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The Twenty-Seventh Hymn to Agni
A HYMN OF THE STRENGTH AND ILLUMINATION
[The Rishi under the figure of the demigod, Traivrishna Tryaruna Trasadasyu, and the seer Ashwamedha, symbolises the fulfilment in the human mentality of the illumination of the God-Mind Indra, and the power of the God-Will, Agni, in the vitality. The Mind-Soul, destroyer of the demons, awakened to knowledge as the human-born Indra, has given to the seer his two cows of light that draw his wain, his two shining horses that draw his chariot and the ten times twelve cows of the dawn of knowledge. He has assented to and confirmed the desire with which the Life-Soul has given the sacrifice of the Life-Horse to the gods. The Rishi prays that this Mind-Soul, lord of the triple dawn, may give to the journeying Life that seeks the truth, the mental intelligence and power of possession needed and may itself in return receive from Agni the peace and bliss. The Life-Soul on the other hand has given the hundred powers, the vital strength needed for the upward journey; the Rishi prays that this Life-Soul may attain to that vast strength which is the power of the Sun of Truth on the superconscient plane.]
1. O Will, O Universal Power,1 the mighty One supreme in vision, master of his being, lord of his plenitudes has given me his two cows of the Light that draw his wain. He of
1 Or, Godhead.
Page – 466 the triple dawn, son of the triple Bull,2 has awakened to knowledge with the ten thousands3 of his plenitude.
2. He gives to me the hundred and twenty4 of the cows of dawn; his two shining5 horses he gives, yoked to the car, that bear aright the yoke. O Will, O Universal Power, do thou rightly affirmed and increasing extend peace and bliss to the lord of the triple dawn.
3. For thus has he done desiring thy grace of mind, new-given for him new-manifested, —he, the disperser of the destroyers,6 the lord of the triple dawn who with attentive mind gives response to the many words of my many births.7
2 The Triple Bull is Indra, lord of the three luminous realms of Swar, the Divine Mind; Tryaruna Trasadasyu is the half-god, man turned into the Indra type; therefore he is described by all the usual epithets of Indra, “Asura”, “Satpati”, “Maghavan”. The triple dawn is the dawn of these three realms on the human mentality. 3 Thousand symbolises absolute completeness, but there are ten subtle powers of the illumined mind each of which has to have its entire plenitude. 4 The symbolic figure of the illuminations of divine knowledge as the series of dawns (cows) of the twelve months of the year and twelve periods of the sacrifice. There are again ten times twelve to correspond to the ten subtle sisters, powers of the illumined mentality. 5 The two shining horses of Indra identical probably with the two cows of light of the first verse; they are the two vision-powers of the supramental Truth-consciousness, right-hand and left-hand, probably direct truth-discernment and intuition. As cows symbolising light of knowledge they yoke themselves to the material mind, the wain; as horses symbolising power of knowledge to the chariot of Indra, the liberated pure mind. 6 Trasadasyu; in all things he reproduces the characteristics of Indra. 7 The seer by this self-fulfilment on the higher plane is born, as it were, into many realms of consciousness and from each of these there go up its words that express the impulses in it which seek a divine fulfilment. The Mind-Soul answers to these and gives assent, it supplies to the word of expression the answering word of illumination and to the Life that seeks the Truth it gives the power of intelligence that finds and holds the Truth.
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4. May he who answers to me with assent give to the illumined giver of the Horse-sacrifice,8 by the word of illumination possession of the goal of his journey; may he give power of intelligence to the seeker of the Truth.
5. A hundred strong bulls of the diffusion9 raise me up to joy; the gifts of the sacrificer of the steed are as outpourings of the wine of delight with their triple infusions.10
6. May the God-Mind and the God-Will uphold in the sacrificer of the Horse and giver of his hundred a perfect energy and a vast force of battle even as in heaven the Sun of Light indestructible.11
8 The Horse-sacrifice is the offering of the Life-power with all its impulses, desires, enjoyments to the divine existence. The Life-soul (Dwita) is itself the giver of this sacrifice which it performs when by the power of Agni it attains to vision on its own vital plane, when it becomes, in the figure of the hymn, the illumined seer Ashwamedha. 9 The complete hundred powers of the Life by whom all the abundance of the vital plane is showered upon the growing man. The vital forces being the instrument of desire and enjoyment, this diffusion is like the outpouring of the wine of delight that raises the soul to new and intoxicating joys. 10 The delight extracted from existence is typified by the honey wine of the Soma; it is mixed with the milk, the curds and the grain, the milk being that of the luminous cows, the curds the fixation of their yield in the intellectual mind and the grain the formulation of the light in the force of the physical mind. These symbolic senses are indicated by the double meaning of the words used, go, dadhi and yava. 11 Perfect and vast energy in the vital being corresponding to the infinite and immortal light of the Truth in the mental being.
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