Freitag, Januar 13, 2006

Bring Kantarou down to earth! - Issue 2

From Carmen Blacker's The Catalpa Bow: a study of shamanistic practices in Japan

One pair, poised on the edge of a precipitous slope down to the lake, was particularly remarkable. The maeza stood close to the medium, twisting his hands with ferocious intensity into the nine mudras known as kuji, repeating as he did so the nine accompanying magic syllables:
Rin-byou-tou-sha-kai-jin-retsu-zai-ZEN!
At the last syllable his voice rose to a sharp yell, while with two fingers stiffly outstretched he made the nine strokes of the gate, four vertical, five horizontal, through which no evil influences may pass. He then thrust his fingers fiercely forwards the medium's stomach in the pointed sword mudra, shouting meanwhile in sharp grunting tones the syllables 'A-UN-A-UN!'. These, the first and last letters of the Sanscrit alphabet, are believed to encompass between them the entire universe...

I've yet to get my hands on this book by Blacker (but I'm dying to), and am quoting from the introduction from Notes on the kuji by David Waterhouse.

I also understand there's the confusion about the second syllable, that if it's "Byou" or "Pyou". Different articles (that I've looked up on) use one or the other; there's no stating which is right or more popular. In the process of my research, I realise that old publications use "Byou" while modern authors, "Pyou". Hence, in my personal opinion, the ancients must have read the second syllable as "Byou", and as time passes, "Byou" slowly evolves into "Pyou". I won't dwell into this trival matter, for there are esoteric interpretations in the nine syllables as well. Pronunciation should be the last thing one should be concern about.

posted by empress @ 7:01 PM