✶Gnosis
← Contents
Theme
0962 / 1027

Listen

Dhammapada · narration sample

A one-minute narration sample. Every book in the library is narrated end to end — hear the rest in the app.

Rig Veda · 962 of 1027

Mandala 10: HYMN CXXV. Vāk.

1.I TRAVEL with the Rudras and the Vasus, with the Ādityas and All-Gods I wander. I hold aloft both Varuṇa and Mitra, Indra and Agni, and the Pair of Aśvins.

2.I cherish and sustain high-swelling Soma, and Tvaṣṭar I support, Pūṣan, and Bhaga. I load with wealth the zealous sacrificer who pours the juice and offers his oblation

3.I am the Queen, the gatherer-up of treasures, most thoughtful, first of those who merit worship. Thus Gods have stablished me in many places with many homes to enter and abide in.

4.Through me alone all eat the food that feeds them,—each man who sees, breathes, hears the word outspoken They know it not, but yet they dwell beside me. Hear, one and all, the truth as I declare it. 5 1, verily, myself announce and utter the word that Gods and men alike shall welcome. I make the man I love exceeding mighty, make him a sage, a Ṛṣi, and a Brahman. 6 I bend the bow for Rudra that his arrow may strike and slay the hater of devotion. I rouse and order battle for the people, and I have penetrated Earth and Heaven. 7 On the world’s summit I bring forth the Father: my home is in the waters, in the ocean. Thence I extend o’er all existing creatures, and touch even yonder heaven with my forehead. 8 I breathe a strong breath like the wind and tempest, the while I hold together all existence. Beyond this wide earth and beyond the heavens I have become so mighty in my grandeur.

Asked of Guide

Why does Vāk claim she ‘holds together all existence’ and supports gods and men?

Vāk speaks as the creative, sustaining Word: she names actions — “I travel with the Rudras,” “I cherish and sustain high-swelling Soma,” and “I make the man I love exceeding mighty” — showing speech as the power that empowers gods, grants wealth, and confers sagehood. Her presence in water, on the world’s summit, and her breath “like the wind and tempest” tie linguistic action to cosmological presence, so the hymn locates reality’s cohesion in articulated, living speech.

This chapter treats Vāk as both immanent force and ritual agent: saying is doing, and saying ordains status and order within sacrifice and society. This mirrors ideas in the Upanishads where speech (vak) links to Brahman and creation, especially in the Brihadaranyaka and Mandukya passages that identify word with cosmic principle.

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.