The Secret of the Veda

The First Hymn to Mitra-Varuna

The Lords of the Thousand-Pillared Home of Truth and Bliss

[The Rishi hymns the eternal and immutable Truth of which the Truth in mutable things is the veil; that is the goal of the journey of the manifested Sun of divine knowledge; it is the eternal unity of all things that are and the supreme Divine of which the Gods are various forms. Into it unite all the wealth of being and knowledge and power and bliss won by the sacrifice. It is the large vastness of the wide purities of Varuna and of the shining harmonies of Mitra. There, eternally stable, dwell the herds of the divine radiances of knowledge; for that is the happy field to which they here are travelling. The Impeller of the cosmic movement and journey pours out knowledge in us, the milk of the herds, by the dawns of the inner light and there descend the streams of the immortal existence followed by the single and perfect movement of Mitra-Varuna, the Light and the Purity, the Harmony and the Infinity. It is the rain of heaven which these two Godheads pour down, upholding the physical existence in its fruits and the celestial in its herding radiances of illumination. They thus create in man a force full of divine knowledge and a wide being which they guard and increase, a strewn seat for the sacrifice. This thousand-pillared force of knowledge they make a home for themselves and dwell there in the revelations of the Word. It is luminous in its form and its pillars of life have an iron strength and stability. They ascend to it in the dawning, in the rising of the Sun of knowledge and look with that eye of their divine vision on the infinite existence and the finite, the indivisible unity of things and their multiplicity. It is a home full and large with the sweetness and ecstasy of the supreme and inviolable peace and bliss which by their cherishing

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and fostering protection we seek to conquer and possess.]

ऋतेन ऋतमपिहितं ध्रुवं वां सूर्यस्य यत्र विमुचन्त्यश्वान् ।
दश शता सह तस्थुस्तदेकं देवानां श्रेष्ठं वपुषामपश्यम् ॥१॥

1) By the Truth¹ is veiled that ever-standing Truth of yours where they unyoke the horses of the Sun;² there the ten hundreds³ stand still together; That One,—I have beheld the greatest of the embodied gods.⁴

तत्सु वां मित्रावरुणा महित्वमीर्मा तस्थुषीरहभिर्दुदुह्रे ।
विश्वाः पिन्वथः स्वसरस्य धेना अनु वामेकः पविरा ववर्त ॥२॥

2) That is the utter vastness of you, O Mitra and Varuna; there the Lord of the movement milks the herds of his stable radiances by the days. Lo, you twain swell all the streams of the Blissful One and your one wheel⁵ moves in their path.

अधारयतं पृथिवीमुत द्यां मित्रराजाना वरुणा महोभिः ।
वर्धयतमोषधीः पिन्वतं गा अव वृष्टि सृजतं जीरदानू ॥३॥

3) You uphold earth and heaven, O Mitra King and King Varuna, by your greatnesses; you increase the growths of earth, you nourish the shining herds of heaven, you pour forth the rain of its waters, O swift in strength.

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आ वामश्वासः सुयुजो वहन्तु यतरश्मय उप यन्त्वर्वाक् ।
घृतस्य निर्णिगनु वर्तते वामुप सिन्धवः प्रदिवि क्षरन्ति ॥४॥

4) Let horses perfectly yoked with their well-governed reins of light bear you down to us; the form of the clarity follows in your coming and the Rivers flow in the front of heaven.

अनु श्रुताममतिं वर्धदुवीं बर्हिरिव यजुषा रक्षमाणा ।
नमस्वन्ता घृतदक्षाधि गर्ते मित्रासाये वरुणेळास्वन्तः ॥५॥

5) Increasing the strength that conies to our ear of knowledge, guarding by the sacrificial word⁶ your wide realm⁷ as if our seat of sacrifice, bringing obeisance, holding fast to judgment, you take your seat in your home, O Mitra, within the revealings of knowledge, O Varuna.

अकविहस्ता सुकृते परस्पा यं त्रासाथे वरुणेळास्वन्तः ।
राजाना क्षत्रमह्रणीयमाना सहस्त्रस्थूणं बिभृथः सह द्वौ ॥६॥

6) With hands that spare not, protectors of the beyond for the doer of perfect works whom you deliver and he dwells within the revealings of knowledge, kings free from passion, together you uphold a thousand-pillared strength.

हिरण्यनिर्णिगयो अस्य स्थूणा वि भ्राजते दिव्यश्वाजनीव ।
भद्रे क्षेत्रे निमिता तिल्विले वा सनेम मध्वो अधिगर्त्यस्य ॥७॥

7) Its form is of golden light, iron is its pillar and shines in, heaven as if the swift lightning;⁸ in the happy field⁹ it is shaped or in the field of the gleaming.¹⁰ May we win possession of the sweet honey¹¹ which is in that home.

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हिरण्यरुपमुषसो व्युष्टावयःस्थूणमुदिता सूर्यस्य ।
आ रोहथो वरुण मित्र गर्तमतश्चक्षाथे अदितिं दितिं च ॥८॥

8) To that home whose form is of the gold, whose pillars are of the iron, in the breaking of the Dawn, in the uprising of the Sun you ascend, O Varuna, O Mitra, and thence you behold the Infinite and the Finite.¹²

यद्वंहिष्ठं नातिविधे सुदानू अच्छिद्रं शर्म भुवनस्य गोपा ।
तेन नो मित्रावरुणावविष्टं सिषासन्तो जिगीवांसः स्याम ॥९॥

9) That bliss of yours which is most large and full and without a gap, O strong guardians of the world, so that none can pierce through and beyond it, by that cherish us, Mitra and Varuna; may we be victorious, who would take possession of that peace.

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