Shloka 82
Śiva-stavarāja: Upamanyu’s Preface and Initiation of the Śarva-Nāma Enumeration
Anuśāsana-parva 17
महामेघनिवासी च महाघोरो वशी कर: । अग्निज्वालो महाज्वालो अतिधूम्रो हुतो हवि:
mahāmeghanivāsī ca mahāghoro vaśī karaḥ | agnijvālo mahājvālo atidhūmro huto haviḥ ||
Vāyu-deva dit : «Il demeure au sein des immenses nuées (surtout celles de la dissolution) ; il est d’une terreur extrême, le maître qui soumet tout, l’instrument de la destruction. Il flamboie comme le feu, d’une flamme plus grande encore ; au temps de l’embrasement universel, il est épais de fumée. Il est le Feu que réjouissent les offrandes, et il est aussi l’offrande elle-même — ghee, lait, et tout ce qui doit être versé dans la flamme sacrée.»
वायुदेव उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse fuses cosmic and ritual theology: the same divine principle is both the fearsome power of dissolution (terrible, controlling, destructive, smoky time-fire) and the beneficent sacrificial fire that accepts offerings—indeed, it is also the offering itself. Ethically, it points to seeing the sacred as pervading both awe-inspiring cosmic forces and everyday dharmic acts like yajña.
Vāyu-deva is describing a deity in a litany of epithets—portraying him with pralaya imagery (great clouds, terror, destruction, smoke) and with yajña imagery (Agni who is pleased by oblations, and the oblation itself). The passage functions as praise/identification through names and attributes.