Upaniṣads · Rāma-tāpanī Pūrva 4.48
॥
Devanāgarī
आदिक्षान्तान्केसरेषु वृत्ताकारेण संलिखेत् । तद्बहिः षोडशदलं लिख्य तत्केसरे हृयम्
Transliteración (IAST)
ādikṣāntānkesareṣu vṛttākāreṇa saṃlikhet | tadbahiḥ ṣoḍaśadalaṃ likhya tatkesare hṛyam
Palabra por palabra
SánscritoIASTSignificado
आदिक्षान्तान् केसरेषुādikṣāntān kesareṣufrom “a” to “kṣa” — on the filaments; all letters from a to kṣa in the whorl
वृत्ताकारेण संलिखेत्vṛttākāreṇa saṃlikhetlet him write in a circle; let him inscribe along the round
तद्बहिः षोडशदलम्tadbahiḥ ṣoḍaśadalamoutside it — the sixteen-petalled; beyond it the sixteen-leaved
लिख्य तत्केसरे हृयम्likhya tatkesare hṛyamhaving written, in its filaments — “hrīṁ”; having traced, in the whorl the syllable hrīṁ
Traducción
From “a” to “kṣa” let him write in a circle on the filaments; and outside — a sixteen-petalled lotus, with the syllable “hrīṁ” in its whorl.
Versión
9cd39f9edc9a · publicado 29 jul 2026, 5:15:19 UTC
Disponible enRUENPasa de verso en verso con
The alphabet is written out once more, and now entire: ādi-kṣāntān — “from ‘a’ to ‘kṣa’”, that is, from the first letter to the last.
The whole sound-stock of the language — fifty and more signs — is drawn in a ring around the name.
In the diagrams this is called mātṛkā, “the mother”: the gathering of all letters as the source of every word. And they are placed in a ring because speech has no beginning and no end — it returns upon itself.
The fourth lotus is of sixteen petals, and in its middle the syllable hrīṁ. This is the seed syllable of the feminine power, the one by which in the rites the Goddess is invoked.
Again, then, the feminine principle is set at the centre, as ramā was set in the forty-second and forty-sixth verses.
This diagram, looked at whole, is built thus: in the middle Rāma with Sītā, around them all speech, around speech the names of Viṣṇu, and the whole girded by the syllables of the Goddess. Not one circle without her.
The fourth Upaniṣad never says this outright. But its sixth verse compared Them to the moon and the moonlight, and the diagram simply repeats the comparison in lines.