The verse and its meaning · Upanishads · Taittiriya · Lessons for the Student

Trishanku's Song of Himself

Taittiriya Upanishad 1.10.1

अहं वृक्षस्य रेरिवा कीर्तिः पृष्ठं गिरेरिव । ऊर्ध्वपवित्रो वाजिनीवस्वमृतमस्मि । द्रविणँसवर्चसम् । सुमेधा अमृतोक्षितः । इति त्रिशङ्कोर्वेदानुवचनम्

Meaning · English

I stir the tree. My name stands like a mountain ridge. Pure as the deathless in the sun, I am shining wealth, wise, undying. Thus Trishanku, having known the Veda.

A seer named Trishanku speaks in the first person about what he has become after taking the Veda fully in. He calls himself the one who sets the tree moving. Commentators take the tree as the world of things that grow and fall. His name stands high and plain, like a ridge against the sky. He is pure from above, like the undying light the sun carries. He is wealth that shines, clear in mind, and soaked through with what does not die.

Look at a tree on a windy afternoon. The branches bend and the leaves turn over, but the wind itself is never seen. Only the movement shows it is there. Trishanku places himself in the wind's position. The world is the moving tree, and he speaks as the unseen push behind it.

अर्थ · हिन्दी

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