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Description

Śrī Sūktam, is a Sanskrit devotional hymn revering Śrī as Lakṣmī, the Hindu goddess of wealth, prosperity and fertility. The hymns are found in the Rig Vedic khilanis, which are appendixes to the Ṛkveda that probably date to pre-Buddhist times. The goddess Śrī appears in several earlier vedic hymns, and is the personification of auspicious and royal qualities. Śrī Sūkta is perhaps the first text in which the homology between Śrī and Lakṣmī is drawn, and the goddesses are further associated with the god of fire, Agni. Since the later epic period (ca 400 CE), Śrī-Lakṣmī is particularly associated with Viṣṇu as his wife or consort. The Śrī Sūkta describes Śrī as glorious, ornamented, royal, lustrous as gold, and radiant as fire, moon and the sun. She is addressed as the bestower of fame, bounty and abundance in the form of gold, cattle, horses and food; and entreated to banish her sister alakṣmī (misfortune), who is associated with need, hunger, thirst and poverty. The hymn also associates Śrī with (agrarian) fertility and she is described as the mother of Kārdama (mud), moist, perceptible through odour, dwelling in cowdung and producing abundant harvest. The Śrī Sūkta uses the motifs of lotus (padma or kamala) and elephant (gaja) - symbols that are consistently linked with the goddess Śrī-Lakṣmī in later references. The lotus is thought to be symbolic of purity, beauty, spiritual power, life, fertility, growth or, in Tantra, the entire created universe. It is a recurring motif in Hindu (as well as Buddhist and Jain) literature and a lotus growing from Viṣṇu's navel is said to mark the beginning of a new cosmic creation. The elephants are symbolic of royalty and, in Hindu mythology, are also related with cloud and rain; they thus reinforce Śrī-Lakṣmī's stature as the goddess of abundance and fertility.