Friday, January 6, 2017

Glossary of Styles of Hindu Chants and Mantras



Aarti also spelled arti, arati, arathi, aarthi (In Devanagari: आरती ārtī) is a Hindu religious ritual of worship, a part of puja, in which light from wicks soaked in ghee (purified butter) or camphor is offered to one or more deities. Aartis also refer to the songs sung in praise of the deity, when lamps are being offered.


The term ashtakam (Sanskrit: अष्टकम् aṣṭakam), also often written astakam, is derived from the Sanskrit word aṣṭā, meaning "eight". In context of poetic compositions, 'ashtakam' refers to a particular form of poetry, written in eight stanzas.


Bija Mantra
Bija: In Hinduism and Buddhism, the Sanskrit term Bīja(बीज) (Jp. 種子 shuji) (Chinese 种子 zhǒng zǐ), literally seed, is used as a metaphor for the origin or cause of things and cognate with bindu.
Mantra: A "Mantra" (/ˈmæntrə, ˈmɑːn-, ˈmʌn-/ (Sanskrit: मंत्र);[2]) is a sacred utterance, a numinous sound, a syllable, word or phonemes, or group of words in Sanskrit believed by practitioners to have psychological and spiritual powers.


Chalisa: literally “Forty Chaupai” and indicates forty verses of poetry together in a devotional song. Most popular are the Hanuman, Ganesh, Durga, and Shiv Chalisas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaupai_(poetry)
A chaupai (चौपाई) is a quatrain verse of Indian poetry, especially medieval Hindi poetry, that uses a metre of four syllables.


Gayatri (Sanskrit: gāyatrī) is the feminine form of gāyatra, a Sanskrit word for a song or a hymn, having a Vedic meter of three padas, or lines, of eight syllables. In particular, it refers to the Gayatri Mantra and the Goddess Gāyatrī as that mantra personified.


Kavacam, Kavacham, Kavach is a mantra of protection, not a particular style of chant. It is often comprised of Stotram verses.


Shloka (meaning "song", from the root śru, "hear"[1]) is a category of verse line developed from the Vedic Anustubh poetic meter. It is the basis for Indian epic verse, and may be considered the Indian verse form par excellence, occurring, as it does, far more frequently than any other meter in classical Sanskrit poetry.[1] The Mahabharata and Ramayana, for example, are written almost exclusively in shlokas.[2]


Stotra or Stotram (stotra) is a Sanskrit word, that means "ode, eulogy or a hymn of praise".[1][2] It is a literary genre of Indian texts designed to be melodically sung, in contrast to shastras which are composed to be recited.[1]



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