters! O life-giving streams! We do praise thee and do honor thee!
Ye do flow from the highest mountains, swift and pure and cold. Ye do carry the blessing of the sky down to the waiting earth. Without you, all would be parched and dry; all would be lifeless as the dust.
We drink of your waters; we bathe in your currents; we do use you for all our needs. You do sustain us; you do nourish us; you do refresh us. In you is the very essence of life itself.
O waters, ye are divine! Ye are not mere liquid substance, but rather ye are the goddesses who do pour forth your blessings upon all creatures. Ye do know the secrets of the earth; ye do carry the power of the gods.
When ye fall as rain from the heavens, the parched earth doth drink and rejoice. The seeds do sprout; the plants do grow; the animals do find pasture. All of this doth happen because of you, O sacred waters!
Come unto us! Flow through our lands! Nourish our crops! Quench the thirst of our herds! Purify our bodies and our souls!
We give thanks unto the waters. We honor them. We do make offerings unto them. And we promise to use them wisely and to never pollute them or treat them with disrespect.
O waters, accept our worship! Be unto us a source of blessing forever!
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.47
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.
āpo yaṁ vaḥ prathamaṁ devayanta indrapānam ūrmim akṛṇvateḻaḥ |
taṁ vo vayaṁ śucim aripram adya ghṛtapruṣam madhumantaṁ vanema || 1 ||
tam ūrmim āpo madhumattamaṁ vo 'pāṁ napād avatv āśuhemā |
yasminn indro vasubhir mādayāte tam aśyāma devayanto vo adya || 2 ||
śatapavitrāḥ svadhayā madantīr devīr devānām api yanti pāthaḥ |
tā indrasya na minanti vratāni sindhubhyo havyaṁ ghṛtavaj juhota || 3 ||
yāḥ sūryo raśmibhir ātatāna yābhya indro aradad gātum ūrmim |
te sindhavo varivo dhātanā no yūyam pāta svastibhiḥ sadā naḥ || 4 ||
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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