Talk:Upanayana

Old Convo
Moved from Iyengar. To be incorporated in this article.

"Around puberty, every male Brahmin child undergoes the thread ceremony, also known as 'upanayanam' in Sanskrit or 'munji' in Kannada or ponool in Tamil. It is believed that the sacred thread purifies the adolescent's mind and guards him from dangers physical as well as spiritual. Post the thread ceremony, the wearer is supposed to perform daily rituals including the Sandhyavandanam."

Ambarish | Talk 20:02, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * Hmm, the around puberty part is one I don't think we need, although I see it is no longer in the article. Although most children receive the thread around the ages of 7-11, some even get it just a few years before their marriage. Adityan 16:59, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I too feel that pubetry is not needed in the context as the ritual can happen at any time before the marriage. Moreover, the ritual is not only for brahmin child. It is also done for the male child from Kshyatriya and Vaishya communities. sunils 17:11, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Should this article be merged with Upanayana? nkife 02:41, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Ya, this article can be merged with the article Upanayana. Both of them talk about the same ritual. Infact, the article Upanayanam is more elaborate. sunils 17:11, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
 * And, unfortunately, after the merge, the wrong entry has been retained. The Sanskrit word is upanayana, not "upanayanam", which is a South Indian diction. rudra 07:18, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Caste
It's interesting that sunils mentions it is not just for Brahmins. In a lot of more 'traditionalist' thinking, for instance, in Kolkata, many people view the sacred thread ceremony as suitable only for Brahmins and Kshatriyas. Indeed, the family priest (connected with Vedic and Vaishnav lineages) have not even been approached to perform a thread ceremony on me, even though all the uncles on my mother's side have had upanayan done... why? My father's family is kaisthya (half-kshatriya, half-vaishya, to put it simplistically) while my mother's family, 'pure-blood' Rajputs, have a claim as Kshatriyas.

Maybe this page could become more rounded and reflective of actual history and mention some of these persisting dogmas. Also, puberty is commonly used in different traditions as the marking point of upanayan. There's no need to be childish and shrink from the mention of puberty just because it's related to the development of the sexual function. --LordSuryaofShropshire 04:08, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
 * sunils is correct: upanayana is the "second birth" that makes one a dvija, which is why Shudras have always been excluded from this samskāra. But it may actually be better, in these times of political correctness, to let sleeping dogmas lie than to bring the actual history of caturvarnya to light. rudra 07:42, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

The name
As stated before, the correct spelling would be upanayana, as can be confirmed at a Sanskrit dictionary, and the current name is a south Indian pronounciation of the original. Renaming needs an admin, and I propose to ask for a move. Imc (talk) 20:45, 24 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Totally disagree. The sanskrit name is "Upanayanam", not Upanayana.  It is a neuter gender word.  Please dont go for dictionaries which sepll the word using roman scripts.  See sanskrit dictionaries in devanagari script.  The name should immediatly be reverted to Upanayanam.. the correct one. (Nayanam is a neuter gender word.. The word upanayanam forms  as upa +  nayanam). Ambalavasi (talk) 06:41, 25 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I have no Devanagari dictionaries, but there is Monier-Williams, which uses a lossless transliteration, as does any other formal system. Monier-Williams states that it is upanayana, which strangely enough, corresponds exactly to it in Kannada script, in my Kannada dictionary. You should post the Devanagari text that you consider that it is, so we can see. You should also not have moved it back as you did without discussion, given the other opinions.  Imc (talk) 21:11, 7 September 2009 (UTC)


 * The convention is to use the root forms of words without gender; thus we write "Rāmāyaṇa", not "Rāmāyaṇam", "Mahābhārata" instead of "Mahābhārataḥ", and so on. I support moving this page to "Upanayana". Shreevatsa (talk) 21:33, 7 September 2009 (UTC)


 * Moved it back to upanayana. Imc (talk) 18:31, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Yagyopavita
Presently, the Yagyopavatia redirects to this article. I think there should be a seperate article on Yagyopavita. as it is a different thing altogether. It may be a small article but it needs to be seperate. Ap aravind (talk) 05:33, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Rename the article to "Sacred Thread"
Many Hindu and Buddhist groups share this basic ceremony but everyone calls it by a different name. I think Upanayanaa is the name used in South India for a specific set of versions of it, not shared by groups like the Arya Samaj. I propose renaming this article to "Sacred Thread" and then list the various names and practices in it. We could also call it "Sacred Thread in Hinduism and Buddhism" if people prefer that. Otherwise there will be pushes and pulls on the name over time. I will leave this note here for a week and then move it if there is no debate. I imagine and hope there will be some discussion. Cheers! --Hunnjazal (talk) 02:36, 4 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Another option is to break the article into separate articles. --Hunnjazal (talk) 11:50, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Shifting table
I have shifted this table from the main article here. This is the version of the article that was used. There are no references directly supporting the table and the current references in the article in general do not help to explain a number of table entries. A quick internet search doesn't also help with a number of table entries.

If you think I shouldn't have shifted the table here in this manner, please restore. I wouldn't mind the discussion even after the table is restored.