Shloka 43
Adhyāya 31: Rājasūya-samāgama — The Gathering of Kings and the Ordering of Hospitality
चित्रभानु: सुरेशश्व॒ अनलस्त्वं विभावसो । स्वर्गद्वारस्पृशश्चवासि हुताशो ज्वलनः शिखी
citrabhānuḥ sureśaś ca analas tvaṃ vibhāvaso | svargadvāraspṛśaś cāsi hutāśo jvalanaḥ śikhī vibhāvaso ||
हे विभावसो! आप ही चित्रभानु, सुरेश और अनल कहलाते हैं। आप सदा स्वर्गद्वार का स्पर्श करते हैं। आहुति को भक्षण करने से आप ‘हुताशन’ हैं; प्रज्वलित होने से ‘ज्वलन’ और शिखा धारण करने से ‘शिखी’ हैं।
सहदेव उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse highlights Agni as the sacred mediator of offerings and a purifier who upholds ritual truth: fire ‘consumes’ oblations, rises heavenward, and thus symbolizes the ethical seriousness of vows, sacrifices, and truthful conduct performed before a divine witness.
Sahadeva is addressing and praising Agni by enumerating his traditional names and qualities—his brilliance, his insatiable consuming nature, his role as receiver of offerings, and his upward-reaching flames—using these epithets as a formal invocation/stuti within the ongoing discourse of the chapter.