Upanishads · Rudrākṣajābāla 2.19
॥
Devanāgarī
रुद्राक्षमूलं तद्ब्रह्मा तन्नालं विष्णुरेव च । तन्मुखं रुद्र इत्याहुस्तद्बिन्दुः सर्वदेवताः
Transliteration (IAST)
rudrākṣamūlaṃ tadbrahmā tannālaṃ viṣṇureva ca | tanmukhaṃ rudra ityāhustadbinduḥ sarvadevatāḥ
Word-by-word
SanskritIASTMeaning
रुद्राक्ष-मूलं तत् ब्रह्माrudrākṣa-mūlaṃ tat brahmāthe root of the rudrākṣa is Brahmā
तत्-नालं विष्णुः एव चtat-nālaṃ viṣṇuḥ eva caits stalk is Viṣṇu
तत्-मुखं रुद्रः इति आहुःtat-mukhaṃ rudraḥ iti āhuḥits mouth is Rudra, they say
तत्-बिन्दुः सर्व-देवताःtat-binduḥ sarva-devatāḥits dots are all the deities
Translation
The root of the rudrākṣa is Brahmā, its stalk is Viṣṇu, its mouth, they say, is Rudra, its dots are all the deities. Thus.
Version
35b6df3b45fa · published Aug 12, 2026, 5:00:00 AM UTC
Available inRUENPage between verses with
The verse portion ends strongly, and the image is well chosen: in one seed — root, stalk, mouth, and dots, and all of it parceled out to the gods. It is worth noting the order: Brahmā below, Viṣṇu in the middle, Rudra above. This order is Śaiva, and in Vaiṣṇava books it would be reversed; but the order is not the point.
The point is that here one thing is broken into parts and declared to consist of all of them at once. Not "this seed belongs to such-and-such a god," as in all the preceding list, but — this whole seed is their aggregate. This shift deserves noting, for it is a shift from allotment to unity. For twenty lines the book was dividing: one face to one god, another to another; and in the last line everything is gathered back together.
The Vaiṣṇava side accepts the idea of the unity of the deities and expresses it through aṃśa, "portion": the Bhāgavatam, having listed a multitude of descents, concludes with the famous ete cāṃśa-kalāḥ puṃsaḥ kṛṣṇas tu bhagavān svayam — "all these are portions and fragments of the Puruṣa, but Kṛṣṇa is the Lord Himself" (1.3.28). In this verse both movements deserve noting at once. The multitude is not denied — it is called portions; and the unity does not dissolve the multitude — it is called the source.
The dispute between the communities is not over whether the deities are one, but over who is the source and who the portion; and it is settled not by lists, but by whom the books speak of at greater length and more precisely.