Atharva-Veda Samhita/Book XIX/Hymn 39

39. With kúṣṭha: against diseases.

[Bhṛgvan̄giras.—daçakam. mantroktakuṣṭhadevatyam. ānuṣṭubham: 2, 3. pathyāpan̄kti; 4. 6-p. jagatī (2-4. 3-av.); 5. 7-p. çakvarī; 6-8. aṣṭi (5-8. 4-av.).]

Found also in Pāipp. vii. The viniyoga is the same with that of the preceding hymn. ⌊Whitney, note to Prāt. ii. 67, speaks of the critical bearing of the fact that vs. 1 is cited by the comm. to the Prāt.: see above, p. 896, ¶1.⌋

Translated: Grohmann, Ind. Stud. ix. 392, 420-422 (parts); Ludwig, p. 198; Bloomfield, 5, 676; Griffith, ii. 295.—Hillebrandt, Ved. Mythol., i. 65-66, discussing the connection of kuṣṭha and soma, cites part of the hymn. Cf. v. 4 and vi. 95.

1. Let the heavenly rescuing kúṣṭha come hither from off the snowy [mountain]; do thou make vanish all takmán and all the sorceresses.

Of course, himávant may also be rendered 'Himālaya.' ⌊For -tas pari, cf. note to Prāt. ii. 67.⌋ Emendation in c to nāçáyan is suggested as acceptable; ⌊and nāçayaṁ is the reading of Ppp., both here and in 5 f⌋. Some of the mss. read at the beginnings étu; the pada-mss. have blunderingly āitu instead of ā́: etu; SPP. emends to the latter.

2. Three names are thine, O kúṣṭha: by-no-means-killing, by-no-means-harming:—by no means may this man take harm, for whom I bespeak (pari-brū) thee, at evening and in the morning, likewise by day.

In a, part of the mss. accent kúṣṭha. In b, c, SPP. reads nadyamāró nadyā́riṣaḥ: nádyā ’yám etc. There is hardly any ms. that distinguishes dya and gha in such a manner that confidence can be placed in its testimony as between the two; so that, although SPP. reports nadya- from all his mss., it is really of no account. But the comm. shows that he reads nadya- by his explanation: nadya, he says, means "being in a stream (nadī)," and by "stream" is meant the waters (udakāni) in a stream; and the virtual sense is "diseases that originate in faults of water": or else, he sagely adds (betraying that his expositions are, as usual, the merest guesses of a skilless etymologist), nadya means nadanīya or çabdanīya: i.e., atyantaduṣpariharatvena çabdyamāna; and the two epithets mean "killing" or "harming" such nadyas; while the third name is nadya simply, since a killer (māraka) of nadyas is himself called nadya. We had the second of the two epithets above, at viii. 2. 6 and 7. 6, and in the former passage the comm. explained (falsely) and read nagha-. It seems hardly doubtful that our readings. ⌊with gh, not dy⌋ and the translation founded on them are the true ones here, though that implies that the comm. worked from mss. only, and not from oral representatives of the text ⌊Weber, Sb. 1896, p. 681, discusses na gha.⌋ Ppp. agrees precisely with our text in b and c (in d it has asmāi and in e divaḥ). In b, all the mss. read (assuming, here and later, that the character is dya, and not gha) nadyá mā́ro (p. nadyá: mā́raḥ); nearly all follow it with nadyā́yuṣo or -ṣaḥ (p. nadyá: ā́yuṣaḥ); but two of SPP's, and two others p.m., give nadyā́riṣo ⌊the comm. nadyariṣo⌋. In c the general reading is nadyā́yámpúruṣoriṣat, but one or two fail to accent ’yam, and a few have -ṣo rṣat (all the pada-mss. ṛṣat). The comm. treats nadya in c as a vocative, and SPP. accordingly changes the accent to nádyā ’yám; in b he alters the pada-text to nadya॰māráḥ: nadyá॰riṣaḥ. The Anukr. pronounces this verse, as well as the two following, tryavasāna, but nearly all the mss. omit here the sign of interpunction before na ghā ’yam puruṣo riṣat, although they introduce it both times later; in this verse, our edition follows the mss., but SPP's the Anukr. In d, all the mss. give pári bra-; SPP. follows us in emending the accent to paribrávīmi. The comm. repeats nadyā ’yam puruṣo riṣat a second time.

3. "Lively" by name is thy mother; "living" by name is thy father:—by no means may etc. etc.

All the mss., the comm., and Ppp., read in b jīvantás, and so of course SPP.; there was doubtless no sufficient reason for altering to jīvalás in our text. Ppp. adds further, after pitā, mārṣa nāma te svasā. With a, b compare i. 24. 3 a, b.

4. Thou art the highest (uttamá) of herbs, as the draft-ox of moving creatures (jágat), as the tiger of beasts of prey:—by no means may etc. etc.

⌊Pādas a-c are repeated from viii. 5. 11: see note.⌋ Ppp. combines uttamo ‘sy oṣ-. It repeats in the refrain its readings asmāi and divaḥ (see note to vs. 2).

5. Thrice from the Çāmbus, from the An̄girases, thrice from the Ādityas, thrice from the All-Gods art thou born; this all-healing kúṣṭha stands along with soma; do thou make vanish all the takmán and all the sorceresses.

All the authorities ⌊save Ppp.⌋ agree in çā́mbubhyas, and our alteration to bhṛ́gubhyas is not to be approved. All our saṁhitā-mss., and the majority of SPP's saṁhitā-authorities, with the text of the comm., read after it án̄gireyebhyas (one or two -raye-), and the comm. takes the word as adjective (= an̄girasām apatyabhūtebhyaḥ) qualifying çā́mbubhyas. SPP. adopts án̄girebhyas, with the rest of the mss.; our emendation to -robhyas is a very simple and plausible one, when dealing with a text in the condition of this. Ppp. is very corrupt: tiṣyāmividyogirayebhyas; in d, further, it has -bheṣaja, in e tiṣṭhasi, in f nāçayaṁ (as in 1 c). SPP., probably by an oversight, inserts a stroke of interpunction between d and e; it is against the Anukr., and our mss. do not have it.

6. The açvatthá, seat of the gods, in the third heaven from here: there [is] the sight (cákṣaṇa) of immortality; thence was born the kúṣṭha.

This verse and the next correspond nearly with v. 4. 3, 4 (repeated as vi. 95. 1, 2). Most of the mss. accent in d kuṣṭhás. SPP. adds to this verse and the next the last four pādas of vs. 5, as a refrain continued from that verse; and this is evidently the understanding of the Anukr., and the comm. ratifies it. Whether SPP. makes the addition on the authority of these two alone, or whether some of his mss. also intimate it, he does not state; not one of our mss. gives any sign of it. ⌊Ppp. has jayatāt saḥ: presumably answering to the end of pāda d of the Berlin ed.; but Roth's Collation is not quite clear.⌋

7. A golden ship, of golden tackle, moved about in the sky; there [is] the sight etc. etc.

As to the correspondence and the extent of this verse, see the note to vs. 6. Ppp. reads hiraṇyena nāur ⌊and omits c, d⌋.

8. Where there is no falling downward (?), where the head of the snowy [mountain], there is the sight of immortality; thence was born the kúṣṭha:—this all-healing kúṣṭha etc. etc. (as vs. 5).

The mss. all ⌊save SPP's D., which has nā́vaḥ: cf. the navaṣ of Ppp.⌋ read in a nā́ ’va prabhráṅçanam (p. ná: áva: pra॰bhr-), and the comm. so understands it (yatra dyuloke tatrasthānāṁ sukṛtinām avān̄mukhaprabhraṅço nā ’sti); and considering this (if there were such a place-name, it is just the sort of thing that we might fairly expect the comm. to know and report), and that nāva nowhere appears as combination-form of nāu, and that pra-bhraṅç is not used of the sliding down of a boat or ship on a mountain, and appears wholly unadapted to that use, it must be pronounced an excessively daring and not less questionable proceeding to emend to nāvaprabhráṅçanam, translate it by the "descent of the ship," and connect it with the more modern Brāhmaṇa-legend of Manu's flood—as is done in our text, by Weber in his notes to Die Fluthsage (Ind. Streifen i. 11), and by others elsewhere ⌊cf. Griffith's note⌋. Ppp. reads ⌊sa⌋ yatra navaṣ paribhraçanaṁ.

9. Thou whom Ikshvāku of old knew, or thou whom Kushṭhakāmya [knew], whom Vāyasa, whom Mātsya—thereby art thou all-healing.

There is almost nothing here that is not very questionable. Only the comm. has ikṣvākus in a; the majority of mss. give íṣvākas, but some (which SPP. follows) íkṣvākas. In b the pada-mss. divide kuṣṭha: kāmyàḥ, and the comm. so understands it (kāmya = kāmaputra); SPP. follows them; though here our emendation to kuṣṭha-kāmyàs seems plainly called for. In c, the mss. have yáṁ vā váso (or vā́so: SPP. váso) yám ā́tsyas t-; the text of the comm., yaṁ vā vaso yamāsyas (explained as "having a mouth like Yama's"!); here emendation is a rather desperate undertaking; the translation follows the conjectures of our text ⌊but with íkṣvākur in a⌋. Ppp. reads, in a-c, pūrvakṣvāko yaṁ vā tvā kuṣṭikāç ca ahiçyāvaso anusāricchas tenā- etc.—too corrupt to give any help.

10. The head-paining, the tertian, ⌊and⌋ that which is constant, is hibernal—the takmán, O thou of power in every direction, do thou impel (sū) away downward.

The last half-verse is identical with v. 22. 3 c, d, above. The mss. read in a çīrṣalokám (p. -ṣa॰lo-); and the comm. understands it as two words, çīrṣa lokam, translating "they call thy head the third world (i.e. the sky, which is third world in respect to earth)"! Ppp. has çīrṣālākaṁ. The comm. reads in c -vīryam, with his customary disregard of accent; ⌊some mss. accent viçvádhā, thus suggesting viçvádhāvīryam (epithet of takmā́nam) as a possible, if inferior, variant⌋. Only two or three of the mss. give the accent tṛ́tīyakam, found elsewhere in the text (i. 25. 4: v. 22. 13), and SPP. follows the majority and adopts tṛtī́-. SPP. is also inconsistent in writing in pada-text sadam॰díḥ but in saṁhitā-text sadandír; Ppp. has instead sadantī.