BOOK I
1
Lords, inspiration of sacrifice! May our ears hear the good. May our eyes see the good. May we serve Him with the whole strength of our body. May we, all our life, carry out His will. May peace and peace and peace be everywhere.
The Creator came first; He created Himself as Creator; then called Himself the Protector of the world. He gave the knowledge of Spirit, foundation of all knowledge, to his eldest son Atharwa.
Atharwa gave it to Angee; Angee to Satyawaha Bharadwaja; Satyawaha Bharadwaja to Angiras.
That famous man the householder Shounaka said to Angiras: 'What is it that when known, makes us know everything in the world?'
Angiras said: 'Those who know Spirit say that there are two kinds of knowledge, a lower and a higher.
'The lower is the knowledge of the four Vedas and such things as pronunciation, ceremonial, grammar, etymology, poetry, astronomy. The higher knowledge is the knowledge of the Everlasting;
'Of that which has neither tangibility, nor antecedent, colour, eyes, ears, hands, feet; of that which is prevalent everywhere, immeasurably minute, self-evident, indestructible, always alive; of that which the wise name the Source.
'As the web springs from the spider and is again withdrawn, as the plant springs from the soil, hairs from the body of man, so springs the world from the Everlasting.
'Brooding Spirit creates food, food life, life mind, mind the elements, the elements the world, the world Karma, Karma the Everlasting.
'He looks at all things; knows all things. All things, their nourishment, their names, their forms, are from His will. All that He has willed is right.
'The Sages studied the rituals described in the Vedas, went beyond them to the truth. You may find it better to stay with them; if you seek the reward of your actions, stay with them.
'When the sacrificial fire has been kindled, set it ablaze with butter, pour an oblation, then let the butter set it ablaze again.
'If the worshipper does not offer his sacrifice, according to the rules, during the new moon, or full moon, or at the rainy season, or at harvest time, if he offer it without regularity or at other seasons, or not at all, if he entertain no guests at the sacrifice, his people for seven generations shall be unlucky.
'There are seven tongues of fire, the ruinous, the terrible, the swift, the smoky, the red, the bright, the flickering.
'If the sacrifice has been made at the right time, the tongues, emblem of the solar rays, carry the devotee into paradise.
'"Welcome! Welcome!" cry his pleasant flattering good deeds, as the tongues, emblem of the solar rays, carry him. "Look upon what we have made for you, look upon this beautiful paradise."
'Those sacrifices with their crew of eighteen men, are unseaworthy ships, belong to a trivial karma. The fool fixes his hopes upon them; goes to wreck.
'Fools brag of their knowledge, proud, ignorant, dissolving; staggering to and fro, blind and led by the blind;
'Dunces think, in their pride, that they have solved every problem; the passionate never learn. All these, the merit of their sacrifice exhausted, are thrust from paradise into the misery of life.
'These dunces think ritual and alms are enough, they know nothing of the good itself; when ritual and alms have done their work, they fall into their old human life or it may be lower still.
'The wise and the clean, content with what they get, living in solitude, practising austerities, go to the Deathless, through the gates of the sun.
'He that understands the results of action, wants to renounce them all. Activity cannot attain the Inactive; therefore, with hands folded, let him go to some teacher who lives in Spirit and in whom revelation lives.
'To such a pupil, humble, master of mind and sense, the teacher can teach all he knows, bringing him to the Deathless.'
BOOK II
1
'This is the truth: the sparks, though of one nature with the fire, leap from it; uncounted beings leap from the Everlasting, but these, my son, merge into It again.
'The Everlasting is shapeless, birthless, breathless, mindless, above everything, outside everything, inside everything.
'From Him are born life, mind, sense, air, wind, water, earth that supports all.
'He is the inmost Self of all. Fire, His head; sun and moon, His eyes; the four quarters, His ears; revelation, His voice; wind, His breath; world, His heart; earth, His feet.
'Fire is from Him, its fuel sun, moon from sun, rain from moon, food from rain, man from food, seed from man; thus all descends from God.
'From Him are hymns, holy chants, ritual, initiation, sacrifice, ceremonial, oblation, time, deeds, everything under sun and moon;
'From Him, gods, angels, men, cattle, birds, living fires, rice, barley, austerity, faith, truth, continence, law;
'From Him seven senses like ritual fires, seven desires like flames, seven objects like oblations, seven pleasures like sacrifices, seven nerves like habitations, seven centres in the heart like hollows in the cavern.
'From Him, seas, rivers, mountains, herbs and their properties: in the middle of the elements the inmost Self.
'My son! There is nothing in this world, that is not God. He is action, purity; everlasting Spirit. Find Him in the cavern; know the knot of ignorance.
'Shining, yet hidden, Spirit lives in the cavern. Everything that sways, breathes, opens, closes, lives in Spirit; beyond learning, beyond everything, better than anything; living, unliving.
'It is the undying blazing Spirit, that seed of all seeds, wherein lay hidden the world and all its creatures. It is life, speech, mind, reality, immortality. It is there to be struck. Strike it, my son!
'Take the bow of our sacred knowledge, lay against it the arrow of devotion, pull the string of concentration, strike the target.
'Om is the bow, the personal self the arrow, impersonal Self the target. Aim accurately, sink therein.
'Into His cloak are woven earth, mind, life, the canopy, the Kingdom of Heaven. He is alone and sole; man's bridge to immortality.
'Come out of all the schools. Meditate upon Om as the Self. Remember He takes many shapes, lives in the hub where the arteries meet; and may His blessing bring you out of the darkness.
'He knows all, knows every particular. His glory prevails on earth, in heaven, in His own seat, the holy city of the heart.
'He becomes mind and guides body and life. He lives in man's heart and eats man's food. He that knows Him, in finding joy, finds immortality.
'He that knows Him as the shaped and the shapeless, cuts through the knot of his heart, solves every doubt, exhausts every action.
'In a beautiful golden scabbard hides the stainless, indivisible, luminous Spirit.
'Neither sun, moon, star, neither fire nor lightning, lights Him. When He shines, everything begins to shine. Everything in the world reflects His light.
'Spirit is everywhere, upon the right, upon the left, above, below, behind, in front. What is the world but Spirit?'
BOOK III
1
'Two birds, bound one to another in friendship, have made their homes on the same tree. One stares about him, one pecks at the sweet fruit.
'The personal self, weary of pecking here and there, sinks into dejection; but when he understands through meditation that the other—the impersonal Self—is indeed Spirit, dejection disappears.
'When the sage meets Spirit, phallus and what it enters, good and evil disappear, they are one.
'The sage who knows Him as life and the giver of life, does not assert himself; playing with Self, enjoying Self, doing his duty, he takes his rank.
'The Self is found by veracity, purity, intelligence, continence. The ascetic, so purged, discovers His burning light in the heart.
'Falsehood turns from the way; truth goes all the way; the end of the way is truth; the way is paved with truth. The sage travels there without desire.
'Truth lies beyond imagination, beyond paradise; great, smaller than the smallest; near, further than the furthest; hiding from the traveller in the cavern.
'Nor can penance discover Him, nor ritual reveal, nor eye see, nor tongue speak; only in meditation can mind, grown pure and still, discover formless truth.
'The Self shines out of the pure heart, when life enters with its five fires and fills the mind.
'A pure man gets all he wants. A man with mind fixed upon some man who knows the Self, gets all he wants.'
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'The daring man adores the knower of that Spirit, wherein the world lives and is bright; knows him escaped from the seminal fluid.
'He who desires one thing after another, brooding over them, is born where his desires can be satisfied; but the Self attained, one desire satisfied, all are satisfied.
'The Self is not known through discourse, splitting of hairs, learning however great. He comes to the man He loves; takes that man's body as His own.
'Blunderers, charlatans, weaklings, cannot attain the Self. He is found by the pure, daring, cautious man.
'He who has found Him, seeks no more; the riddle is solved; desire gone, he is at peace. Having approached from everywhere that which is everywhere, whole, he passes into the Whole.
'When the ascetic has mastered theory and practice, he forgets body, remembers Spirit, attains immortality.
'His phases return to their source, his senses to their gods, his personal self and all his actions to the impersonal imperishable Self.
'As rivers lose name and shape in the sea, wise men lose name and shape in God, glittering beyond all distance.
'He who has found Spirit, is Spirit. Nobody ignorant of Spirit is born into his family. He goes beyond sorrow, sin, death; the knots of his heart unloosed.
'The Rig-Veda says "Tell this to those that know the Vedas, do their duty, obey the law, make themselves an oblation to the sole Fire."
'This is that ancient Truth,' sage Angiras declared. 'Obey the law and understand.'
We bow down to you, Great Sage! Bow down to you, Great Sages!