bill: > Shankara says: > >The yogi who does both these achieves one-pointedness > of the mind. By repetition of Om he has his mind > turned toward Ishvara and he meditates on the meaning > of Om, i.e. Ishvara... > Not sure where this saying comes from - maybe it's from Shankara's Vivarna on the commentary by Vyasa, on Patanjali's Yoga Sutra. If so, most folks on this forum don't seem to be aware of Shankara making any comments on Patanjali.
There's no 'OM' mentioned in the Saundaryalahari, and no 'OM' in the Sri Vidya fifteen bija mantras, composed by the Adi Shankaracharya, (circa 800 AD). There's no "OM' in mentioned in the Hindu scriptures: Rig Veda, Brahma Sutra, Yoga Sutra, or in the Bhagavad Gita. The monosyllable 'OM' isn't even mentioned by the historical Buddha. Lord Chaitanya didn't advocate the chanting of 'OM'. And the chanting or meditating on 'OM' isn't advocated by the Ramana Marshy. So, if chanting 'OM' isn't based on the scriptures, then it is just an invention, added on much later, a symbol devised for the uninitiated. 'OM' isn't a genuine tantric bija mantra, that's the point.
