Maha Mrityunjaya Mantra: Sanskrit Text and Meaning

By the Awaken Library Editorial TeamEditorial Team · Updated October 23, 2026Oct 23, 2026 · How we write

The Maha Mrityunjaya mantra, also called the Tryambakam mantra, is a verse of the Rigveda (7.59.12) addressed to Tryambaka, “the three-eyed one”, an epithet of Rudra, later Shiva. It asks to be freed from death like a ripe cucumber from its stem, “not from deathlessness”. Hindus recite it for long life and liberation; it is a prayer, not a treatment.

Maha Mrityunjaya mantra lyrics: Sanskrit, transliteration and English

This is Rigveda 7.59.12 as printed in the standard edition (via the Cologne Rigveda links), with the Vedic accent marks. Most recordings add Om before it; the verse itself begins with tryambakaṃ.

Two English translations:

“Tryambaka we worship, sweet augmenter of prosperity. As from its stem the cucumber, so may I be released from death, not reft of immortality.”
R. T. H. Griffith, 1896

“We sacrifice to Tryambaka the fragrant, increaser of prosperity. Like a cucumber from its stem, might I be freed from death, not from deathlessness.”
Stephanie Jamison and Joel Brereton, 2014, as quoted by Wikipedia

The same verse goes by several names: Maha Mrityunjaya (“great death-conquering”), Tryambakam after its first word, and the Rudra mantra. It is also spelled Mahamrityunjaya, Mahamrityunjay and Trayambakam.

What does the Maha Mrityunjaya mantra mean? Word by word

Put together: “We worship Tryambaka, the fragrant one who makes things thrive. Like a cucumber from its stalk, may I come loose from death, not from the deathless.” The first line praises the god; the second is the request.

How it is chanted: japa, 108 and when

The verse gives no instructions, and our sources give no fixed rule for number or time. Practical points:

• Number. Sites suggest 1, 3, 11, 21 or 108 repetitions. 108 is the bead count of a standard mala. Pick a round you can say steadily; the counter above offers 27, 54 or 108.
• Time. Some sites say before sunrise; others say any time. We found no rule in the verse about night, and none about periods.
• Om. Many people add Om at the start. That is common practice; the verse does not have it.
• Pace. One verse is two lines, about 30 syllables. Say each line on one out-breath, without forcing; at about 12 seconds a verse, a round of 27 takes about five and a half minutes.

If you belong to a tradition or follow a teacher, their rules are the ones to keep. For counting, malas and why 108, see what a mantra is.

Does the Maha Mrityunjaya mantra work? What research says

In Hindu traditions, Wikipedia says, the mantra is recited for longevity and immortality and for mental, emotional and physical health. That is a religious practice and a hope people bring to it. It is not a medical claim we can confirm.

On October 23, 2026, a PubMed search for the mantra by name found two records. One studied 60 people with neck pain: adding a relaxation technique that included chanting A-U-M, Om and the Maha Mrityunjaya mantra to physiotherapy reduced pain and anxiety more than physiotherapy with supine rest (Yogitha et al., 2010). The effect of the mantra alone was not measured. The other record was not a study of people. We found no trial showing that the mantra treats illness, prevents accidents or extends life.

Sites that call it the “most powerful” mantra or say it “heals” cite no study. If the chanting calms you, that is worth having.

The sections below are for readers who want the scholarship: what tryambaka and urvāruka mean, and where the verse comes from.

Tryambakam: three-eyed or three-mothered?

Almost every page translates tryambaka as “three-eyed”, from tri, three, and ambaka, eye. That is the standard meaning, and later Shaiva tradition pictures Shiva with a third eye. But the Monier-Williams dictionary adds a note: the word was “originally probably ‘three-mothered’”, connected with the threefold call ambe ambike mbālike in the Yajurveda, addressed to mother goddesses. Griffith’s White Yajurveda (3.57) has Rudra take his share “with Ambikā thy sister”.

Both readings are scholarly, and nobody can settle which one the poets meant. We use “three-eyed”, the usual gloss.

Cucumber, gourd or pumpkin: how translators read urvārukam

The fruit in the verse is urvāruka. English translators say cucumber, and the Arthaśāstra, an old Indian manual of statecraft, uses the word for cucumber too. Other translators chose a different fruit:

The image works the same with any of them. A fruit on a vine is held by its stalk; when it is ripe, it comes off by itself, without tearing. The prayer asks for that kind of release from death.

“Not from immortality”: what māmṛtāt means

The last word is two words joined: mā, “not”, and amṛtāt, “from the deathless”. Amṛta, “not-dying”, is also the word for the drink of immortality. Griffith renders the close “not reft of immortality”, Jamison and Brereton “not from deathlessness”, Geldner “nicht vom Nichtsterben”.

So the verse does not ask never to die, despite the later name “death-conquering”. It asks to come away from death, like ripe fruit from the stalk, while keeping hold of what does not die. What that deathless part is, the Vedic verse does not say; later Hindu traditions read it as liberation (mokṣa), and Wikipedia notes that the verse is counted as a mokṣamantra, a mantra for liberation.

Where does the Maha Mrityunjaya mantra come from?

A hymn of Vasiṣṭha. The verse is the twelfth of hymn 59 in book 7 of the Rigveda, a hymn attributed to Vasiṣṭha Maitrāvaruṇi. Wikipedia, following Jamison and Brereton, says the last four verses of this hymn, including this one, are late additions to it.

A ritual verse. Those last verses belong to the sākamedha, the final rite of the four-monthly sacrifices, which ends with an offering to Rudra Tryambaka. So the verse began as part of a sacrifice, not as a healing formula.

Repeated in the Yajurveda. The verse also appears in the Taittirīya Saṃhitā (1.8.6) and the White Yajurveda (3.60). In Griffith’s translation of the White Yajurveda a second stanza follows with the same image but a different request: “We worship him, Tryambaka, the husband-finder, sweet to smell. As from its stem a cucumber, hence and not thence may I be loosed.”

A mantra of Shiva. Later texts read the verse in Shaiva terms. In the Śiva-purāṇa (2.2.38) the sage Śukra teaches the Mahāmṛtyuñjaya to Dadhīca and explains Tryambaka as “the three-eyed lord … the lord of the three worlds”. Today, Wikipedia notes, the verse is chanted in japa (repetition), in homa (fire offerings) and while applying sacred ash.

What this page does not promise. The Maha Mrityunjaya mantra will not treat an illness, prevent death or protect anyone from harm, and no source on this page says it will. The tool shows the words and counts; it plays no audio.

Related: what a mantra is · Om · Gayatri mantra · Om Mani Padme Hum · karma · meditation for spiritual awakening · get help