01The fourth Veda, the Brahman's Veda
The Vishnu Purana tells that Maharshi Vyasa gave the Atharvaveda to his disciple Sumantu. Sumantu taught it to Kabandha, who divided it between Devadarsha and Pathya, and from these teachers came the shakhas, among them the Shaunaka and the Paippalada. It is apaurusheya like the other three, heard by the rishis Atharvan and Angiras and their families. Because the Brahman priest, who guards the whole yajna, draws his learning from it, it is also called the Brahmaveda. Sushruta calls Ayurveda an upanga, a limb, of the Atharvaveda, and the Mundaka, Mandukya and Prashna Upanishads all belong to it.
02The fourth Veda, the Brahman's Veda
The Vishnu Purana tells that Maharshi Vyasa gave the Atharvaveda to his disciple Sumantu. Sumantu taught it to Kabandha, who divided it between Devadarsha and Pathya, and from these teachers came the shakhas, among them the Shaunaka and the Paippalada. It is apaurusheya like the other three, heard by the rishis Atharvan and Angiras and their families. Because the Brahman priest, who guards the whole yajna, draws his learning from it, it is also called the Brahmaveda. Sushruta calls Ayurveda an upanga, a limb, of the Atharvaveda, and the Mundaka, Mandukya and Prashna Upanishads all belong to it.
03Twenty kandas
The Shaunaka Samhita has twenty kandas, 730 suktas and about 6,000 mantras, some of them in prose. The first seven kandas hold short hymns, broadly arranged by the number of their verses, for healing, protection, the home and the harvest. Kandas 8 to 12 carry longer hymns, ending with the Bhumi Sukta. Kandas 13 to 18 each keep to one theme: Rohita the rising sun, marriage, the Vratya, protection, the departed. Kanda 19 gathers supplementary hymns and kanda 20 is almost wholly made of Rigvedic hymns to Indra, used by the Brahman priest's assistants at the Soma rite. The Paippalada Samhita is also in twenty kandas, with much that the Shaunaka does not have.
04The Veda of Atharvan and Angiras
Its old name is Atharvangirasa, after the two rishi families who saw its mantras. The Atharvan mantras are shanta, for peace and healing; the Angirasa mantras are ghora, to drive away disease, enemies and harmful beings. At the yajna the Brahman priest, the fourth of the great priests, belongs to this Veda. He sits silent and watches the whole rite, and if a fault is made, he sets it right.
05Skambha, prana, kala
Beside its healing charms the Atharvaveda holds some of the deepest hymns of the Samhitas. The Skambha Sukta (10.7) asks what pillar holds up the earth, the sky and the waters, and finds it in Brahman. The hymn to Prana (11.4) bows to breath as the lord of all that lives. The Brahmacharya Sukta (11.5) praises the student who, by tapas and discipline, upholds the worlds. Two hymns to Kala (19.53 and 19.54) see Time as a horse with seven reins that carries all beings. And the Sahridaya Sukta (3.30) prays for a household of one heart and one mind, the members loving one another as a cow loves her new-born calf.
06Gopatha, Kaushika, Vaitana
The Atharvaveda has one Brahmana, the Gopatha, in two parts, which upholds the place of the Brahman priest and of this Veda in the yajna. Its sutras divide the work. The Kaushika Sutra lays out the household and healing rites in which the hymns are used: which mantra for fever, which for a new house, which for the marriage and the funeral. The Vaitana Sutra gives the Atharvavedi share of the great shrauta sacrifices. The Muktika canon assigns thirty-one Upanishads to this Veda, from the Mundaka, Mandukya and Prashna to the Nrisimhatapani, Ramatapani and Ganapati Upanishads, recited in worship to this day.
07Twenty kandas
The Shaunaka Samhita has twenty kandas, 730 suktas and about 6,000 mantras, some of them in prose. The first seven kandas hold short hymns, broadly arranged by the number of their verses, for healing, protection, the home and the harvest. Kandas 8 to 12 carry longer hymns, ending with the Bhumi Sukta. Kandas 13 to 18 each keep to one theme: Rohita the rising sun, marriage, the Vratya, protection, the departed. Kanda 19 gathers supplementary hymns and kanda 20 is almost wholly made of Rigvedic hymns to Indra, used by the Brahman priest's assistants at the Soma rite. The Paippalada Samhita is also in twenty kandas, with much that the Shaunaka does not have.
08Where it is chanted today
The Shaunaka shakha is kept by a small number of Atharvavedi families in Gujarat and Maharashtra, and taught at a few pathashalas. The Paippalada lives on among the Utkala Brahmins of Odisha. Sayanacharya's bhashya covers only part of the Samhita. In the twentieth century Shripad Damodar Satavalekar printed the whole Shaunaka text at Pardi with a Hindi explanation, and many households first met the Bhumi Sukta through his edition. Its marriage mantras from the fourteenth kanda and the funeral mantras of the eighteenth are still used in the samskaras, and the Ganapati Atharvashirsha, recited in every Ganesh puja in Maharashtra, carries the Atharvaveda's name.
What it contains
- 1Kandas 1–7
Short hymns of a few verses each, broadly ordered by length: healing of fever and wounds, protection from harm, long life, the home, the cattle and the harvest. Here is the Sahridaya Sukta (3.30) for harmony in the family.
- 2Kandas 8–12
Longer hymns on large themes. Kanda 10 holds the Skambha Sukta (10.7) on the pillar of all things, kanda 11 the hymns to Prana (11.4) and to the brahmacharin (11.5). Kanda 12 opens with the Bhumi Sukta (12.1), sixty-three mantras to Mother Earth.
- 3Kanda 13: Rohita
Hymns to Rohita, the red rising sun, seen as the power that climbs the sky and upholds the king and the kingdom. Rohita is praised as the one who made heaven and earth firm.
- 4Kanda 14: Vivaha
The marriage hymns, built around the wedding of Surya and Soma that the Rigveda also sings. Their mantras are still spoken as the bride enters her new home.
- 5Kanda 15: Vratya
A kanda in prose on the Vratya, the wandering one who becomes one with the directions, the seasons and Mahadeva himself. The guest who is a true Vratya is to be honoured as the devas are honoured.
- 6Kandas 16–17
Two short kandas. The sixteenth holds protective formulas, largely in prose. The seventeenth is a long prayer to Indra as the sun for victory and freedom from fear.
- 7Kanda 18: the departed
The hymns for the last rites and the pitris, many shared with the funeral hymns of the Rigveda's tenth mandala. They are still used at the antyeshti and the shraddha.
- 8Kandas 19–20
Kanda 19 gathers supplementary hymns, among them the hymns to Kala (19.53–54) and the prayer for fearlessness (19.15). Kanda 20 is a collection of Rigvedic hymns to Indra used by the Brahman priest's assistants at the Soma rite.
Famous verses
सत्यं बृहदृतमुग्रं दीक्षा तपो ब्रह्म यज्ञः पृथिवीं धारयन्ति। सा नो भूतस्य भव्यस्य पत्न्युरुं लोकं पृथिवी नः कृणोतु॥
Truth, the great cosmic order, strength, consecration, tapas, Brahman and the yajna uphold the Earth. May she, queen of what was and what will be, make wide space for us.Atharvaveda (Shaunaka) 12.1.1 (Bhumi Sukta)
माता भूमिः पुत्रो अहं पृथिव्याः। पर्जन्यः पिता स उ नः पिपर्तु॥
The Earth is my mother, and I am her son. Parjanya, the rain-cloud, is my father; may he nourish us.Atharvaveda (Shaunaka) 12.1.12
सहृदयं सांमनस्यमविद्वेषं कृणोमि वः। अन्यो अन्यमभि हर्यत वत्सं जातमिवाघ्न्या॥
I make you of one heart and one mind, free from hatred. Love one another as the cow loves her new-born calf.Atharvaveda (Shaunaka) 3.30.1
अभयं मित्रादभयममित्रादभयं ज्ञातादभयं पुरो यः। अभयं नक्तमभयं दिवा नः सर्वा आशा मम मित्रं भवन्तु॥
Fearlessness from friend and from foe, from the known and from what lies ahead; fearlessness by night and by day. May all the quarters be my friends.Atharvaveda (Shaunaka) 19.15.6
Ayurveda traces itself to the Atharvaveda, and its marriage and funeral hymns are still used in the samskaras. Sayana's commentary covers part of it; W. D. Whitney's translation and the new Paippalada editions made it widely read.