Blog

Sanskrit Letters, Transliterations, and the Siri Gayatri Mantra

In the last blog, we undertook a in depth exploration of the the last part (So Hung), of the mantra Ra Ma Da Sa, Sa Say So Hung in light of the Upanishads and other topics. Now that we have laid all that out we will explore the Siri Gayatri mantra and how it can be viewed in light of Sanskrit alphabet. In this blog we will explore the connections as well as the mismatches with how Yogi Bhajan expressed the Siri Gayatri Mantra and how other sources do as well. 

Ra, Ma, Da, and Sa are consonants in the Sanskrit alphabet. The meaning of these letters according to Dr. David Frawley’s in his book Mantra Yoga and Primal Sound is mostly congruous with the Siri Gayatri Mantra as Yogi Bhajan taught it, although not 100%.

I have tremendous respect for Dr. Frawley's body of work and teachings.  That being said, and this is not to discredit him,...

 Introduction

I first experienced Yoga practices using the word Kirya when my Mom brought me to a Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan class in 1997.  As a teenager I was taken by the story around the practice and the high I got from the powerful breath work.  I continued with this practice for the next 13 years until 2010.  At times I practiced for minimum of 3 hours a day, doing early morning sadhana singing with my friends in Sikh Dharma and enjoying the ups and downs of being involved with many of the traveling musicians in the 3HO community.  Community life was rich and a wonderful yet challenging time of my life.

Back in 2001 while sick with lyme disease, I laid in bed and went on a mystical journey reading Yogananda’s classic work Autobiography of a Yogi.  Up to that time I had exclusively been following Yogi Bhajan’s view on Kriya.  Reading Yogananda’s amazing book, which brought up Kriya Yoga often, made me very...