सः ऐक्षत यदि वा इमम् अभिमंस्ये कनीयः अन्नम् करिष्ये इति सः तया वाचा तेन आत्मना इदम् सर्वम् असृजत यद् इदम् किञ्च ऋचः यजूंषि सामानि छन्दांसि यज्ञान् प्रजाम् पशून् सः यद् यद् एव असृजत तत् तत् अत्तुम् अध्रियत सर्वम् वा अत्ति इति तद् अदितेः अदितित्वम् सर्वस्य अत्ता भवति सर्वम् अस्य अन्नम् भवति यः एवम् एतद् अदितेः अदितित्वम् वेद
saḥ aikṣata yadi vā imam abhimaṃsye kanīyaḥ annam kariṣye iti saḥ tayā vācā tena ātmanā idam sarvam asṛjata yad idam kiñca ṛcaḥ yajūṃṣi sāmāni chandāṃsi yajñān prajām paśūn saḥ yad yad eva asṛjata tat tat attum adhriyata sarvam vā atti iti tad aditeḥ adititvam sarvasya attā bhavati sarvam asya annam bhavati yaḥ evam etad aditeḥ adititvam veda
He thought: "If I fall upon him, I shall make my food the less." With that speech, with that self, he created all this, whatever there is: the ṛcs, the yajuses, the sāmans, the metres, the sacrifices, men, cattle. And whatever he created, he set about eating. "He eats everything" — this is the nature of Aditi. He becomes the eater of everything, and everything becomes his food, who thus knows the nature of Aditi.
6b5c576393ec · publicado 27 jul 2026, 0:37:41 UTC
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Hunger checks itself by a calculation: to eat its only child would be "to make the food the less"; better to multiply it. And by speech — that very cry which became a word — he creates everything: hymns and chants, sacrifices, men, cattle. The motive of creation is dreadful and honest: the world is multiplied as a menu; from Death's point of view every being is made edible.
The name of this law is Aditi, derived from √ad, "to eat": "the Devourer". The Upaniṣad boldly gives the great goddess of Boundlessness an etymology of hunger: the boundlessness of a mortal world is the boundlessness of appetite; saṁsāra is a feast in which every guest is also a dish. The Gītā will say the same of Time's image: "I am Time, the destroyer of worlds… I devour all beings" (BG 11.32).
Why know this horror? So as not to look for eternity in a world of mutual devouring — and not to serve it. There is another table: where the Lord partakes of what is offered with love and returns what he has tasted as mercy; the hunger of the world is overcome not by abstinence but by a change of table.