The Twenty-First Hymn to Agni

A HYMN OF THE DIVINE FLAME IN HUMANITY

[The Rishi invokes the divine Flame to burn as the divine Man in humanity and to raise us to our perfection in the seats of the Truth and the Bliss.]

1. As the human1 we set thee within us, as the human we kindle thee; O Flame, O Seer-Puissance, as the human offer sacrifice to the gods for the seeker of the godheads.

2. O Flame, thou burnest in the human creature when thou art satisfied with his offerings; his ladles go to thee unceasingly, O perfect in thy birth, O presser out of the running richness.

3. Thee all the gods with one heart of love made their envoy; O seer, men serve and adore thee in their sacrifices as the godhead.

1 The godhead descending into man assumes the veil of humanity. The god is eternally perfect, unborn, fixed in the Truth and Joy; descending, he is born in man, grows, gradually manifests his completeness, attains as if by battle and difficult progress to the Truth and Joy. Man is the thinker, the god is the eternal seer; but the Divine veils his seerhood in the forms of thought and life to assist the development of the mortal into immortality.  

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4. Let mortal man adore the Will, the divine, by sacrifice to the powers divine; but thou, O Brightness, shine out high kindled; enter into the home of the Truth, enter into the home of the Bliss.

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