Talk:Gayatri Mantra

Parsi123

Parsi123, if you have an issue with 1 thing, why are you reverting multiple things?VictoriaGrayson^Talk 18:45, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Translation

So, if I understand the word-by-word translation correctly, the mantra may as well mean "Think about (remember, recall) the Power (Sun) that makes us live"? If so, compare to "Atman is Brahman," that is, 'the life-force (breath, "atmen") within is the same as the life-force (Brahman, the force that makes the ritual work) without.' Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 09:18, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

@JJ: This translation is unusual in many ways, interesting too. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 11:49, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

From memory (sincere apologies if I quote this wrong): 'Think of abd Allah, who makes it rain, whereby the plants grow, so we can live. Praise to abd Allah!'. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 12:07, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

But seriously: even a word-by-word translation may give a lot translations and interpretations, right? See for example [1], which says that dhīmahi comes from the verb dhyai (as in dhyana?), while this page says that the root is dhā. Or is that the same? It seems to me that a word-by-word translation would be very helpfull. Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 12:17, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

@JJ: Rreminds me of similar passages in the African Traditional Religions I stumbled into, while I was busy with the Africa Destubathon initiative. Some of those seem to long predate the arrival of Islam in Africa. Returning to Gayatri Mantra, word by word translation can be WP:OR-Synthesis, since the Buddhist/Hindu/Jaina textual traditions have simultaneous subject-object contextualization, giving concepts/words many context sensitive meanings. The Vedic context of this verse is here. Indeed, the Gayatri mantra has long been, since their earliest Upanishads, re-interpreted, re-stated and re-quoted in different ways. One unusual historic modification, for example, has been the kamagayatri, which is found in Yoga, Shakti and Tantra texts. David White, wrote about it, if I remember right, in Yoga in Practice. As did Douglas Brooks. Many others. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 12:43, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

@JJ: One more thing. What archaic Vedic words and hymns mean has been the ancient puzzle. Yaska, who probably lived sometime between 600-400 BCE, beautifully explains this dilemma. He tried your approach, break down words to roots (verb are best, he says). His work is part of their Vedanga studies, called Nirukta. Fascinating is his work. Helpful in parts, confusing in others. Confusing because a word can be broken into many roots, each combination giving a different inconsistent suggestion, which one is right we don't know, nor is there a way to know. Some call parts of it folk etymology. Little agreement. The Gayatri mantra is Vedic, same difficulty. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 12:59, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

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Page move

Recently the article was moved to the title Gayatri (mantra) by User:The Evil IP address with edit summary "decap general noun". I have reverted the move since

1. the previous move was undiscussed
2. this is not just a mantra named Gayatri, but a mantra commonly known as "Gayatri mantra"; and
3. given that the goddess Gayatri is a (later, relatively obscure) personification of the mantra, Gayatri Mantra would be the primary topic, and thus having the latter article being the one with the parenthetical disambiguator is not appropriate IMO

Guessing from the move's edit summary, perhaps The Evip IP address would consider Gayatri mantra to be the preferred title for the article instead. I have no particular objection to that reanaming. But it would be good to wait a couple of days for any others to voice their objections and to perform a literature search for sanity check, in order to avoid a series of moves/reversals. Abecedare (talk) 17:46, 31 July 2018 (UTC)

• I was bold in renaming this move, it's legitimate to discuss it here. I believe "mantra" here is used as a general noun, as the name of the subject is "Gayatri". And as far as I understand, that's how the article should be named then, right? --The Evil IP address (talk) 10:30, 1 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Parenthesis are used in article titles on wikipedia mainly for disambiguation purposes, which in this case is unnecessary. Also WP:COMMONNAME would argue for the current title (with or without capitalized 'M' in mantra), since that is how the mantra is referred to. Compare with wikipedia articles on the various asana, most of which have asana in their title since that common noun, as per usage, is considered part of the name. Abecedare (talk) 20:32, 1 August 2018 (UTC)

Image has obvious issues

The following image, linked in the article, has serious issues in the script:

Major issues: nearly every conjunct consonant is broken up; line 1: suva: instead of sva:; line 2: tatsavitu is turned into nonsense; line 3: dhimahi is turned into nonsense; line 4: dhiyo is turned into nonsense.

The image needs to be recreated with the text in the "Text" section of the article, preferably by someone who knows how to input devanagari correctly. 2A01:E0A:BA:8E90:21B2:7018:9F15:BDA6 (talk) 08:26, 20 October 2020 (UTC)