Mantra
Taking a break from the mela (festival) and its fifteen-thousand participants, my wife and I walked along the small river as the water tumbled over and between large smooth rocks. We were far from civilization as we know it, far from flush toilets or running water, in the impoverished countryside of eastern India. We had bathed daily in this river or out of buckets drawn from open wells.
Our search for a quiet meditation spot that evening was interrupted when we encountered two men laboring to prepare their meal over a small gasoline stove on the bank of the river.
“Namaskar [salutations],” they said. We returned the greeting and introductions were commenced. The thin young man was Jitendra, but I was having trouble understanding the name of the chubby one.
“I am Bugbut,” he said proudly in heavily accented English.
“I’m sorry?” I replied.
“Bugbut,” he said.
“Bhagavat?” I asked, choosing a Sanskrit name close to what I was hearing.
He looked perplexed. “Bugbut,” he repeated a third time.
Frustrated, I decided to make it clear what I was hearing. “Bug Butt?” I asked.
“Hyan [yes],” he smiled. “Bugbut.” And so it was, at his insistence, we called him Bug Butt.
Thereafter, through the remaining days of the mela, we encountered these two young men frequently. They must have thought I was a very jolly fellow as every time I greeted them I could not suppress my laughter. I just could not say, “Namaskar [salutations], Bug Butt,” with a straight face. My strange affect did not seem to bother them at all; on the contrary, it seemed to break whatever cultural barrier stood between us and they were immensely hospitable toward us.
In retrospect, I think his name probably was Bhagavat, a name of Sanskrit origin with an uplifting meaning. The problem was that his Bengali accent and my California accent were just not connecting up.
Words are sounds to which we attach meaning. When I said the word “Bug Butt,” this gentleman heard a name that had a subtle and uplifting meaning while I heard a meaning relating to the posterior of an insect.
The yogic science of mantra is the science of sounds; the use of special Sanskrit words and phrases that resonate to the innermost core of the mind. But mantra is not a meaningless sound; all mantras used in yogic meditation have meaning. Ideation on this meaning is as important as the correct incantation of the sound.
The rhythm and sound of the mantra resonates through the cakras (psychic centers along the spine) to the base of the spine and awakens what is called the kundalini, the spiritual potentiality dormant in the lowest cakra. But it is the ideative aspect of the mantra (the meaning of the mantra) that associates this awakened potential with infinite consciousness.
Stated another way, you cannot attain spiritual enlightenment by merely repeating a sound. To associate one’s identity with that of infinite consciousness requires the ideational aspect of the mantra. Repeating a mantra without ideating on its meaning can facilitate deep relaxation and mental concentration, but, according to the science of yoga, it does not result in psychic expansion.
It is true that in the final merger with unqualified consciousness one goes beyond the mantra. This is because in that state the final subject (the infinite witnessing consciousness), its object (your sense of identity), and the connecting link (mantra), all become one.