SOUNDS AND VIBRATIONS

As Quantum physics has now revealed to us, anything and everything consists of vibration. The primary essence of any object or phenomena, then, could be thought of as its own unique pattern, or composite patterns, of vibration.

It is said that the language of Sanskrut itself arises from these vary root sounds or vibrations of the Universe. The various vowels and consonants that make up Sanskrut words represent these core sounds, known as bijas. Whilst in states of deep resonance with the cosmos (in other words, while in meditation), the Rishis, the ancient spiritual scientists, could perceive these beej sounds; and from this profound sense of perception, they recognized the inherent sounds of each and every thing.

A Sanskrut word, then, is not merely a word chosen to name something, but an actual reflection of the inherent ‘sound’ of that object, concept or phenomena. In fact, proper, or rather, perfect, pronunciation of Sanskrut words, it is told, can replicate the exact nature, or essence, of that which it is referring too.

It is also told that if one’s mind was utterly pure, then upon hearing this perfectly pronounced symbol, the Sanskrut word, the image of that object, idea, etc., would immediately appear within the mind and the ‘field of understanding’ of this individual, even if they had never seen or heard of this thing or idea before. Likewise, the perfect pronunciation of a Sanskrut word has the power to manifest and/or influence that particular thing. Sanskrut, for this very reason, is referred to as the ‘perfect language’.

This is, at heart, the essence of one of the principles behind mantra chanting in the vedic tradition. Today there are very few who possess this precise knowledge and ability of ‘perfect enunciation’, and fewer still who are pure enough of mind to be able to receive the innate truths of this language upon hearing it.

Chand's :

 

Sound Wave Form

Chand's, the study of Vedic meter, is one of the six Vedang (limb of the Ved). When the celestial Ganga descends on earth, it is held in the matted locks of Lord Siva and flows down from the Gangotri glacier at a rapid pace. By the time it reaches the destination, the Bay of Bengal delta, its speed is very much reduced and it meanders along the way. The rhythm of the flow changes with time. This rhythm is called chandas. Mantra and stotra as well as all vedic hymns are received in certain chand's. Chand's is the specific rhythm with which the sound flows. None of the ancient works dealing exclusively with chandas have survived. Some of the surviving works are the Chand-Shashtra and we have good sources in the Agni Puran, Bharatiya Natya Sastra (Ch.15), and Brhat Samhita (Ch.104). We start learning Chand's from the teachings of Sri Acyutanand.

 

Pad :

 

In order to study the quality of the sound wave form the ancients employed various techniques. One of them was the concept of pad meaning foot. The basic pada consists of 4 syllables. Human beings have two feet (dvi-pad) and the root meter for their movement would be defined by 2×4=8 syllables. This is called a pada or step and is referred to as gayatri-pada. Sri Acyutanand explains this as sa-sa-ba-da pa-ra-ra-ja.

Using the pada (4 syllable foot) we can explain the root of some of the chand's – dvipad viraj (20), gayatri (24), usnih (28), anustubh (32), brhati (36), pañkti (40), tristubh (44), and jagati (48). However, all of these are really not multiples of the pada (8 syllables).