By Victor M Fontane
Chanting mantras has become very popular in our western societies but how much do you know about mantras?
Mantra Sastra is the foundation of spiritual practices in eastern societies and is central to all schools. It is the study of sound, how each sound is produced, the effect of each sound form, how to elevate one’s consciousness through these sounds to strike a rhythm with the cosmic vibration.
The study of sounds that activate different Nādīs or energy channels in the human body, their rhythm and the timing/chanting methods that effectively activate those, is Mantra Sastra. Broadly there are three aspects, the study of various aspects of mantra, sadhana/upasana and the philosophy of sadhana/spiritual philosophy.
A mantra (Sanskrit: मन्त्र, romanized: mantra, /ˈmʌntrə/; Pali: mantaṃ) or mantram is a sacred utterance, a numinous sound, a syllable, word or phonemes, or group of words in Sanskrit, Pali and other languages believed by practitioners to have religious, magical or spiritual powers. Some mantras have a syntactic structure and literal meaning, while others do not. The mantra is repeated usually 108 times or beads on a rosary of japa-mala.
The earliest mantras were composed in Vedic Sanskrit in India. At its simplest, the word ॐ (Aum, Om) serves as a mantra, it is believed to be the first sound which was originated on earth (the sound of the creation). Aum sound when produced creates a reverberation in the body which helps the body and mind to be calm. In more sophisticated forms, mantras are melodic phrases with spiritual interpretations such as a human longing for truth, reality, light, immortality, peace, love, knowledge, and action. Some mantras without literal meaning are musically uplifting and spiritually meaningful.
The Sanskrit word mantra can be broken down into two parts: “man,” which means mind, and “tra,” which means transport or vehicle and is derived from the root man- "to think".
Scholars consider the use of mantras to have begun before 1000 BC. By the middle Vedic period (1000 BC to 500 BC) – claims Frits Staal – mantras in Hinduism had developed into a blend of art and science.
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