Observations placeholder
Rig veda - The Golden Womb
Identifier
004772
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
The yolk, or the central core of the onion was also perceived in some observations as being ‘a womb’. In Hindu observations it was called the Hiranyagarbha (golden womb) and (the first egg). In effect, in any cosmology concerning the order of creation, the yolk of the egg, the womb, or the central core part of the onion came first.
A description of the experience
Hiranyagarbha Sukta
Hiranyagarbhah samavartatagre bhutasya jatah patireka asit,
Before creation existed the golden womb Hiranyagarbha, Lord of everything born. (Rig Veda 10.121.1)
The Rig Veda [translated by Wendy Doniger]
In the beginning the Golden Embryo arose. Once he was born, he was the one lord of creation. He held in place the earth and this sky. Who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
He who gives life, who gives strength, whose command all the gods, his own, obey; his shadow is immortality – and death. Who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
He who by his greatness became the one king of the world that breathes and blinks, who rules over his two footed and four footed creatures – who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
He who through his power owns these snowy mountains and the ocean together with the river Rasa, they say; who has the quarters of the sky as his two arms – who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
He by whom the awesome sky and the earth were made firm, by whom the dome of the sky was propped up, and the sun, who measured out the middle realm of space – who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
He to whom the two opposed masses looked with trembling in their hearts, supported by his help, on whom the rising sun shines down – who is the god whom we should worship with the oblation?
When the high waters came, pregnant with the embryo that is everything, bringing forth fire, he arose from that as the one life’s breath of the gods