According to MMY in Beacon Light of the Himalayas' "For our practice, we
select only the suitable mantras of personal Gods. Such mantras fetch to
us the grace of personal Gods and make us happier in every walk of
life." This statement was confirmed by Satyanand at a CCP I once
attended in Berkely with Jerry Jarvis. Bhagavan Das wrote that MMY gave
him the bija mantra Ram to use in his meditation.
But, strictly speaking, the bija mantras are not the actual names of the
Gods - they are just the nick-names of the Devatas. Apparently only very
highly evolved individuals get to be on a first name basis with God
Almighty!
In fact, all the TM bija mantras are common tantric householder mantras.
All the Devatas such as Rama, Ram Chandra, Devaki, Vasudeva and Krishna
used these same mantras. The Devatas are deified heroes, that is, that
are highly evolved humans. They reached a high level of consciousness by
yogic means - tapas, and by utilizing the same non-ideational mnemonic
devices as we TMers use today.
That's why MMY selected only suitable mantras that the ancient yogis
used, because they are time-tested. In the Shankaracharya tradition,
such mantras indeed fetch to us the grace of the Devatas, and they make
us happier in every walk of life.
So, I mean, who doesn't like to hear the sound of their own name?
Work cited:
'It's Here Now (Are You?)'
By Bhagavan Das
Broadway, 1998
On 10/10/2013 6:01 PM, iranitea wrote:
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com>
wrote:
When MMY first started out in Kerala, according to 'Beacon Light of
the Himalayas', he only used Ram (for the guys) and Shyam (for the
gals), not unlike the ISKCON pundit boys who sing the maha mantra.
Sure about that? I found copies of the beacon light online, and there
is no such reference in it. Rather, to the opposite, there is a
report, that the persons mantra is selected according to their Ishta
Devata, Also people are adviced to meditate for one hour, or if they
don't experience Ananda, to just meditate long enough. There is no
mention of the Ram mantra or the Shyam mantra there. On which page
would that be?
It was only later in 1957 that MMY started using the five bijas and
created the sixteen variants bijas to include the Saraswati bija which
he got from SBS.
Again, where do you get this from? Can you name a source? In 1957
Maharishi was still in India, and AFAIK there was no other uniform
method of selection there.
According to MMY, the Shankaracharya tradition is the custodian of the
bija mantras. This makes sense because the sixteen bijas are
enumerated in the Sound Arya Lahari, compiled by the Adi Shankara, the
main scripture of the Sri Vidya sect. Go figure.
A yoga teacher can use any seed sounds they want toin spiritual
practice, even make up new ones, as long as they are given out in a
ritual initiation. Otherwise, they are just simple phonemes or
quasi-phonemes with no apparent meaning.
However, most Indians, and thus most TMers, only use bijas in a short
sentence, such as with the word 'namah' at the end. You get one single
bija mantra in TM and then you get the more advanced technique with
the added words.
So, you get the seed sound and then the fertilizer; you water the root
and enjoy the fruit. All you have to do is start the mantra and then
just baby sit your bija and watch it grow. It's that simple!
On 10/10/2013 9:41 AM, Michael Laurenson wrote:
Hi Richard,
I taught TM in the early 70s and been reading FFL posts for awhile.
I've read that shyam, shyama are related to Krishna.
Are these still considered Saraswati mantras?
Warm regards,
Michael
