Xin_Kai05/24/02 at 21:10:08#1Hi,
I had the good fortune to receive the sanskrit syllable collection here at this web site:
http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/member/fcgi-bin/view_album.fcg?ab=ab5&id=yamantaka999&accept=1
However, I found some discrepancy : referring to the "Ah"
sanskrit syllable, isn't it suppose to have 2 small circles at the right hand side of the main body of the syllable?
I am reading GM's book and the "ah" syllable has 2 small circles at the right hand side of the main body.
Please advise me on this as I am quite new to the sanskrit syllables.
Secondly, could anyone tell me if there are other sources where I could find out how to write "kan" , sanskrit syllable of Usnisa vijaya dharani?
Regards
Xin Kai
mimosa05/24/02 at 21:59:26#2Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable I am reading GM's book and the "ah" syllable has 2 small circles at the right hand side of the main body.
##I learned Tibetan before, so I hope that I can somehow answer that question. It is not two circles. it is like an English "R". It looks different in the picture because the way it is written. Just like the Chinese, depends on who writes it. It seems to different but it is the same.
Secondly, could anyone tell me if there are other sources where I could find out how to write "kan" , sanskrit syllable of Usnisa vijaya dharani?
## kan is a very common Tibetan word, but I dont know how to show it to you.
did you look the picture that Luljeta posted? vijaya? it is same as usnisa vijaya.....the seed syllable is in the center..I think
Mimosa
lian hua dance05/24/02 at 23:18:58#3Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable :)
The sanskrt in the mandala pictures is very stylized.
This may help you better to know what things "usually" look like.
The vowels are on the last page.
http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/language/devanagari_flashcards.pdf
You will notice that the vowel "a" by itself does not have a "visarga" (circles - or dots like a colon ":").
"ah" has dots; the unvoiced "h" sound is represented by the two vertical dots.
This "ah" is different from the conventional way of writing "Ah" in English, in which the "h" only serves to let the reader know how to pronounce the "a", since English is totally irrational and inconsistent, there is no way to know how to pronounce something as simple as a vowel.... In Sanskrt, vowels are always the same: there is "a" and "aa" (or "a" with a line over it, if my typewriter worked that way), and no other kinds of "a"'s.
That is the extent of my erudition.
lian hua dance
ex-Sanskrt scholar
(Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche's Nairopa Institute in Boulder Colorado one summer)
na hi jnanena sadrsham pavitram iha vidyate
tat syayam yogasamsiddhah kalena atmani vidyate!!
Xin_Kai05/25/02 at 01:30:41#4Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable Hi,
mimosa and dance, thank you for yr replies.
So, which syllable( i mean with or without the 2 dots) should i use for visualisation?
Does TBSN has a site for this?
Sorry, the only syllable i know how to visualise is hum ,I thought that this syllable could be treated like a multi purpose syllable in any visualisation.
BTW, I saw "kan" from Lujetta's mantra circle and I would like to know what colour the "kan" is to be visualised in?
Regards
Xin Kai
lian hua dance05/25/02 at 08:20:05#5Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable :)
Well, I am not sure why you are choosing Sanskrt over Tibetan for the "Ah" - Actually, I am not sure why the Sanskrt is there on the site! My ignorance surpasses yours. Which of GM's books mentions and shows the Sanskrt? Maybe one uses Sanskrt for specific practices? IF you were going to visualize Ah in Sanskrt instead of Tibetan, THEN I would recommend with visarga (the two dots representing the "h"). However, maybe Tibetan script is the way to go. Not knowing Tibetan well at all, it seems much clearer to me in the mantra mandalas! The Sanskrt (devanagari is the name of the script used for both Sanskrt and Hindi) is barely recognizable to me. Beautiful, none-the-less.
lian hua dance
Luljeta05/25/02 at 21:22:12#6Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable Hi Xin Kai
You should visualize the 'kan' in a white color. It is in the center of the Dharani wheel on the photo i attached above.
Do you still have the Dharani wheel I sent to you some time ago? You can see it better on the actual paper, the kan is in the center.
Do you know how the 'brom' syllable in Tibetan looks? It looks almost like 'hum' but a little different. You can visualize a white brom for Usnisa Vijaya practice. GM actually used brom when he transmitted this Dharma.
http://www.tbsn.org/english/news/oct98/namgyl1.htm
http://www.tbsn.org/english/news/oct98/foreword.htm
Regards,
Lu
Xin_Kai05/26/02 at 20:14:44#7Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable Hi,Dance and Lujetta,
Dance, I encountered the issue of the 2 circles when I am reading book 154.In one of the articles, the "ah" is written with 2 circles on the right hand side of main body.
I think I would follow yr advice and visualise the "ah" with 2 circles.
Lujeta, thanks for the tip,unfortunately , I don't have it ( the paper)with me here in Australia, I left it in singapore.
That's why I am asking:))
Have you chanted the Usnisa Vijaya mantra for 1 million times?
Say, if i didn't get empowerment for the complete practice( visualisation and mudra), I just got empowerment for chanting the mantra.Do you think it is still ok?
Sorry my questions sounded simple, I have only get to know more abt Tantric Buddhism thru GM's books.Before that i am from Traditional Buddhism.
The only practice that I could do well then is a meditation practice known as Metta Bhavana ( Loving kindness meditation) of the Theravada tradition and the only mantra that I could chant well at that time is Om mani pad me hum.
Of course, I could chant Namo Amitabha.
You know, once I had very strange ideas abt Amitabha Buddha: The bodhisattava that I reverenced then is avalokitesvara Bodhisattva (Guan Yin) ,becos He has saved my mother once( that is another story).
I was thinking at that time( when I was abt 17 or 18 years old), Guan Yin is good , becos He listen to the suffereing cries of the sentient beings and help them, while Amitabha buddha is "lazy" , since he only stays in his comfortable Pureland and do nothing else.
HaHa , the irony is that many years later, i am the disciple of amitabha buddha!!
Regards
Xin Kai
Luljeta05/26/02 at 22:37:02#8Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable Xin_Kai wrote (05/26/02 at 20:14:44):
author=Xin_Kai link=board=buddhism;num=1022299812;start=0#6 date=05/26/02 at 20:14:44
Hi Xin Kai,
Sorry you don't have it with you. :'( I wish i had a place to refer you to for the syllable...
I've chanted the root and heart mantra close to 500,000 times. But the Dharani I've chanted close to a million times. Don't ask, I usually chant the longer mantras more than the shorter ones lol...Actually I love chanting the Dharani so maybe that's why.
Regarding your question, I think that if you pray to Grand Master first and request his blessing, it should be ok to practice the visualization part even though you only have the mantra empowerment. I'm not sure if the practice is included in the mantra empowerment--maybe someone else knows more about this.
No questions are simple! It's better to know that not to know if you don't know. :)
Regards,
Lu
:)
I understand the question better, and I can make up a new answer -
First note that all my previous answers related only to Sanskrt, not Tibetan, since I really don't know Tibetan.
But I do notice the same "discrepancy" that you mention - all within Tibetan, with no reference to Sanskrt at all.
In the syllable-by-itself mandala, "ah" doesn't have the circles:
[img]http://http://http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/yamantaka999/ab5/p111.jpg
[/img]
But in context of the Amitaba Mantra, the Ah syllable has those circles! (In the 2 o'clock position)
http://http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/yamantaka999/ab1/p40.jpg
All I can wonder is if the first is really the Tibetan letter "a", and the second is the Tibetan writing of the Sanksrt syllable "ah" - assuming the circles in Tibetan correspond to the visarga dots in Sanskrt. Mimosa would know!
... 1 minute later ...
Now I know!! Mimosa is bound to agree with me! .. The circles ARE the Tibetan equivalent of the visarga, and are ONLY used in Tibetan for recreating Sanskrt words, since the visarga is not a native Tibetan feature...
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/9594/tibet.html
is useful - and says, about 1/2 way down:
Sanskritic Letters
The Tibetan alphabet was created also with the idea for using it to write Sanskrit words. So, extended letters were created to account for the letters not found in the Tibetan alphabet. These are pretty easy to figure out - they are not really a part of the alphabet - you should be at least familiar with them although they appear infrequently. "T, TH, D, N, and SH" are retroflex consonants. "H" is a visarga and pronounced like a breathy "h". "M" is an anusvAra and represents nasalization. The others represent Sanskrit long vowels.
SO: I think you should visualize with the circles, and I think LuoLuan might put them in the syllable mandala! But, maybe he knows something I don't know.
thank you for listening!
lian hua dance
louyuan05/31/02 at 12:23:44#10Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable ##
http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/member/fcgi-bin/photo_show.fcg?ab=ab5&idx=15louyun
thanks for replying it!! I was going to ask you.
I went to the url, but nothing is displayed :-(
Mimosa
Last edited 06/01/02 at 10:42:57 by mimosa
Buddhafly05/31/02 at 13:08:32#11Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable It is found in the book The Power of Mantra.
louyuan06/03/02 at 10:14:47#12Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable louyuan wrote (05/31/02 at 12:23:44):
author=louyuan link=board=buddhism;num=1022299812;start=0#9 date=05/31/02 at 12:23:44
why???
I dont understand!!!
Is there any nessary change my url to english yahoo site!!!
please tell me!!!
it has nothing to do with English or Chinese. I can read both English and Chinese.
the problem is this
the old url you posted was
http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/member/fcgi-bin/photo_show.fcg?ab=ab5&idx= 15
the right url should be
http://tw.photo.yahoo.com/member/fcgi-bin/view_album.fcg?ab=ab5&p=2&id=yamantaka999&accept=1
notice your id "yamantak999" is there?
you must give that otherwise no one can see. The only person can see it is yourself because you have already log in :-)
Thanks a million!
Mimosa
mimosa06/03/02 at 11:49:46#14Re: Question abt sanskrit syllable ®É½üª÷è¤Q¦r©GµP
(if you can not see the chinese, change your view, encoding to big5)
The English translation should be
Kalachakra Ten Syallable Mantra
Last edited 06/03/02 at 11:51:50 by mimosa
