In Hinduism, all sacred, auspicious and significant events in life are supposed to start with invocation of a God to seek His blessings in the successful conduct and completion of the activity without hindrance. Nowadays, this is normally done through prayers to Ganesha who is considered as ‘gate keeper’ to prevent any ‘vignams’ (hindrances), thus Ganesha is also called Vigneshwara.
All the Hindu mantras end with the invocation of peace through the chanting of ‘Om Shanthi, Shanthi, Shanthihi..’. The word Shanthi means ‘peace’ and is repeated 3 times. Swami Chinmayananda Guruji has explained the significance of repeating this word ‘Shanthi’ three times as below:
The first ‘Shanthi’ is for preventing God-Sent (Aadhi-Daivika) obstacles which come unexpected and unpredictable, such as asteroids hitting the earth, earthquakes, Tsunami’s etc.; The second ‘Shanthi ‘is for preventing worldly phenomenon (Aadhi-Bhoutika) obstacles such as floods, fires etc. which are known to mankind, but not controllable. The third ‘Shanthi’ is for preventing subjective inner obstacles in each of us such as worries, anger etc. It is prayed that the ‘Vignams’ from all these three are prevented till the function or event is completed successfully.
When reciting the prayers, Guruji suggests that the first ‘Shanthi’ should be loud and clear, the second time it should be of moderate sound and the third time it should be a whisper since it is for subjective mind and intellect.
Om Shanthi, Shanthi, Shanthihi. Hari Om.
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