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The Magahi language

From Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia
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LANGUAGE..."From my earliest childhood in Tibet, I was always fascinated with language. During my studies at Oxford, I was fascinated by the way the Oxonians spoke." (Trungpa: First Thought: 1983..pg xx)

Atisha.jpg

The Magahi language (मगही, also known as मगधी, Magadhi) is a language spoken in India. The ancestor of Magadhi, from which its name derives, Magadhi Prakrit, is believed to be the language spoken by the Buddha, and the language of the ancient kingdom of Magadha. Magadhi is closely related to Bhojpuri and Maithili and these languages are sometimes referred to as a single language, Bihari. These languages, together with several other related languages, are known as the Bihari languages, which form a sub-group of the Eastern Zone group of Indo-Aryan languages. Magadhi has approximately 13 million speakers.

For those who are wondering what happened next, let me tell you briefly. AZ succeeded in restoring the old Mazdayasni religion to its pure original state and added to that his own marvellous new Zarathushtri revelations (that's why we are known by the double-barrelled name "Mazdayasni-Zarathushtri"). Many of the Aryans embraced AZ's teachings and became his followers. But many others did not budge and remained in the Daevayasni camp. The religious strife became so intense that during or shortly after the mission of AZ, the two camps within the Aryan community split up in a Great Schism, parted company for ever and went their own separate ways.

I may mention that this split occurred when the Aryans were apparently located at around 50 degrees North latitude somewhere in Northern Eurasia. Later, the Iranian-Aryans migrated further Southwards and finally settled in the Iranian Plateau (Persia), while the Indo-Aryans took a different route and finally settled in the Indo-Gangetic Plain of North India. The split was complete, even physically/geographically.

However, having once been united and having shared a common homeland and culture for thousands of years in the remote past, these two branches of the Aryan family naturally share certain common features in religion, history & heritage, as well as in language --- Avesta and Vedic Sanskrit are actually sister languages!

But due to the religious divide and the Great Schism which resulted in much bitterness and enmity (various attempts at a reconciliation having failed), there are also naturally many major differences in religious doctrine and practice between the two branches. This is no better illustrated than by the terms "Daeva" and "Ahura." Ahura is the name by which the Iranian-Aryans refer to God. But did you know that when the Indo-Aryans use that very same word Asura ("s" & "h" being interchangeable between Avesta and Sanskrit) they take it to signify a demon? Now look at Daeva. This word comes from the root "div"/"dav" which can have two contrary meanings --- one meaning = to shine, and the other meaning = to deceive. The Indo-Aryans picked the first meaning with the good connotation (i.e., to shine) and applied the words Daeva and Daevi to signify their various gods and goddesses. No prizes for guessing what the Iranian-Aryans did! They picked the second meaning with the bad connotation (i.e., to deceive) and hence took Daeva to signify a demon. Tit for tat!

SPEECH...Vowells are feminine and consonants masculine..."In Shinto, 'norito' is the dignified utterance of words addressed to the gods."..(Jinja: 1958...pg 11)..."The Lord of Speech" refers to the use of concepts as filters to screen us from a direct perception of what is. The concepts are taken too seriously, they are used as tools to solidify our world and ourselves." (Trungpa: 1973..pg 6)

"Synchronizing mind and body is looking and seeing directly beyond language." (Trungpa: 1984..pg 53)

INDO-IRANIAN....Two ancient Iranian languages: Avestan (Northeastern Iran: 6th Century BC). Old Persian: (Southwestern Iran)....Median is also an ancient Iranian Language. Old Persian is the language of teh Achaemenian Court. Middle Persian is the language of the Sasanian court.Their earliest literature is the vedas, sacred hymns to the Aryan deities. The most archaic Sanskrit is the Vedas (1500-1200 BC)...

OLD PERSIAN..."The kings themselves and their Persian (ie: SW Iranians) subjects spoke Old Persian." (Wiesehofer: 1996..pg 8)...

PROTO-INDO-ARYAN...Refers to that stage of the language existing before the migrations into India and after the separation from Iranian. The Proto-Aryan Period was 2000 BC at the latest. (Burrow: 1973...pg 125)

SANSKRIT....(Tibetan: legs sbyar gyi skad)...Sanskrit appears about 2000-1500 BC in India with the migration of the Indo-Aryan branch of speakers into northwest India. The nearest relative of Indo-Aryan is Persian.

INDO-IRANIAN...."These 's-peoples' who spoke an Indo-Iranian {{Wiki|dialect]] using the hard sibilant 's', were driven south by kindred peoples who changed the hard sibilant 's' to 'h'. The 's-people' went to India. The 'h-people' stayed in Iran. Example: Asura and Ahura." (Sambala and Shambhala?...Saka and Shakya?) (Burrow: 1973...pg 133)...

MAHABHARATA...consists of 100,000 couplets. Close affinity to the Iranian Avesta. The Sanskrit dramatists had little regard for the three classical unities of space, time, and action. (Ency Britannica)

MAGACHI.....Sakyamuni Buddha taught in the Magachi language. Sanskrit, the more cultured language was favored by the educated elite.

"In the language of the gods of the Yungdrung (phywa sans mu rgyal ad phyod gsal)" (Francke: 1950..pg 163)...

DAKINI CODE....Code languages (brda skad)

Mural of Atisha at Ralung Gompa, 1993.jpg

ALTAI...."the Altaic language is related to Mongolian and to the Tungus language spoken in other parts of Siberia. The ancient Turkic languages also belong to the Altaic language family."(Kharatidi: 1996..pg 203)...

MASANG..."tha language of the Masang, a class of semi-divine beings of the Theurang" (Norbu: 1995..pg 15)

"the lore of the deu made use of secret languages to transmit knowledge. Deu (lde'u) is an ancient Tibetan term, possibly from the language of Shang-Shung."(Norbu: 1995..pg 21)

UIGHUR SCRIPT...."With the Manichean religion, the Uighurs took over the Soghdian alphabet, derived from Syriac, and developed it into the famous Uighur script." (Knobloch: 1972..pg 224)

SHANG SHUNG...Until the 7th century, an independent, non-Tibetan kingdom, with its own language and history..... Especially the Zhang-zhung terms: WER RO (king), NYI RI (sun), SHE TUN (heart)(Kvaerne: 1996).... The Zhang-zhung {{Wiki|dialect]] is somewhat related to Tibetan, but it is closer to the modern Kanauri language of the western Himalayas. (Reynolds:1996)..."The Tibetan script U-Med is based on the ancient script of Zhang-Zhung. This script is called sMar-yig or Lha-bab-yi-ge, which means "script descended from the heavens" and is possibly 3000 years old. (Ngakpa:1986..pg 178)

KALACHAKRA....."the 1047 verses of the Kalachakra Tantra used today (the original is 12,000 verses) was composed by the eighth King of Shambhala, the first Kulika (Kalki), Jampal Trakpa. The original 12,000 verses have never been translated into Tibetan." (Kongtrul: 1995..pg 271)..."The Kalachakra is one of the last Sanskrit works to have been written in a Central Asian land." (Geoffrey Hopkins: 1985..pg 60)..."King Sucandra wrote the 12,000 verse root text to the Kalachakra in an unknown tongue called the 'twilight language.' (Bryant: 1992..pg 68)..."Sixteen translations of the Sri Kalachakra from Sanskrit to Tibetan appeared between the 11th and 14th centuries." (Bryant: 1992..pg 71)...

SPEECH...Vowells are feminine and consonants masculine..."In Shinto, 'norito' is the dignified utterance of words addressed to the gods."..(Jinja: 1958...pg 11)..."The Lord of Speech" refers to the use of concepts as filters to screen us from a direct perception of what is. The concepts are taken too seriously, they are used as tools to solidify our world and ourselves." (Trungpa: 1973..pg 6)

MANTRA...."The followers of Pon believe that mantras, words of power, are the keynote (key-note) to any particular body of atoms, and that each organism has its own vibratory rate, though it may be the sun, a rain cloud, or a mountain. When this rate of vibration is known, the organism can be disintegrated or even created. The ancient Greek theory of music appears similar to this Tibetan conception." (Clark: 1954..pg 354)..."the great mystery of how mind can create matter."..(Kongtrul: 1995..pg 41)..."In Shinto, there is a belief, called the working of the 'koto-dama' (the mysterious spiritual force believed to exist in words)."..(Jinja:1958..pg 28)....."In ancient Persia, the 'mathra' was a magic spell which caused things to expand. The utterance of the sovereign sky-god was compressed into a formula so potent it could banish one from the world of darkness to the world of light."..(Campbell: 1968..pg 101)...

SEED SYLLABLES...(t= tsik...Sk= bija)..."The six syllables representing the six classes of living beings are: THU-hell, TRI-tormented spirits, SU-animals, NA-humans, KA-demigods, SO-gods." (Kvaerne: 1985..pg 16)....Every deity has its essence or seed in a certain vibration or sound. From this sound comes the deity. (Allione: 1984..pg 129)...thugs srog: spiritual life force; seed syllable in the heart..."A is the final letter of the Tibetan alphabet, inherent in all the consonants; it is a phonetic symbol of Primeval or Absolute Reality." (Kvaerne: 1996..pg 29).....SO SO (BSWO BSWO) is a characteristic exclamation found in the ancient ritual texts. (Norbu: 1995..pg 178)..."In her right hand she holds the heroic letters of the "Five Seeds" (Hoffman: 1979..pg 105)..."Five heroic syllables: A, OM, RAM, HUM, DZA" (Kvaerne: 1985..pg 22)..."these seed syllables are not only written characters, or symbolic representations, but living beings endowed with motive power. Not only the name of fire, it is the seed of fire. (David-Neel: 1931..pg 202)..."The ancient Persian idea that the creation of the world was by a word uttered by a sky-god appears not only in the first chapter of Genesis, but elsewhere in the cosmologies of the ancient east." (Campbell: 1968..pg 100)...

ARYAN LANGUAGES...."Peoples of Ancient India and Iran spoke Aryan languages. This is basically a linguistic concept denoting the closely related Indo-Aryan and Iranian languages which form that branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of the historical languages is called Proto-Aryan. The Vedic, Avestan, and Old Persian show remarkable similarities. (Old Indo Aryan: arya...Old Persian: ariya...Avestan: airiia). The linguistic history indicates that the Aryans originally formed a single people until the beginning of the 2nd millenium BC when the Indian Aryans and the Iranian Aryans went separate ways." (Yarshater: 1987..pg 684)...

SOGDIAN...."linguistic affinity between Old Persian (a Southwest Iranian language) and the Northeast-Iranian Sogdian language. (Yarshater: 1987..pg 685)...

06-Janasutra.jpg

SOMA....Indo-Iranian: Sauma...Vedic: Soma...Avestan: Haoma

TOKARIC...."the most ancient form of Indo-European in Siberia." (Sykes: 1958..pg 97)...

KALA..(Castle)...Kilat or Kalat in Persian....Qalaq in Armenian...Kal'ah or Kal'at in Arabic...(Le Strange: 1966..pg 395)...

"Languages develop from clan language to tribal language to folk language to national language." (Rudenko: 1970..pg 226)...

HERODOTUS..."Anyone who does business with the Scyths (Sakae) needs seven interpreters speaking seven languages. Sharp divisions among the pastoral tribes has to be recognized." (Rudenko: 1970..pg 226)...

"The Kushan Empire was a region of intense linguistic contact between the Indo-Aryan and Iranian languages." (Gafurov: 1968..pg 172)...

"The Aryan terms for deity are borrowed from fire and light. For example, 'deva' is from the root 'div' which means 'to shine'. In old Sanskrit, 'Athar' is 'fire'."..(James: 1963...pg 79)...

DIONYSIAC FESTIVAL.....Ritual cry of "euhai...euhoi" (Burkert: 1987...pg 172)...

"Lha gyalo"...'the gods are victorious'...(Born in Tibet...pg 209)

" The linguistic history indicates that the Aryans ("Indo-Europeans"....."Iran"....) originally formed a single people until the beginning of the 2nd millenium BC when the Deva worshipping Indian Aryans and the Asura worshiping Iranian Aryans went separate ways." (Yarshater: 1987..pg 684)... ... The Kalachakra discusses the expulsion of the Deva worshippers from Shambhala and refers to the Rigden kings as Asura...... "

Shambhala .... "Iranian origins"......the mostly extinct Avestan Iranian tradtions of pre-Buddhist/pre-Islamic Persian [[Wikipedia:Central Asia|Central Asia]] of which the Tibetan Bon, Zorastrian, and MANICHAEISM are quite interesting.......

"Appreciation" of the DRALAS of Western Europe and North America.....Who are these Gods...these Dralas...MITHRA... the Greek and Roman warrior gods...the Avestan Asura......their rituals and ceremonies....their costumes and uniforms........where do they abide....their power spots.....their sacred dances...the songs of the Asuri .....

Shiva (in Tibetan, Lha Chen) also plays an important role; in fact his god-realm is called Shambhala.

Non-Visible Beings/////Drala or Dralha?...... Drala is actually a transliteration for two different Tibetan terms. Therefore it stands for two slightly different kinds of deity. One is spelled sgra bla, and the other is spelled in Tibetan, dgra lha. The first one with the element, sgra refers to a kind of energy; it is a vibrational entity. The second (dgra-) word ends in the syllable lha, and it is a kind of god.....Jamgon Kongtrul the Great used a third spelling .....

Drala spelt sGra bla begins with the syllable sgra which means sound, and continues with la that here means "a type of individual energy that is endowed with protective functions" (Norbu 1995.) For example, seng- ge'i sgra means the lion's roar. It is also possible to write and hence, refer to sgra'i lha since sGra means a sound or cry, but using lha here instead of la conveys the meaning of a sound deity.

Ancient relationships ... the ancient Bon Kingdom of Shang Shung which was located at the base of Mt Kailas, the dwelling place of Shenlha Okar and the 360 WERMA Deities.....the Avestan/Aryan traditions of pre-Islamic Iranian [[Wikipedia:Central Asia|Central Asia]] and their influence the secret ..MITHRAIC.. Lodge ceremonies of Pre-Christian Western Europe.... and the ceremonial rituals and dances of Sotuknang, of the Hopi Tradition, whose face is brilliant like a bright star and whose body is the nature of crystal.....

Source

okarreview.blogspot.com.au