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Re: Doubt on Brahma Shabdam!

From the Bhakti List Archives

Rohit Iyer • July 28, 2002 


Srimathe Ramanujaya Namaha,

In the samskrta words Brahma, Ahna (day) and Vahni
(fire), are written with h first, but the
pronunciation of h is flipped.

So Brahma is pronounced bram-ha
Vahni as Vanhi
and Ahna as an-ha.

This is in keeping with the rules of Samskrta grammar.

Ahna is used in the popular compound word Madhyahne,
which means "at midday" and is pronounced Madhyan-he.

The root word for Brahma is Brhaman.
When the word is used as the first part of a compound
the "n" drops off, hence we get "Brahma-sabdam".

Other example of "n" ending words are Atman(soul),
naman(name) etc.

And we get "Atma-jnana", "Hari-nama-sankirtana" etc.

Also there is a masculine gender Brahman and neuter
gender Brahman. The masculine one is called brahmaa,
and refers to the creator. The neuter is brahma and
refers to the supreme being.

Brahma also means Vedas in many places.

Hope this clarifies.
thanks,
rohit


--- Lakshmi Narasimhan Venkatapathy
 wrote:
> Srimathe Ramanujaya Namaha
> Respected Learned Members,
> I have a doubt. Although we write bra-h-ma we
> pronounce it as bram-ha. Is 
> this correct or should it be pronounced as bra-h-ma
> itself? Could anyone 
> kindly clarify?
> Adiyen Ramanuja Dasan,
> Lakshmi Narasimhan
> 
>
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