स तपोऽतप्यत स तपस्तप्त्वा स एतं मन्त्रराजं नारसिंहमानुष्टुभमपश्यत्तेन वै सर्वमिदमसृजत यदिदं किञ्च । तस्मात्सर्वमानुष्टुभमित्याचक्षते यदिदं किञ्च । अनुष्टुभो वा इमानि भूतानि जायन्ते । अनुष्टुभा जातानि जीवन्ति । अनुष्टुभं प्रयन्त्यभिसंविशन्ति तस्यैषा भवति अनुष्टुप्प्रथमा भवति अनुष्टुबुत्तमा भवति वाग्वा अनुष्टुप् वाचैव प्रयन्ति वाचोद्यन्ति परमा वा एषा छन्दसां यदनुष्टुबिति
sa tapo'tapyata sa tapastaptvā sa etaṃ mantrarājaṃ nārasiṃhamānuṣṭubhamapaśyattena vai sarvamidamasṛjata yadidaṃ kiñca | tasmātsarvamānuṣṭubhamityācakṣate yadidaṃ kiñca | anuṣṭubho vā imāni bhūtāni jāyante | anuṣṭubhā jātāni jīvanti | anuṣṭubhaṃ prayantyabhisaṃviśanti tasyaiṣā bhavati anuṣṭupprathamā bhavati anuṣṭubuttamā bhavati vāgvā anuṣṭup vācaiva prayanti vācodyanti paramā vā eṣā chandasāṃ yadanuṣṭubiti
He gave himself to austerity; and, having performed austerity, he beheld this king of mantras, the Nārasiṃha one, in the anuṣṭubh metre, and with it he created all this, whatever there is. Therefore they say that everything, whatever there is, is anuṣṭubh's. From the anuṣṭubh these beings are born, born by the anuṣṭubh they live, to the anuṣṭubh they go and into it they enter. The anuṣṭubh is the first and the anuṣṭubh is the last; the anuṣṭubh is speech — by speech they depart, by speech they ascend. It is the highest of metres.
cbe48bf87e99 · 发布于 2026年7月29日 04:39:50 UTC
可用语言RUEN用方向键翻颂
Prajāpati did not devise the mantra — he saw it: apaśyat.
This verb is the chief one in Vedic literature. Hymns are not composed but “seen”; hence their makers are called ṛṣis, “seers”, and hence the śruti is “what was heard”, not “what was compiled”.
And he saw the mantra-rāja, “the king of mantras”: the thirty-two-syllable anuṣṭubh devoted to Nṛsiṃha. The whole first Upaniṣad will be about it; but the book does not give the mantra at once — it will lay it out word by word in four riddles.
Then comes a row worth reading attentively: from the anuṣṭubh beings are born, born by it they live, to it they go and into it they enter.
This is the most ancient formula for defining Brahman: that from which one is born, by which one lives, and into which one departs. The Brahma-sūtra sets it as its second aphorism. Here it is said of a poetic metre.
The anuṣṭubh is eight syllables to the quarter, thirty-two to the verse; in it the Rāmāyaṇa and the Mahābhārata are composed, in it almost all the smṛti speaks.
And it is explained why it is the highest: vāg vā anuṣṭup — “the anuṣṭubh is speech”.
The same thought we have read more than once: in the Gopāla-tāpanī the world unfolded out of the syllables of the mantra; in the Rāma-tāpanī the whole moving and unmoving world lay in the seed of the name. Here it is applied to the metre: the world is put together not out of stuff, but by measure.