Aksharabhyasa Samsakara

[सीताराम]

Dear Scholars, 

I recently witnessed an Aksharabhyasa Samsakara. Where father held son's hand and made him write letters / words on a slate for the first time. 

Everybody might have different regional flavor of same concept. 

The priest told to write " ओ ना म: , शिवाय:, सिद्धं नम: " I am not exaggerating anything this is exactly how the priest told and the person followed like a robot, without questioning. 

I think the more appropriate sentence would be to write " ॐ नम: शिवाय, सिद्धं नम: " 

I was wondering if scholars can give any reference to this ritual and point me to the correct sentence. 

The first part is pretty clear, I could not understand what does सिद्धं नम: mean?

Your help would be greatly appreciated. 

--
धन्यवाद: - राम

PS: - This ritual was done in a Telugu family, People sure can tell how its done in other regions as well. 

[Sunder Hattangadi]

Namaste,         This article may be helpful: http://www.teluguworld.org/Telugu/Onamaalu.html From           a...@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Sitaramayya Ari) Organization   Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, U.S.A. Date           26 Feb 1996 17:00:32 -0500 Newsgroups     soc.culture.indian.telugu Message-ID     <4gtai0$7...@saturn.acs.oakland.edu> The Telugu alphabet is called Onamaalu. There is a good reason and a  little bit of history for this. Just as Buddhism was widely practised in the ancient Telugu country,  Jainism flourished in the Kannade country. The writers of the earliest  Kannada literature were Jains. They were the religious leaders and  educators of that day. Common folks sent their children to Jain gurus for  education. The gurus initiated the Aksharabhyasam of the children with a  prayer to the Thirthankaras and Siddhas. That prayer started with  "Siddham Namaha." The close ties with the Kannada country helped spread the Jain traditions  in the Telugu country. There is even a school of thought that the Jain  and Buddhist literature that existed before Nannaya was destroyed by  scholars and kings who embraced Hinduism. Even if the literature was  destroyed, the traditions survived and Aksharabhyasam continued to be  initiated with the prayer - Siddham Namaha. In later years, between 10th and 14th centuries, Saivism became wide  spread in the Telugu country (Paa So wrote Basava Puranam during this  time). Now the religious leaders and teachers were the Saivites and they  initiated Aksharabhyasam with a prayer that started with "Onnamassivaaya." But the Jain tradition did not die away. The initiation prayer generally  took the form of "Onnamassivaya Siddham Namaha." Over the years it became  O-Na-Ma-See-Vaa-Yaa-See-Dham-Namaha and the alphabet that was learnt with  this prayer came to be called "O-na-ma-lu." Source: Mana lipi puttupoorvotharaalu by Thirumala Raamachandra. Regards, sunder --- On Mon, 2/18/13, सीताराम <raam...@gmail.com> wrote:

From: सीताराम <raam...@gmail.com> Subject: [Samskrita] Aksharabhyasa Samsakara To: sams...@googlegroups.com Date: Monday, February 18, 2013, 9:48 PM

I recently witnessed an Aksharabhyasa Samsakara. Where father held son's hand and made him write letters / words on a slate for the first time.  Everybody might have different regional flavor of same concept.

The priest told to write " ओ ना म: , शिवाय:, सिद्धं नम: " I am not exaggerating anything this is exactly how the priest told and the person followed like a robot, without questioning.  I think the more appropriate sentence would be to write " ॐ नम: शिवाय, सिद्धं नम: "

any reference to this ritual and point me to the correct sentence.  The first part is pretty clear, I could not understand what does सिद्धं नम: mean? Your help would be greatly appreciated.  -- धन्यवाद: - राम

PS: - This ritual was done in a Telugu family, People sure can tell how its done in other regions as well.

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[krishna kaushik]

you remind me of my childhood (many scores of years ago...)
I remember this aged and very dutiful religious man, who used to perform tarpaNa every morning...
still in his wet clothes after his bath, holding his brass kalasha in both hands, he used recite loudly -
ओ ना मासि धम्म्   - much later, when I reached the university, it dawned on me that the old man used to say,
ॐ नाम  सिद्धम्

---

From: सीताराम <raam...@gmail.com>

To: sams...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013 1:48 PM
Subject: [Samskrita] Aksharabhyasa Samsakara

[G.L.N.Murthy]

Yes.Famous Telugu Literary history writer Late Sri Arudra was also of the  same opinion.It is a prayer from Jaina sidhas and not the original Teugu Akshrabhyasam.Telugu jateeyam is (Onamaalu diddadam)-Learnign Om.Namha Sivaya writing frist before learning  Alphabet,because the words originated from Lord Shiva only.-I am not a sanskrit scholar.Please enlighten me if any mistakes are there-Ganti Lakshminarayana Murthy(Bangalore).

 

GLN

---

From: Sunder Hattangadi <sun...@yahoo.com>
To: sams...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 7:15 PM
Subject: Re: [Samskrita] Aksharabhyasa Samsakara