Rigveda – Mandala 1, Sukta – 56 to 58

We shall discuss the hymns, Sukta wise & Mandala wise. Our focus is on the implicit meaning of the various hymns instead of literal translations of the hymns. These purported meanings are based primarily on the English translations by Swami Dharmanand Saraswati of the works done by Swami Dayanand Saraswati.
 
Highlights –
All boys and girls should study sciences and enter into wedlock after knowing merits of one another & should have mutual love for domestic happiness. If they are highly learned, they should teach boys & girls, otherwise discharge other duties according to their merits & temperaments. Husband & wife should be source of happiness to all by their good character and conduct. 
 
A humble righteous, mighty and industrious person should be selected for the position of head in the Assembly, Educational Institutes and Army. Men should constantly enjoy happiness by meditating up on the infinite power of God. The soul is ever pervaded by God who is eternal, Absolute Existence, Absolute Conscious, Perfect Bliss, Omnipotent, Self-refulgent, the Support, Creator of the world, Infinite, Omnipresent Supreme Being The soul is eternal, conscious, finite and not omniscient. The soul is the free doer of actions and enjoys soon the fruits of its good or bad actions in the form of happiness and misery. The soul in the body is the impeller of the body, its organs and inner senses, their upholder, controller, master, possessing desires, malice, volition, happiness. misery and consciousness. The knowers of the real nature of the soul get extreme happiness and joy.
 
The hymn wise, purported explanations –
 
Mandala 1 – Sukta – 56

1. A preacher should marry a learned lady like himself. As he preaches among men-and teaches the boys, his wife should preach among women and should teach girls. By so doing ignorance and fear cannot remain anywhere.
2. All boys and girls should study all sciences with the observance of Brahmacharya (continence) and after the attainment of full youth, they should enter into wedlock, having known and tested one another's merits, actions and temperaments and after the development of mutual love. If they are highly learned, they should teach boys and girls, otherwise, they should discharge the duties of the Kshatriyas, Vaishyas or Shudras to which ever Varna (class-not caste by birth) they belong according to their merits, actions and temperament.
3. That marriage is the best where the bride and the bridegroom are of suitable beauty and temperament, but the power and the age of the bridegroom should be equal to one and half of the bride.
4. When a husband loves his wife and the wife loves the husband, it is only then that domestic happiness follows
5. As the solar world by its light, attraction and other attributes, makes all worlds rotate in their axis and drawing the sap by its splendour in all directions causes rain and thus sustains all people, in the same manner, husband and wife should behave. (They should be source of happiness to all by their good character and conduct).
6. As learned persons manifest justice like the sun and protect the people by casting aside or crushing all enemies, so we should also do. In this hymn, there is the mention of the attributes of the sun, lightning and President of the Assembly etc. so it has connection with the previous hymn.

 
Mandala 1 – Sukta – 57

1. As the water becomes clean and steady going from higher place to the tank below, in the same way, wealth becomes in exhaustible and secure (steady) in the hands of a humble righteous mighty and industrious person, who having acquired the royal prosperity, gives it for the welfare of all, for the development of knowledge and for the growth of physical and spiritual power. We should enthrone only such a liberal hero for the Presidentship or the Assembly, Educational Institutes and Army.
2. As the lions and other wild beasts in the mountain and waters in the cloud become safe and secure, so the subjects become firmly established in happiness and bliss by resorting to the President of the Assembly etc.
3. Men should appoint a very admirable virtuous person who sets aside all injustices the morning dispels all darkness, in charge of the battles as the Commander of the Army. They should appoint a person who adorns all with education, wisdom, army, humility and the observance of justice and who gladdens all by providing wealth and food etc. as President of the Assembly.
4. Those persons only become worthy of reverence who do not accept any one else except God as Averrable and who do not accept anything that is not in accordance with the teachings of the Vedas-revealed by God.
5. Men should constantly enjoy happiness by meditating up on the infinite power of God, thereby fulfilling their own noble desires and acquiring the kingdom of the earth.
6. Men should appoint as commander of the Army and President of the Assembly etc. a mighty and learned person who is the destroyer of his enemies and is engaged in preserving the people.

 
Mandala 1 – Sukta – 58

1. O men, you should know that the soul is ever pervaded by God who is eternal, Absolute Existence, Absolute Conscious pervaded-ness and Perfect Bliss, Omnipotent, Self-refulgent, the Support and Creator of the world, Infinite, Omnipresent Supreme Being The soul is eternal, conscious, finite and not omniscient.
2. Men should know that the soul is the free doer of actions and enjoys soon the fruits of its good or bad actions in the form of happiness and misery under the Superintendence of God. It is upheld by Perfect God and based upon the sky and other substances for its nourishment. It illumines the intellect and mind etc.
3. The souls are those which move on earth with the Pranas (vital breaths), which play so to speak with bodies like the chariots and which desire good articles and happiness.
4. God tells all men. What I have taught through the Vedas, is the real nature of your soul. You should know it well.
5. Men should know that the soul in the body is the impeller of the body, its organs and inner senses, their upholder, controller, master, possessing desires, malice, volition, happiness. misery and consciousness.
6. As men enjoy happiness by acquiring knowledge, wealth and friends, in the same manner, the knowers of the real nature of the soul get extreme happiness and joy.
7. Those men who know God after acquiring the knowledge of their own soul, attain emancipation.
8. O knowers of the soul and God, make all people happy by casting away the misery of all through the sermons on the real nature of the soul and God.

Men should accept that learned man to be the President of the Assembly etc. who being endowed with Dharma (righteousness) and humility governs well and protects all people.