Shloka 26
Muñjavān on Himavat: Maheśvara’s abode, Śiva-stuti, and sacrificial gold
Chapter 8
सहस्रशिरसे चैव सहस्नरचरणाय च । नम: स्वधास्वरूपाय बहुरूपाय दंष्टिणे
sahasraśirase caiva sahasracaraṇāya ca | namaḥ svadhā-svarūpāya bahurūpāya daṃṣṭriṇe ||
Saṃvarta said: “Salutations to Him who is thousand-headed and also thousand-footed; salutations to Him whose very essence is Svadhā (the sacred offering to the ancestors), who assumes many forms, and who is fanged.” In this hymn-like address, the speaker frames the divine as all-pervading and multiform—present in cosmic magnitude, in ritual duty toward the Pitṛs, and in awe-inspiring power—thus grounding ethical life in reverence for the One who upholds both worldly order and sacred obligation.
संवर्त उवाच
Educational Q&A
The verse teaches reverence for the divine as simultaneously cosmic (innumerable heads and feet), ritually present (as Svadhā, the ancestral oblation), and powerful (fanged). Ethical life is implied to rest on honoring both universal order and concrete duties such as rites for ancestors.
Saṃvarta is offering a praise-salutation (namas) using exalted epithets. The speech functions as a devotional invocation, identifying the addressed deity as all-pervading and multiform, including a form connected to ancestral rites.