Upadesa Saram - Post 8

Verse 6

उत्तमस्तवादुच्चमन्दतः|

चित्तजंजपध्यानमुत्तमम्|| 

uttamastavāduccamandataḥ|

cittajaṁjapadhyānamuttamam || 

Superior to hymns of praise is loud or soft japa;

Mind-born japa-meditation is the best. 

Than the best hymns of praise, loud or soft,

Mind-born japa or meditation is better. 

The Four Stages in Japa described in this verse are as under:-

i) Stava: This means “glorification of the Lord”. This includes the singing of Stotrams, praises to the Lord, Bhajans, chanting of the Vishnu Sahasranam, the 1000 Names of Lord Vishnu, etc. In this stage, there can be musical accompaniments also. One’s hands, ears, eyes, and mind are engaged in the practice. 

ii) Uccha Japa: In this form, everything remains as above, but the musical instruments are removed as a way of narrowing down the attention of the devotee to fewer senses. The hands are not used; only the ears, eyes and the mind are available for this form of concentration on the Lord. 

iii) Manda or Upamshu Japa: When the Japa is chanted very softly, as a whisper, the sense of hearing is effectively removed from the practice; only the eyes and the mind are available for the practice. 

iv) Chintajam Japa: When the Japa is done only with the mind, with even the eyes kept closed; another sense is withdrawn from the practice; now only the mind is available for it. Having taken the practice into the mind, this becomes the subtlest form of Japa. 

Ramana Maharishi says, the chittam japa or the silent meditation is better than the manda japa or chanting in lower voice, chanting in lower voice is better than the chanting in louder voice or uccha japa which in turn is better than just praising the Lord through ritualistic singing / chanting.

Mainly focusing on the last two modes of Japa - Slow and soft chanting and silent mental japa, there is mantra / chant, then silence, then mantra, then silence. 

Since each time we chant softly or silently a mantra, Say AUM NAMAH SHIVAYA, there can be no thought building up in the mind as each chant is complete by itself and does not lead to any other process in continuation of the chanting.

For example, let us say, we see a car, immediately we may think about the country in which it is made, say America. From there, the thought can go to America and from there, thought can go to some memory about America which you have read somewhere or when you have visited, from there, the thought can travel about some person whom you met in America, from there, attachment / hatred feeling can arise out of your memory of your experience with that person etc… So, you have started from somewhere and have gone somewhere!!

Whereas, in a soft / silent japa on “Aum Namah Shivaya”, each time, it can be only thought of Shiva and then there is silence, the process is complete. Then again chanting again thought on shiva only.

Thus, in this process, you are nearing silence. There is no “building up” of thoughts in this case, like the build-up we saw above in case of thoughts building up on the sight of a car.

It is to be noted, observed and absorbed that SILENCE IS ONE’S REAL EXISTENCE AS SELF.

During japa, one has to observe the silence between the chant / japa. The observer is also Silence and the observed is also Silence. Thus, the mental chanting taken up by observing silence is actually meditation, as it takes you to your SELF.

In this way, the chanting itself becomes a meditation as it is helping you to observe the silence between the chants.

This silence is not disturbed by chanting, provided the chanting is not mechanical chanting and mouth chanting and thoughts not aligned with the chanting and they travel somewhere.

When there is silence at three levels, silence of the body , silence of speech and most important, silence of mind, then , for those few seconds, you lose cognizance of your individual physical identity and you exist as PURE EXISTENCE or SELF.

Love.