The Hare Krishna mantra is composed of Sanskritnames: Hare, Krishna, and Rama (in Anglicized spelling). It is a poetic stanza in anuṣṭubh meter (a quatrain of four lines (pāda) of eight syllables with certain syllable lengths for some of the syllables).
The mantra as rendered in the oldest extant written source, the Kali-Saṇṭāraṇa Upaniṣad, is as follows:[1][6]
When followers of Sri Krishna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu teach and practice the Mahamantra, it is rendered with the name Krishna first. So the followers of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu read it as
Pronunciation of mantra in IPA (Sanskrit):
This mantra has multiple interpretations. "Hare" can be interpreted as the vocative form of Hari, another name of Vishnu meaning "he who removes illusion". Another interpretation is as the vocative of Harā,[7] a name of Rādhā,[4] Krishna's eternal consort or his energy (Krishna's shakti). According to A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Harārefers to "the energy/shakti of Supreme Personality of Godhead" while Krishna and Rama refer to Supreme Godhead himself, meaning "He who is All-Attractive" and "He who is the Source of All Pleasure".[8][9] In the hymn Vishnu Sahasranamaspoken by Bhishma in praise of Krishna after the Kurukshetra War, Krishna is also called Rama.[10]
It is sometimes believed that "Rama" in "Hare Rama" means "Radharamana" or the beloved of Radha (another name for Kṛṣṇa). The more common interpretation is that Rāma refers to Ramaof the Ramayana, an earlier avatar of Krishna. "Rama can also be a shortened form of Balarama, Krishna's first expansion."[11] The mantra is repeated, either sung out loud (bhajan), congregationally (kirtan), or to oneself aloud or mentally on prayer beads made of Tulasi (japa). A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami describes the process of chanting the Maha Mantra as follows:
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