SOME LINES ON FIRE
A Learner’s Dictionary defines fire as the flames, light
and heat, and often smoke, heat are produced when something burns.
In journalistic prose writings, a few
synonyms of the word fire are: blaze, conflagration, inferno, holocaust and
flames. But metaphorically, one will find such phrases as people
of fire to mean energy, spirit, life, liveliness, animation, vigour, verve,
vivacity, sparkle, scintillation, dash, vim, gusto, enthusiasm, fervor, eagerness,
force, passion, intensity, inspiration, imagination, flair, creativity, inventiveness,
etc.
Fire of body, mind, love, life, competition,
sportsmanship, romance, business, enjoyment, are also likely phrases.
Spiritually, love and sex can be called
the sacred fire. So can be the love of body.
Religiously, Agni (Fire) is both “physical
heat that sustains the body and spiritual illumination that sustains the mind.
So worship of Agni is adoration of values of life as well of mind.”
It has been beautifully said in some
religious book:
“Agni is the
symbol of the wonder of life itself.”
And in one of the Hindu scriptures, we find the following prayer:
Thou Agni art the protector of the
body, protect my body,
Thou Agni art the bestower of long
life, bestow on me long life,
Thou Agni art the bestower of intellectual
brilliance ,
Whatever Agni is deficient in my
body,make that complete for me.
To conclude , in the Rigveda Agni
is identified with the divine itself, in man and outside man:
“A steady light, swifter than thought,
is stationed among the moving things, to show the way; all the gods of one mind
and like wisdom proceed devoutly to that one intelligence. My ears strain to
hear, my eyes to see this all-spreading light lodged within my spirit, my mind
roams afar beyond its confines what shall I speak and , and what indeed shall I
think?
******
G.R.Kanwal
13 January 2026.
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