Confusing verse in Rg Veda

tackleberry · 03-26-2008, 04:51 AM

Can some Sanskrit scholar explain this?

A no bhadrAH kratavo yantu vishvataH | (Rg Veda I-89-1)

I know it's usually interpreted as 'Let noble thoughts come from all sides."

But I need a word to word meaning, where is the word 'thoughts' in this verse?

And what does "A no" stand for? I'd appreciate some clear idea on this.

Thanks in advance.

pokoya · 03-26-2008, 03:21 PM

Hi, tackleberry. I want to make clear I am not a Sanskrit scholar, but have studied it on my own for the past year or two. The vertical bar, called a "danda" is one of the few punctuation marks used in writing Sanskrit verse. The single bar marks the halfway point, the double bar marks the end of the verse.

आ नो भद्राः करतवो कष्यन्तु विश्वतो.अदब्धासो अपरीतास उद्भिदः |
देवा नो यथा सदमिद वर्धे असन्नप्रायुवो रक्षितारो दिवे-दिवे ||

ā no bhadrāḥ kratavo kṣyantu viśvato.adabdhāso aparītāsa udbhidaḥ |
devā no yathā sadamid vṛdhe asannaprāyuvo rakṣitāro dive-dive ||

The period of the word viśvato is not a punctuation stop, but is being used, I believe, to mark a relationship between the ending vowel of viśvato and the beginning vowel of adabdhāso.

If you are aware of this, and want simply an explanation of the quarter of a verse you have posted, rather than the full verse, I can possibly answer a few of your questions.

There is no word for "thoughts" in this verse. Here is another tranlation found on the web for the verse:
MAY powers auspicious come to us from every side,

The only problem here, is that there is no word for "Powers" either.

A no bhadrAH kratavo yantu vishvataH | (Rg Veda I-89-1
A - up to, until
no - and not
bhadrAH auspicious day, favourable season
kratavo appears to be either a genitive or locative form of kratu - plan, design, intention, resolution, determination, purpose
kṣyantu is what appears in the text, you have yantu. su-yantu means curbing or guiding well, su is the prefix for good or well. kṣ is a prefix meaning "in an instant", "the moment of".
vishvataH Some methods transcribe sh to z. You would type vishva, others would transcribe as vizva. It means to pervade, and can be used as a word for "all the gods".

If this is correct so far, (and remember, I don't claim it is), a possible translation would go:
"and not until the auspicious moment of God's design"
But I wouldn't really claim this to be an accurate translation, until one has looked at the whole verse. Do you see how the Sanskrit word "no" appears in the second verse, as well as the first? It could mark a phrase which is dependant on another phrase, such as..."Not until A, will B occur", or the like.

tackleberry · 03-28-2008, 01:22 AM

Thanks a lot. What's the full translation, then?

shankara108 · 04-01-2008, 08:35 AM

the solution is much simpler than has been suggested above.

a - preverb, to be taken with yantu
nah - unto us (1st pl. pronoun)
yantu - let them come (3rd pl. from root i 'to go')
bhadrah - auspicious
kratavah - thoughts (-u stem. Cf. Avestan xratu- 'intellect')
vishvatah - from every direction.

'Let auspicious thoughts come unto us from every direction'.

Hope this helps,
Shankar.

tackleberry · 04-02-2008, 04:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shankara108

the solution is much simpler than has been suggested above.

a - preverb, to be taken with yantu
nah - unto us (1st pl. pronoun)
yantu - let them come (3rd pl. from root i 'to go')
bhadrah - auspicious
kratavah - thoughts (-u stem. Cf. Avestan xratu- 'intellect')
vishvatah - from every direction.

'Let auspicious thoughts come unto us from every direction'.

Hope this helps,
Shankar.

Couple of doubts, if you don't mind. I thought 'naH' meant 'our.'

Is vishvataH the ablative form of 'from vishvam?'

Is the exact meaning of kratavaH thoughts (in plural)? What's it in singular?

Is the word 'yaanti' used for both 'come' and 'go.' I take it 'yantu' is an imperative tense of this verb yanti....

shankara108 · 04-02-2008, 05:14 AM

Hi,
I left out the full grammatical parse, thinking it wouldn't be useful. But evidently it is, so:

nah - used for acc.dat.and gen.pl, of 1st pers.prn. 'aham'. Here it stands for the dative, meaning 'to us'.
kratavah - is nom. voc.pl. of masc. and fem. -u stems. Stem is kratu-.
yantu - 3rd.pl.imperative.active voice (parasmaipada) of verb i 'to go'. When modified by pre-verb a it means 'to come' . Alike gam 'to go' a+ gam 'to come'. yantu means 'let them come'.
Best,
Shankar

shankara108 · 04-02-2008, 01:15 PM

I forgot to answer a couple of your other questions:
vishvatah is an indeclinable.
kratu- means 'intellect' etc. But as a plural (agreeing with the pl. of the verb) it can mean 'thoughts' esp. 'good thoughts' when qualified by bhadra- 'auspicious'.
Best,
Shankar.

pokoya · 04-21-2008, 10:11 PM

Thank you Shankar. I enjoyed your comments. Thank you for taking the time to reply to Tackleberry's post.

Pok.