Phrase guidance
Read the prayer closely without turning it into a health guarantee
tryambakam is the accusative form of Tryambaka, the figure addressed in the mantra. In later devotional explanation it is very commonly connected with the “three-eyed” Shiva. The source metadata itself identifies the deity as Rudra, so this page does not pretend that every later etymology or iconographic explanation is already spelled out by the Ṛgvedic line.
yajāmahe is a first-person plural middle-form verb from the root yaj, giving the prayer its “we worship / we sacrifice to / we honour ritually” movement. sugandhim literally carries the idea of being fragrant. Devotional interpreters may read fragrance symbolically, but SlokaSandra keeps the literal image visible before moving to metaphor. puṣṭivardhanam combines ideas of nourishment, thriving or fullness with increasing/fostering. Rendering it as “fostering nourishment” is intentionally modest; it is not a biomedical claim.
urvārukam iva gives the memorable comparison with an urvāruka, a cucurbit or gourd-like fruit. Historical English translations often choose “cucumber,” while other explanations use “ripe fruit” or “gourd.” The comparison is the important grammatical picture: release from attachment or binding as a mature fruit separates from what holds it. The exact botanical species is not necessary for the devotional point, so the page avoids pretending that one modern crop identification is certain.
bandhanān mṛtyor is the continuous saṃhitā presentation. The padapāṭha separates the underlying forms as bandhanāt and mṛtyoḥ. This is a sandhi/presentation distinction, not evidence for two competing mantras. mukṣīya expresses a wish for release. mā amṛtāt, heard continuously as māmṛtāt, introduces the final contrast often rendered along the lines of “not from immortality.” SlokaSandra keeps the prayerful grammar visible rather than converting it into a promise that chanting can prevent physical death.
Text and recitation integrity
Vedic pronunciation is not ordinary Sanskrit text-to-speech
- त्र्य॑म्बकं यजामहेtryambakaṃ yajāmahe
- सु॒गन्धिं॑ पुष्टि॒वर्ध॑नम्sugandhiṃ puṣṭivardhanam
- उ॒र्वा॒रु॒कमि॑व॒ बन्ध॑नान्urvārukam iva bandhanān
- मृ॒त्योर्मु॑क्षीय॒ मामृता॑त्mṛtyor mukṣīya māmṛtāt
Audio status: awaiting verified recitation.The Vedic accent marks shown here are pronunciation-sensitive. SlokaSandra will not publish generic TTS or ordinary Sanskrit chanting as an authoritative Vedic recitation. A future recording must be expert-reviewed for pronunciation and have clear publication rights. Even then, the normal interface will remain in-site listening with play, slow and repeat controls — no audio download button and no direct-download affordance.
Sources & verification
What this page was checked against
Verified 22 August 2026. Source roles are separated so a translation witness is not silently treated as the canonical Sanskrit authority.
Verse 12 changes the addressee after eleven Marut verses
Ṛgveda 7.59 is not twelve repetitions of the same devotional theme. The Vedic Heritage Portal labels verses 1–11 for the Maruts and identifies verse 12 separately with Rudra. English Wikisource’s public-domain Griffith translation likewise presents the first eleven verses in a Marut setting and then translates the Tryambaka verse as the hymn’s twelfth and final verse.
That source sequence is useful because modern presentations often extract only the famous final mantra. Extraction is not inherently wrong — living devotional traditions routinely preserve verses independently — but a reference library should still tell the reader where the verse came from. Knowing its place in the hymn makes the page more informative without insisting that every modern worshipper must reproduce the whole sūkta.
It also prevents a subtle editorial mistake: later names, ritual frameworks and theological explanations should not be inserted into the ancient source block as if they were part of the same textual layer. SlokaSandra can honour living tradition while keeping the provenance graph honest.