Hi Friends! Today let us explore the beauty in the concept of a Mantra and the beauties of different mantras that exist. Mantras are core of ancient Indian (so called Hindu) philosophy. They occur at every step on our path in discovering the ancient Indian way of spiritual life. What is a Mantra? What is it’s utility? How to train in the art of a Mantra? How does it fit in modern day lifestyle? What are different mantras that exist? etc., forms themost chunk of this article.
We can define a mantra to be “A set of syllables, greater than or equal to one, which are uttered forth through vocals, so as to listen while uttering and to contemplate, which make the utterer experience the ONE“. This is the crux of the splendid meaning of Mantra. Some of you may have objections/doubts with some of the notions – like uttering forth, etc. But, unless you take the very source (which expounds these mantras) as guiding manual, and unless you are sheltered by proper GURU (may be a person or a thing), you may not see the complete potential in the above said definition. At any rate, it has two main parts:
This triangle/pyramid of utterance exists in our daily life as the manifestation of number THREE – 36) Mystic nature of Numbers . In grammar, we call this subject-object-predicate, which forms base of unit statement. Same is true in life, which is a sentence uttered forth by NATURE. We exist with these triangles as basic units. We sleep – we have sleeping person, his sleep and process of sleeping. We play – we have a playing person, process of playing and the played play. So on and so forth. The goal of this pyramid is to reach from the base of triangle of objectivity to the apex of subjective UNITY.
Now some questions need to be answered immediately, before they grow into a layer of obstruction in reading this subtly expressed article.
Let us proceed further.
Because we are still learning, and we are unable to break the triangle as of now, from here on, we will mean MANTRA as in pre-discovered mantras by elders. How many kinds of such mantras exist?
Broadly speaking, there are 2 important kinds:
Ok, we now know that many mantras exist. But, how did the discovery happen? To answer that, we need to answer the question of how were the “Akshara/Syllables” of Sanskrit discovered i.e., why were exactly those sounds (a, ā, i, ī, …ka, kha, ….pa, pha, …etc.) of 50 syllables formed the set for Sanskrit? If we can answer that, we can answer the question of Mantra.
The secret lies in ourselves. It is said that we have 7 chakrās out of which 6 are in our body (33) The Coiled Serpent – Kundalini). These chakrās when evolved become lotuses. Lotuses have petals. A petal here, means a sound-expression. The whole vēdic philosophy rests on the theory that manifestation started from inaudible bases of SOUND called NĀDA. This nāda transmuted in 50 ways to produce 50 syllables which form the many petals of 6 chakrās. in the next section, I will show you clearly.
So, when a sage slowly evolves from the base chakra, petal by petal, the chakra transforms into lotus allowing him to “hear”. This “hear” is not though ears, but something else. Just like in dream, we hear and yet we don’t physically, this too. But here, the hearing is universal i.e., any human awakening that particular petal would hear the same sound. This heard sound was given a physical form of which we now call as syllable.
Here let us see which chakrās are associated with which syllables. The following table shows the name of the chakra, number of petals when that chakra is awakened into path of enlightenment i.e., into LOTUS, Syllables that each petal reveals to the “Seer in us” and a presiding sound that acts as a central potency of the awakening. Each syllable is added with a ” ṃ ” (the nasal sound as in Lime or Cream) because, to suggest that these syllables are not the literal consonants or vowels, but are in the form of BASE-NĀDA or subtle inaudible basis of sound.
Now you can easily see how mantrās work. Because any uttered syllable belongs to the 6 chakrās, a set of such syllables belongs to a set of particular number of chakrās. Thus, the meditation of the utterance of the mantra would inversely awaken those chakrās associated. Instead of chakras awakening and making us hear the sound, we are following the reverse way in mantra meditation. Thus, a mantra was discovered by a sage as an inner hearing, while a student like us, when recites, will awaken ourselves into the sages’ state of revelation. This is the goal of any mantra. Associating mantras to mundane profits in recent times only show a limited development in human minds. Mantra is a grand concept of harmonious way of life.
It is often seen that mantras are a part of “initiations” and these are often secretive. The famous GĀYATRĪ mantra is said to be given only by father to son. What about daughters and mothers? How ironical it is to say the goddess of the mantra is Gāyatrī- a female deity and that women are not initiated into it!! You see how the stupidity of modern human dragged the pious divinity into hell of limited understandings!?
When it is said that a mantra is “RAHASYA” or secret in vēdic lore, it means that IT is realized by oneself and a second can not help. That is why it is secret. Can you make a horse drink water? You can only take it to the lake. Similarly, a guru or anyone can give us mantra but not utter it inside us as verily ourselves. We need to do that. In fact, with above exposition, you must understand that becoming one with mantra implies the awakening of associated chakras and inner hearing of those inaudible sounds as the very faculty of hearing. This is actual meaning of mantra being SECRET. But this transformed into secretive cults, later on, due to misuse of mantra as per low states of evolution which forced gurus to weave a cult-like culture. Are we not destroying worlds, along with developing, in the name of science? Same is the case here, except the toll is expected to be for cycles of life times (karma).
Thus, in a subtle and delicate way, we have seen finer points associated with the concept of Mantra. To interlink different seeming branches of wisdom is the duty of a true spiritual student. Without this overlap, one is left with pieces that do not fit the puzzle of life! Here too we linked Tantra, Mantra, Yoga, Kundalini, Language (Bhāṣa) and other Śāstrās. That is how one can get a complete picture. Stay tuned for another article which would explore the specificities of different mantras in particular, including modern day mantras.
PhD (Quantum Physics), M.Sc. (IIT Madras), B.Tech. (LNMIIT).
Bridging the depths of Science and the wisdom of the Vedas
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