Introduction to and Historical past of Mantra Meditation
Mantras are phrases or phrases which are chanted out loud or internally as objects of meditation. Usually these mantras are related to explicit Buddhist figures, whose qualities will be cultivated by the repetition of the related mantra.
Mantra meditation predates Buddhism, most likely by lots of of years. The origins of mantras return no less than to the Vedic custom that preceded the Buddha, the place mantras had been used as incantations to affect, and even to manage, the gods.
On this part of our web site, you may discover how we outline mantra meditation, be taught how mantra meditation works, and browse concerning the numerous figures that mantras are related to and what their mantras imply.
All through historical past, cultures have believed within the sacred energy of phrases. They’ve believed that uttering sure phrases or names may management the exterior world, or management the unseen forces, like gods or spirits, that they believed acted upon the world. We are able to see that within the English phrase “spell”, which might imply merely to place letters collectively to make phrases, or to make use of phrases with a purpose to management the world via magic.
All through historical past, cultures have believed within the sacred energy of phrases…
The phrases grammar and glamour have the identical unique meanings. Gramma-techne was the Greek time period for the science or artwork of letters. This got here into English because the phrase grammar, but additionally got here in Scots (as “glammer”) to imply “to solid a spell upon” — to make use of the science and artwork of letter magically with a purpose to enchant. The phrase glammer was anglicized as glamour, and got here to have its extra modern romantic and aesthetic associations, the place somebody is ready to affect us, not by the ability of their phrases, however by the fantastic thing about their look. So the English language accommodates fossilized notions that phrases can have magical powers.
The phrase “enchant” is one other phrase that means a connection between phrases — chanting — and influencing others.
This perception is the ability of language was notably sturdy when it got here to the phrases that we name names. In historical India it was believed that when you knew the true names of the gods, then you possibly can name upon them and compel them to do your bidding.
Most of us nonetheless, it appears, have a lingering perception within the particular nature of names. Think about how you’d really feel when you found that somebody had written your title of a chunk of paper, put it in the bathroom bowl earlier than utilizing the toilet, after which flushed your title away. Or take into consideration how hurtful it may be if somebody makes enjoyable of your title.
Though early Buddhism used chanting as a method of observe, and used the recitation of verses as a means of cultivating an consciousness of the qualities of the Buddha (Buddhanusati), using mantras doesn’t appear to have come into Buddhism till the rise of the Mahayana traditions, which included parts of the non-Buddhist strategy to spirituality often called “Tantra.”
Tantra made intensive use of mantras as methods of communing with and influencing the gods, and Buddhism co-opted this system as a means of getting in contact with the qualities of enlightenment. The Mahayana had already developed a “pantheon” of symbolical figures in human kind to signify the range of the enlightened state. Given the shut contact with the Tantric traditions, it was pure that these archetypal Buddhas and Bodhisattvas got here to be related to explicit syllables and mantras.
It was believed that when you knew the true names of the gods, then you possibly can name upon them and compel them to do your bidding.
Mantras are discovered within the Japanese Buddhist Nichiren custom, the place the recitation of Nam Myōhō Renge Kyō (Hommage to the White Lotus Sutra) is the principle observe, and within the Japanese Shingon custom. Within the Japanese Pure Land custom, the mantra Namu Amida Butsu (Homage to Amitabha Buddha) is a key observe. Variations of this mantra are present in Vietnam, Korea, and China.
Strictly talking, there aren’t any mantras within the Buddhist Theravadin custom, though there’s a lot chanting. Chants of lovingkindness, similar to Sabbe Satta Sukhi Hontu (could all beings be blissful), and chants of safety and blessing are quite common, and these operate as mindfulness practices in precisely the identical means as precise mantras.