पुरुषसूक्तPuruṣa Sūkta

Ṛgveda 10.90

पुरुषसूक्तPuruṣa Sūkta

The Hymn of the Cosmic Person. Sixteen verses that picture the universe as one vast being, Puruṣa, offered in the first sacrifice, from whom sky, sun, the Vedas and society are born.

सहस्रशीर्षा पुरुषः सहस्राक्षः सहस्रपात्

sahasraśīrṣā puruṣaḥ sahasrākṣaḥ sahasrapāt

Puruṣa has a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, a thousand feet.

Begin with श्रवण · Sanskrit recitation →

Your path

Three stages, in order. Each step fills in as you complete it: listened to the end, or read through.

  1. श्रवण Śravaṇa · Hear

    Listen first. Let the sound of the verses reach you before their meaning does. Follow the words as they light up, and don't worry yet about understanding.

    1. Sanskrit recitation
    2. Chant with meaning
  2. मनन Manana · Reflect

    Now take it apart. Go verse by verse and word by word: what each word means, how the sentence turns, what the ṛṣi is asking.

    1. Where it comes from
    2. Verses
    3. १
    4. २
    5. ३
    6. ४
    7. ५
    8. ६
    9. ७
    10. ८
    11. ९
    12. १०
    13. ११
    14. १२
    15. १३
    16. १४
    17. १५
    18. १६
    19. Key words
  3. निदिध्यासन Nididhyāsana · Absorb

    Let it settle. Hear the ideas behind the verses, sit with their questions, and see what has stayed with you.

    1. A reading of the hymn
    2. The world as sacrifice
    3. Reading verse 12: the four varṇas
    4. Echoes in later texts
    5. Questions to sit with
    6. Check your understanding

Take it with you

Save every page and recording of this course on this device, to listen with no connection: on a train, in a temple, in a village.

What it is

The Puruṣa Sūkta is a hymn of sixteen verses in the Ṛgveda, the oldest of the four Vedas. Its name comes from its subject, puruṣa, which simply means ‘person’, and in English it is often called the Hymn of the Cosmic Person or the Hymn of the Primeval Man.

Where the Nāsadīya Sūkta asks how the world began and leaves the question open, the Puruṣa Sūkta answers with an image. Before anything else there is a vast being called Puruṣa, with a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, a thousand feet, who fills the earth and reaches beyond it. The gods perform the first sacrifice with Puruṣa as the offering, and out of the offering comes everything: the seasons, the animals, the verses and chants of the Veda, the four groups of society, the moon and sun, the sky, the air and the earth. The world is Puruṣa’s body, given away.

Where it comes from

It is hymn 90 of the tenth maṇḍala (book) of the Ṛgveda, written Ṛgveda 10.90. Like the Nāsadīya, it belongs to the tenth maṇḍala. Versions of it also appear in the Yajurveda, the Atharvaveda and the Taittirīya Āraṇyaka, sometimes with extra verses.

The traditional index names its seer (ṛṣi) as Nārāyaṇa, its subject (devatā) as Puruṣa, and its metre as anuṣṭubh, four lines of eight syllables, with a final verse in triṣṭubh. It is one of the most widely recited Vedic hymns today, chanted in temple worship and household rites across India.

What it deals with

  • The one and the many. How can one being be all beings, and still be more than all of them?
  • Creation as sacrifice. The world is not built out of separate material. It comes from an act of total self-giving, which the human ritual repeats.
  • Body and cosmos. Mind and moon, eye and sun, breath and wind: the hymn maps the human body onto the universe.
  • Order. Knowledge, animals, society and the worlds are all given their places. The last verse calls this the first dharman, the first ordinances.

How to use this course

The course follows the three steps of learning named in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad (2.4.5): śravaṇa, manana, nididhyāsana, hearing, reflecting, and absorbing.

  • Śravaṇa (hear). Listen to the hymn chanted in Sanskrit, each word lighting up as it is sung, then hear it again with its meaning.
  • Manana (reflect). Learn where it comes from, then go verse by verse, where every word is broken out with its meaning, and gather the key words.
  • Nididhyāsana (absorb). Hear a narrated reading of the whole hymn, look closely at the idea of sacrifice and at the much-debated verse 12, follow the hymn into later texts, sit with its questions, and check what has stayed with you.

Go in order the first time. Each page you open is ticked off, so you can always pick up where you left off.

Key understandings

  1. The universe is one body

    The hymn's central image is a single cosmic being, Puruṣa, whose body becomes everything: the sky from his head, the earth from his feet, the sun from his eye, the wind from his breath.

  2. Inside the world, and beyond it

    He covers the earth on every side and still reaches past it. All beings are only one quarter of him; three quarters are immortal, beyond the sky.

  3. Creation as self-giving

    The world comes from a sacrifice in which Puruṣa is the offering. Nothing is made from outside material: he gives himself to become everything.

  4. Even knowledge is born

    The verses, chants, meters and formulas of the Veda come from the same sacrifice as the animals and the seasons. Sacred speech is part of the structure of the world.

  5. Body and cosmos mirror each other

    Mind and moon, eye and sun, breath and wind: the hymn maps the person onto the universe, a link the Upaniṣads would later read in reverse.

  6. One body, many readings

    Verse 12 names four social groups as parts of one body. It became the scriptural root of varṇa, used both to justify hierarchy and, by others, to insist that all are one Puruṣa.