The Secret of the Veda

The Ninth Hymn to Agni

Divine Will Ascendent from the Animal to Mentality

[The Rishi speaks of the birth of the divine Will by the working of the pure mental on the material consciousness, its involved action in man's ordinary state of mortal mind emotional, nervous, passionate marked by crooked activities and perishable enjoyments and its emergence on the third plane of our being where it is forged and sharpened into a clear and effective power for liberation and spiritual conquest. It knows all the births or planes of our existence and leads the sacrifice and its offerings by a successive and continuous progress to the divine goal and home.]

त्वामग्ने हविष्मन्तो देवं मर्तास ईळते ।
मन्ये त्वा जातवेदसं स हव्या वक्ष्यानुषक् ॥१॥

1) Thee the godhead mortals with the oblation seek, O Will; on thee I meditate who knowest the births; therefore thou earnest to the goal our offerings without a break.

अग्निर्होता दास्वतः क्षयस्य वृक्तबर्हिषः ।
सं यज्ञासश्चरन्ति यं सं वाजासः श्रवस्यवः ॥२॥

2) Will is the priest of the oblation for man who gives the offering and forms the seat of sacrifice and attains to his home; for in him our works of sacrifice converge and in him our plenitudes of the Truth's inspirations.

उत स्म यं शिशुं यथा नवं जनिष्टारणी ।
धर्तारं मानुषीणां विशामग्निं स्वध्वरम् ॥३॥

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3) True too it is that thou art born from the two Workings¹ like a new-born infant, thou who art the upholder of the human peoples. Will that leads aright the sacrifice.

उत स्म दुर्गृभीयसे पुत्रो न ह्वार्याणाम् ।
पुरु यो दग्धासि वनाग्ने पशुर्न यवसे ॥४॥

4) True too it is that thou art hard to seize as a son of crookednesses² when thou devourest the many growths of delight like an Animal that feeds in his pasture.

अध स्म यस्यार्चयः सम्यक् संयन्ति धूमिनः ।
यदीमह त्रितो दिव्युप ध्मातेव धमति शिशीते ध्मातरी यथा ॥५॥

5) But afterwards thy fiery rays with their smoky passion meet together entirely; oh then, the third Soul³ forges him in our heavens like a smith in his smithy; 'tis as if in the smith himself that he whets him into a weapon of sharpness.⁴

तवाहमग्न ऊतिभिर्मित्रस्य च प्रशस्तिभिः ।
द्वेषोयुतो न दुरिता तुर्याम मर्त्यानाम् ॥६॥

6) O Will, may I by thy expandings and thy expressings of the Lord of Love,—yea, may we, as men assailed by enemies, so besieged by discords, pass through and beyond these stumblings of mortals.

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तं नो अग्ने अभी नरो रयिं सहस्व आ भर ।
स क्षेपयत् स पोषयद् भुवद् वाजस्य सातय उतैधि पृत्सु नो वृधे ॥७॥

7) Bring to us human souls that felicity, O Will, thou forceful one! May he shoot us forward on our path, may he nourish and increase us and be in us for the conquest of the plenitude. March with us in our battles that we may grow.

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