Anniversary: The Prayer WheelThis is an Indian prayer wheel that belonged to my grandmother. I remember seeing this wheel as a boy every week when Dad would take us up to San Mateo to visit Gram. It sat on an oval marble-topped coffee table that now sits in my mothers house. With it were a fish made of silver, a silver ball (a censer?), and a silver tray about which my mother tells a funny story. Now that were all a little older, the trinkets of our youth take on meaning and new context. I recognize the silver ornament today as a religious artifact, a tool that, like rosary beads, has a specific use in a sacred ritual. I put the pictures here so my brother Miles could have a look at the inscription and see if he could read it. Miles has delved into all kinds of rich philosophical and religious texts, and hes able to wade through Sanskrit, Devanagari and so on. One day when I have the time I hope to learn more about these too. So here are the pictures. If you look closely, you can see every character all the way around the wheel. The same phrase is repeated twice on each level, for a total of four repeats. The text begins with the double-diamond figure 8 (infinity?) where the chain attaches. The next figure 8 on the other side marks where the phrase ends and begins again. Miles offers an explanation:
The idea of the prayer wheel is that you spin it around and around and (if you spin it in the right direction), every time the prayer is repeated your karma improves. Miles has put some further explanations online here, and theres an online prayer wheel you can find here. Highway 127 . . . Desert . . . Town . . . Football |