February 1998

The Vedas

God's Word, Sages' Voices

May Mitra, Varuna and Aryaman grant us freedom and space enough for us and for our children! May we find pleasant pathways, good to travel! Preserve us evermore, O Gods, with blessings.
Rig Veda 7.63.6

There is on Earth no diversity. He gets death after death who perceives here seeming diversity. As a unity only is It to be looked upon--this indemonstrable, enduring Being, spotless, beyond space, the unborn Soul, great, enduring.
Shukla Yajur Veda, Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 4.4.19­20

Where there is duality, there one sees another, one smells another, one tastes another, one speaks to another, one hears another, one knows another. But where everything has become one's own Self, with what should one see whom, with what should one smell whom, with what should one taste whom, with what should one speak to whom, with what should one hear whom, with what should one think of whom, with what should one touch whom, with what should one know whom? How can He be known by whom all this is made known?
Shukla Yajur Veda, Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 4.5.19

Than whom there is naught else higher, than whom there is naught smaller, naught greater, the One stands like a tree established in heaven. By Him, the Person, is this whole universe filled.
Krishna Yajur Veda, Svetaswatara Upanishad 3.9

O guide of the spirits, restore to us our sight, give us again our life breath and powers of enjoyment. Long may our eyes behold the rising of the sun! O gracious Goddess, grant us your favor and bless us. May Earth restore to us our breath of life, may Goddess Heaven and the aery space return it! May Soma give us once again a body and Pushan show us again the way of salvation.
Rig Veda 10.39.6­7