(On modern Multimedia computers you will hear this Mantra)

Listen to more versions of the Gayatri Mantra on:

Gayatri Mantra and: Singing Together

'The Matter of the Heart Sangha'*

Gayatri Mantra:

English translation:

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Book and CD Arati/Gayatri Mantra Sacha Sadhana

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What is a mantra?

    The word mantra is Sanskrit and it means: syllable(s) or sacred word(s). Mantras are vibrational formulas that are recited silently within, or spoken, or sung outwardly. There are mantras in Sanskrit as well as Japanese, Chinese and Tibetan languages. Also tribal languages are known to formulate power syllables and words. A mantra is a precise sound, a frequency that conveys a directive into consciousness.  Mantras are used to deliver results and are repeated a certain number of times for healing and for producing abundance. They are used in the Tantric traditions along with yantras for the cultivation of supernatural powers called siddhis. Mantras are used to open the heart and to aid in receptivity, adapting, preparing and opening every area of the physical, mental and emotional bodies so that one may access and enter into greater awareness and deeper wisdom.

    Some mantras may be likened to prayer while others are powerful and direct demands. There are mantras that are recited, or silently inwardly spoken into extremely subtle recesses of consciousness, acting like homeopathy for such capabilities as healing or blessing or guidance.

Mantras or precise sound vibrations produce geometric patterns. This can be examined under the right conditions. Scientific experiments have shown that, by changing the rate of vibration by raising or by lowering a sound wave, a visual pattern of the vibration also changes along with the rate of sound. This has been demonstrated through the medium of a drop of water, which when charged with different sound waves will produce a flow of geometric patterns. Sand scattered on the surface of a metal plate, shifts from one geometry to another along with currents of higher and lower tones.

What is a Yantra?

    The geometry of a sound vibration containing a particular information code is called a yantra. A yantra is a diagram that transmits subtle information of mystical significance to the one who looks at it. Like a mantra, each yantra embodies a very particular meaning, opening inner awareness and receptivity to the information that the yantra expresses. It is said that a yantra is most potent  when the bij (Sanskrit letters or syllables) are in their  rightful positions and less potent when the bij are absent from the diagram. 

The Gayatri Yantra is a sacred diagram that transmits a subtle language encoded in the Gayatri’s potential. Geometric yantras may be so precise that each line is drawn in a certain direction and in a certain progression. Every curve, every line and even the number of lines convey meaning. Some yantras are not as precise in structure, but are as precise in the meaning that they convey.

The exact message that a yantra embodies is nearly never, if ever, explained or spoken in words.

Click on the Gayatri Yantra to enlarge.

The Gayatri Mantra

    The Gayatri Mantra and Gayatri Yantra are methods of initiation into a finer comprehension of her message. Also the Gayatri in any form is a vehicle for awakening, for grace and selflessness, as well as service to this world. Initiation means to get underway, a new beginning, to move forward and it also means to receive instruction. All of these meanings are gathered in, and carried out in the initiation of the Gayatri Mantra. Often it is asked if initiation into the Gayatri Mantra by a Master is at all necessary. When one is initiated by a lineage of Masters, the mantra carries the full current of the entire lineage. It is said that a mantra is dead unless it is given by a Master who is intimately immersed in the mantra. Yes, indeed that is so. However, there is one more way to empower the mantra’s potency and that is to chant it by the power of your heart. Here, in these pages I have explained a good deal about the Gayatri Mantra and the Matter of the Heart Sangha, a world wide borderless sangha of Gayatri Mantra initiates.

It is important however to speak the mantra correctly.

You can hear a true pronunciation of the Gayatri Mantra at: www.shantimayi.com

    The word Gayatri means meter or rhythm and it also means protection. Though these meanings give some sense of the words, the true significance and full impact of the Gayatri Mantra unfolds with insight. Each progressive insight presents another one of greater awareness, and possibility unfolds again and again.

    We join the great ocean of bodhisattvas. They are the ones who live for the enlightenment of all beings throughout all times and throughout the universes. There are many who live for this alone and their expressions are endless. There are those who vow to return again and again. Then there are those who contribute to this great cause in this life alone and do not vow to return or carry this privilege beyond their immediate contribution. There are those who live this way intensely and those who do not.

    I encourage spiritual aspirants to take some time in their life, in their day, to offer moments of selfless service to the whole of life in the shape of the Gayatri’s verse. Selflessness is enlightening.

    May we generate the heart and mind for the realization of enlightenment and unity of all beings in the light of Truth. Some think it is not possible, but the bodhisattva understands that it is possible (here and now) because after all, the Truth is that all beings are fundamentally one enlightened essential totality. This however must be genuinely realized.

The Gayatri is an Ancient Vigil

    The Gayatri Mantra is not only being chanted here among us and not only by our sangha. People all over the world are also chanting this deeply moving prayer at this very same time.

No matter what time of day or night you may chant, there are others chanting the mantra too. Gayatri is an ancient vigil surrounding the planet.

The Gayatri Mantra is one of the keynotes for the transformation of consciousness and is an identical vibration to the vital force in nature.

The mantra is most effective when chanted in its original language Sanskrit. It is one of the oldest prayers known to humanity, its sentiment is as ancient as light. This prayer appeals to the highest wisdom, to the brilliance of the cosmos, to illumine an understanding of our true nature. The appeal requests that we become subtle and receptive to the divine wisdom that pervades the experience of life and is in essence our true nature.

To chant the Gayatri Mantra purifies

the chanter.

To listen to the Gayatri Mantra purifies

the listener.

This sacred prayer spirals out through the entire universe from the heart of the chanter, appealing for peace and divine wisdom for all.

The balanced qualities of the Gayatri Mantra

    The Gayatri is a perfectly balanced mantra, yin and yang. The body or text of the Gayatri Mantra is feminine, and her message or invocation is masculine. Gayatri is the mother of the Vedas and this means the mother of all knowledge.

She appeals to the masculine Savitur, which is said to be the radiance of perception and intelligence. This radiance, which is everywhere and in every experience, is likened to the radiance of our solar sun.

In other words, all of the knowledge of the intricate ways of existence is contained within the syllables of the mantra, so too is the means and vehicle with which to go beyond worldly knowledge.

Gayatri Mantra's vibration and influence on the physical body

    Silently thinking or speaking or chanting the Gayatri Mantra influences the physical body, clears the emotional body, leading one to the inner heart.** The Gayatri stimulates and facilitates insightfulness and awakening to the Truth within all.

Our energy centers, levels and rhythms are activated by the measure of breaths that are drawn in through the nostrils and released during recitation of the Gayatri Mantra (even during silent repetition).***

This balances electromagnetic rhythm and energy currents in the body with prana. Prana is an undetectable life force energy which is similar to orgone.****

During recitation, all elements of the mantra are in use; even the breath is a precision instrument. It all works together, like an orchestra and the conductor. The breath, voice, meditation and intention, efficiently and effortlessly function (like the sun efficiently and effortlessly shines).

* 'The Matter of the Heart Sangha' is a Worldwide Net of Diamond Beings who chant the mantra for the awakening of all sentient beings.

** Not only the well-known chakra system but all energy and rejuvenating centers are activated by the sound of the Gayatri.

*** The mantra works in a multitude of ways, which align the energies, magnetic currents, biochemistry and brainwave patterns on a very subtle level. Immediately or in time, one will notice the wonderful effect.

**** According to Wilhelm Reich (1897-1957) the universe is permeated by a primal, mass free phenomenon that is called ‘orgone energy’.

The Gayatri is a pearl from the depth

    It is a jewel among the treasures that our Guru and the Sacha lineage have handed down from generation to generation. To be initiated into this sacred mantra is a great privilege. The sound or even the thought of the Gayatri verse sets grace in action as we recognize the fortune we have in our life to live our highest ideals.

Gayatri teaches the chanter her secrets

    By chanting the Gayatri Mantra, the mantra itself reveals the teachings within it.

The Gayatri is flawless and whole. The Gayatri Mantra regenerates unobstructed perception in the same way that crops are renewed. For example, wind carries seeds onto the terrain. In time and by the right conditions, wild flowers and wheat inherit the fields. Again and again an unobstructed flow, season after season. The Earth propagates her seeds and in turn the seeds flourish, grow and produce another generation. The mantra works like that, it is seeded by your chanting, it expresses and propagates. Gayatri’s meaning is like the good season that prospers the Earth. Fruit comes forth again and again. Like a surrendered seed is carried by the wind, we too surrender our intention into the universal intention and the Gayatri flowers in places and at times that we may be or may not be aware of. Gayatri is like the power in the sun.

How can we really speak about such a thing, is it comprehensible at all? Any definition that you hear may be compared to just one grain of sand upon infinite shores. A definition can never indicate the immense significance and intensity of this great mantra.

This jeweled Gayatri Initiation is a privilege for us

    There was once a time when the Gayatri Mantra was not spoken outwardly, it was repeated only in silence or whispered on the tip of the tongue. This method of chanting is a very subtle and powerful way to repeat the mantra. There was a time when women did not chant the mantra. There was also a time when only the Brahman priests and no others chanted the Gayatri Mantra. Today everyone has the privilege to chant the Gayatri Mantra - and what an honour it is.

It seems that the change came when the world events began to turn towards a darker time. Now millions of men, women and children from every walk of life repeat and chant this beautiful and powerful invocation.

Because of its universal appeal and content, this mantra cannot rightfully be associated with a particular religion. The Hindus were the guardians of the Gayatri; it was they who taught it and propagated it throughout the world. You could say that the Gayatri Mantra is their offering to the spirit of humanity and the awakening of all beings. However, the scope of Gayatri's invocation is universal and transgresses all borders of secular religion.

Mantra is the matrix of existence

    Sparkling in the sunrise and clinging to the fields, the morning dew appears by mantra. Then again it disappears by mantra, in the heat of the noonday sun. Everything that appears and disappears, in all of existence, does so by the power of precise sound vibration, pitch, length and tone, by a mantra.

The Gayatri Mantra is a vibration that sets up a condition of subtle receptivity and opens our way to the unconditional Truth. Like the buzzing of a bee contributes to the full web of experience, so too, the chanting of the mantra contributes to the full matrix of existence.

This article is written by ShantiMayi

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More information about the Gayatri Mantra can be found in Q & A