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Dhammapada · narration sample

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Rig Veda · 681 of 1027

Mandala 8: HYMN LXI. Agni.

1.PREPARE oblation: let him come; and let the minister serve again Who knows the ordering thereof,

2.Rejoicing in his friendship, let the priest be seated over man, Beside the shoot of active power.

3.Him, glowing bright beyond all thought, they seek among the race of man; With him for tongue they seize the food.

4.He hath inflamed the twofold plain: life-giving, he hath climbed the wood, And with his tongue hath struck the rock.

5.Wandering here the radiant Calf finds none to fetter him, and seeks The Mother to declare his praise.

6.And now that great and mighty team, the team of horses that are his, And traces of his car, are seen.

7.The seven milk a single cow; the two set other five to work, On the stream’s loud-resounding bank.

8.Entreated by Vivasvān’s ten, Indra cast down the water-jar With threefold hammer from the sky.

9.Three times the newly-kindled flame proceeds around the sacrifice: The priests anoint it with the meath.

10.With reverence they drain the fount that circles with its wheel above, Exhaustless, with the mouth below.

11.The pressing-stones are set at work: the meath is poured into the tank, At the out-shedding of the fount.

12.Ye cows, protect the fount: the two Mighty Ones bless the sacrifice. The handles twain are wrought of gold.

13.Pour on the juice the ornament which reaches both the heaven and earth Supply the liquid to the Bull.

14.These know their own abiding-place: like calves beside the mother cows They meet together with their kin.

15.Devouring in their greedy jaws, they make sustaining food in heaven, To Indra, Agni light and prayer.

16.The Pious One milked out rich food, sustenance dealt in portions seven, Together with the Sun’s seven rays.

17.I took some Soma when the Sun rose up, O Mitra, Varuṇa. That is the sick man’s medicine.

18.From where oblations must be laid, which is the Well-beloved’s home, He with his tongue hath compassed heaven.

Asked of Guide

Why does the hymn call Agni a 'radiant Calf' and mention cows and milking so often?

The hymn uses the image of a ‘radiant Calf’ and repeated cow-and-milking language to picture Agni as a living, nourishing presence at the sacrifice: he is both eater and producer, ‘‘devouring in their greedy jaws’’ yet making ‘‘sustaining food in heaven.’’ These pastoral metaphors tie the household fire to the cosmic herd, so the ritual exchange—milk, soma, oblation—becomes a way the community feeds and is fed by the gods.

The poem links Agni to the sun and to Vivasvān’s ten and sevenfold structures, so the milking motif also encodes cosmic order: the ‘‘seven rays’’ and ‘‘ten’’ suggest celestial forces whose bounty Agni channels. This mirrors descriptions in the Brāhmaṇas where sacrificial images of cows and milk stand for sacrificial nourishment and the maintenance of the world.

Guide is the guide inside the Gnosis app, where every book on these shelves is free to read. Guide is the part you pay for — your guide has read all of them, and answers about the passage you’re actually on. Ask your guide your own question.