{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/sbe32/sbe3234.htm","path":"hin/sbe32/sbe3234.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/sbe32/sbe3234.htm","text":"Vedic Hymns, Part I (SBE32), by Max M\u00fcller, [1891]\n1. O Sy\u00e2v\u00e2sva, sing boldly with 1 the Maruts, the singers who, worthy themselves of sacrifice, rejoice in their guileless glory 2 according to their nature.\n2. They are indeed boldly the friends of strong power; they on their march protect all who by themselves are full of daring 1.\n3. Like rushing bulls, these Maruts spring over 1 the dark cows (the clouds) 2, and then we perceive the might of the Maruts in heaven and on earth.\n4. Let us boldly offer praise and sacrifice to your Maruts, to all them who protect the generation of men, who protect the mortal from injury.\n5. They who are worthy, bounteous, men of perfect strength, to those heavenly Maruts who are worthy of sacrifice, praise the sacrifice!\n6. The tall men 1, coming near with their bright chains, and their weapon, have hurled forth their spears. Behind these Maruts there came by itself the splendour of heaven, like laughing lightnings 2.\n7. Those who have grown up on earth, or in the wide sky, or in the realm of the rivers, or in the abode of the great heaven,\n8. Praise that host of the Maruts, endowed with true strength and boldness 1, whether those rushing heroes have by themselves harnessed (their horses) for triumph,\n9. Or whether these brilliant Maruts have in the (speckled) cloud clothed themselves in wool 1, or\nwhether by their strength they cut the mountain asunder with the tire of their chariot;\n10. Call them comers, or goers, or enterers, or followers, under all these names, they watch on the straw 1 for my sacrifice.\n11. The men (the Maruts) watch, and their steeds watch. Then, so brilliant are their forms to be seen, that people say, Look at the strangers 1!\n12. In measured steps 1 and wildly shouting 2 the gleemen 3 have danced toward the well (the cloud). They who appeared one by one like thieves, were helpers to me to see the light 4.\n13. Worship, therefore, O seer, that host of Maruts, and keep and delight them with your voice, they who are themselves wise 1 poets, tall heroes armed with lightning-spears.\n14. Approach, O seer, the host of Maruts, as a woman approaches a friend, for a gift 1; and you, Maruts, bold in your strength 2, hasten hither, even from heaven, when you have been praised by our hymns.\n15. If he, after perceiving them, has approached them as gods with an offering, then may he for a gift remain united with the brilliant (Maruts), who by their ornaments are glorious on their march.\n16. They, the wise 1 Maruts, the lords, who, when there was inquiry for their kindred, told me of the cow, they told me of Prisni as their mother, and of the strong Rudra as their father.\n17. The seven and seven heroes 1 gave me each a hundred. On the Yamun\u00e2 I clear off glorious wealth in cows, I clear wealth in horses.\nThis hymn is ascribed to Sy\u00e2v\u00e2sva \u00c2treya. Metre, Anushtubh, 1-5, 7-15; Pa\u1e45kti, 6, 16, and 17. S\u00e2yana seems to take verse 16 as an Anushtubh, which of course is a mistake. No verse of this hymn occurs in SV., VS., TS., TB., MS., AV.\nNote 1. One expects the dative or accusative after arka. The instrumental leaves us no choice but to translate, 'Sing with the Maruts, who are themselves famous as singers.' Cf. I, 6, 8; V, 60, 8.\nNote 2. On sr\u00e1vah m\u00e1danti, see Gaedicke, Accusativ, p. 75.\nNote 1. Dhrishadv\u00ednas may also refer to the Maruts.\nNote 1. One expects \u00e1dhi instead of \u00e1ti, see Gaedicke, Accusativ, p. 95 seq.\nNote 2. See note to I, 37, 5; also, Bartholomae in Bezzenberger's Beitr\u00e4ge, XV, 211. The whole verse has been discussed by Benfey, Vedica und Verwandtes, p. 152 seq.\nNote 1. This verse has been discussed before, I, 168, 7, note. Benfey (Nachrichten der K. Ges. der Wiss. zu G\u00f6ttingen, 1876, 28 Juni; comp. Vedica und Verwandtes, p. 141) translated it: 'Heran \u2026 haben die Helden, die hehren, ihre Speere geschleudert; ihnen, den Maruts, nach (erheben sich) traun gleichsam lachende Blitze, erhebt sich selbst des Himmels Glanz.' Rishv\u00e2\u00b4h seems here, as in verse 13, to refer to the Maruts, as in IV, 19, I, rishv\u00e1m refers to Indra, though it can be used of weapons also, see VI, 18, 10. As to the instrumentalis comitativus in rukma\u00edh and yudh\u00e2\u00b4, see Lanman, p. 335.\nNote 2. Benfey's explanation of g\u00e1ghghat\u00eeh is ingenious, though it leaves some difficulties. The writing of ghgh in Devan\u00e2gar\u00ee may have been meant for ggh, as in akhkhal\u00eekr\u00edtya, VII, 103. 3. But there remains the fact that gaksh occurs in the sense of laughing, I, 33, 7, and one does not see why it should have undergone a Prakritic change in our passage, and not there. It might be a mimetic word, to express the sound of rattling and clattering; cf. ga\u00f1gan\u00e2bh\u00e1van, VIII, 43, 8.\nNote 1. As to the adjective in the masculine gender after s\u00e1rdhas, see I, 37, 1, note. The meaning of r\u00edbhvas, bold, rabid, is doubtful; see Bergaigne, Rel. V\u00e9d. II, 408.\nNote 1. S\u00e2yana takes Parushn\u00ee as the name of one of the rivers of the Punj\u00e2b, called the Ir\u00e2vat\u00ee, and at present the Ravi. Parushn\u00ee might mean speckled, muddy, as a synonym of prisni. Roth has suggested that parushn\u00ee might here mean cloud. But what is the meaning of parushn\u00ee in a similar passage, IV, 22, 2. (\u00cdndrah) sriy\u00e9 p\u00e1rushn\u00eem ush\u00e1m\u00e2nah\u2013\u00fb\u00b4rn\u00e2m y\u00e1sy\u00e2h p\u00e1rv\u00e2ni sakhy\u00e2\u00b4ya vivy\u00e9? If it means that Indra clothed himself in speckled wool, that wool might be intended for what we call woolly or fleecy clouds. As the Maruts often perform the same acts as Indra, we might read in our verse ut\u00e1 sma t\u00e9 p\u00e1rushn\u00ees \u00fb\u00b4rn\u00e2h, and pronounce ut\u00e1 sma t\u00e9 p\u00e1rushnia \u00fb\u00b4rn\u00e2h, though Lanman, p. 395, objects to ias for \u00ees in the acc. plur. See, however, het\u00ee\u00b4h \u00e1dev\u00eeh in VIII, 61, 16. The instrumental singular is possible, but again unusual with vas, p\u00e1rushny\u00e2 \u00fb\u00b4rn\u00e2. Possibly the original meaning of parushn\u00ee may have been forgotten, and if the name of the river Parushn\u00ee was generally known, it might easily have taken the place of parushn\u00ee, the cloud. For other explanations see Roth, \u00dcber gewisse K\u00fcrzungen, Wien, 1887; Bartholomae, in Kuhn's Zeitschrift, XXIX, 583; Schmidt, Die Pluralbildungen der indogermanischen Neutra, 1889, p. 307.\nNote 1. Visht\u00e2r\u00e1h does not occur again, and Lanman is therefore quite justified in assigning to it the meaning of straw (p. 339). He paraphrases: 'Let their customs carry them where they may, yet when I sacrifice, they wait quietly on the straw, i. e. the altar, for it.' He reads in the Pada text vi-st\u00e2r\u00e9 for vi-st\u00e2r\u00e1h. Visht\u00e2r\u00edn, which occurs AV. IV, 34, 1, does not throw much light on the exact meaning of visht\u00e2ra in this place. If we retain Visht\u00e2r\u00e1h, the nominative, we must assign to it the meaning of crowd, and refer it to the Maruts.\nNote 1. P\u00e2r\u00e2vata is a turtle-dove (VS. XXIV, 25), and it is just possible that the Maruts might have been compared to them. But p\u00e2r\u00e2vata is used in VIII, 100, 6, as an epithet of vasu, wealth, and in VIII, 34, 18, we read of r\u00e2tis (not r\u00e2tris), i. e. gifts of P\u00e2r\u00e2vata. The river Sarasvat\u00ee is called p\u00e2r\u00e2vataghn\u00ee, killing P\u00e2r\u00e2vata, VI, 61, 2, and in the Pa\u00f1kav. Br. IX, 4, 1I, we hear that Turasravas and the P\u00e2r\u00e2vatas offered their Somas together. I am therefore inclined to take P\u00e2r\u00e2vata, lit. distant people, extranei, strangers, as a name of an Aryan border clan with whom the Vedic Aryas were sometimes at war, sometimes at peace. In that case the frontier-river, the Sarasvat\u00ee, might be called the destroyer or enemy of the P\u00e2r\u00e2vatas. As their wealth and gifts have been mentioned, to compare the Maruts with the P\u00e2r\u00e2vatas may mean no more than that the Maruts also are rich and generous. Ludwig thinks of the \u03a0\u03b1\u03c1\u03c5\u1fc6\u03c4\u03b1\u03b9, which seems more doubtful. For a different interpretation see Delbr\u00fcck, Syntax, p. 531.\nNote 1. I take khandahst\u00fabh in the sense of stepping (according to) a measure, as explained in my Preface (1st ed.), p. cii, though I do not doubt that that meaning was afterwards forgotten, and replaced by the technical meaning of stubh, to shout. See B\u00f6htlingk-Roth, s. v. stubh, and\nstobhagrantha, S\u00e2ma-veda, Bibl. Ind., II, p. 519. It can hardly be supposed that such artificial performances of Vedic hymns, as are preserved in the S\u00e2ma-veda, could have suggested the first names of the ancient metres.\nNote 2. Kubhany\u00fa can only be derived from bhan, to shout.\nNote 3. The k\u00eer\u00ednah are probably intended here for strolling minstrels who, when they approached the well of a village (here the cloud), might be taken either for friends or foes.\nNote 4. Dris\u00ed tvish\u00e9. Grassmann translates: 'Wie R\u00e4uberbanden schienen sie geschart zum Andrang meinem Blick.' Ludwig better: 'Helfer waren sie, glanz zu sehn.' We must either read dris\u00e9 tvish\u00e9, to see the light, or dris\u00e9 tvish\u00ed, to be seen by light. See, however, P. G., Ved. Stud. p. 225.\nNote 1. Vedhas, wise. The different possible meanings of this word have been discussed by Ludwig, Z. D. M. G. XL, p. 716; and by Bartholomae, in Kuhn's Zeitschrift, XXVII, p. 361.\nNote 1. On d\u00e2n\u00e2\u00b4, see Lanman, pp. 533, 335; P. G., Ved. Stud. p. 101.\nNote 2. Dhrishnavah \u00f3gas\u00e2 to be read \u0304 \u0306 \u0304 \u0306 \u0304.\nThis verse, as Roth says, is very obscure, and the translation is purely tentative. Grassmann derives vaksh\u00e1n\u00e2 from vah in the sense of an offering. It may more easily be derived from vaksh, i. e. what gives increase, and be taken as an instrumental. Pischel shows that in many passages vakshan\u00e2 in the plural has the meaning of yoni, also of the yoni on the altar. But even this meaning does not throw much light on our passage. The first p\u00e2da may possibly be taken in an interrogative and conditional sense, or we may translate: 'Now, having perceived them, may he, as a refreshing draught goes to the gods, come\ntogether with the Maruts for his reward.' Whatever the verse may mean, esh\u00e2m dev\u00e2\u00b4n cannot mean the gods of the Maruts, or prove the existence of idols, as Bollensen (Z. D. M. G. XXII, 587) and even Muir (S. T. V, 454) imagined. The translation of Pischel, Ved. Stud. p. 101, s\u00fbr\u00edbhih a\u00f1g\u00edbhih mit 'Herren, die schmieren, d. h. ordentlich bezahlen,' seems too exclusively German. Could a\u00f1gin be an adjective, in the sense of possessed of a\u00f1gis?\nNote 1. If s\u00edkvas is not to be derived from sak (see H\u00fcbschmann, Vocalsystem, pp. 64, 186), we should have to derive nis, night, from a root altogether different from that which yields nakt, n\u00e1kta, &c. But how does s\u00edkvas come to mean, according to Ludwig, both bunch of flowers, and flaming? Does he connect it with sikh\u00e2? Surely, if siksh may stand for sisak-s, why not sik-vas for *sisakvas? 'Bright' leaves it doubtful whether it means clever or flaming.\nNote 1. The seven, seven heroes need not be the Maruts, but some liberal patrons who rewarded Sy\u00e2v\u00e2sva. See Bergaigne, Rel. V\u00e9d. II, 371.","title":"Vedic Hymns, Part I (SBE32): Vedic Hymns: V, 52. To the Maruts (the Storm-gods)","type":"page"}