I came across your post recently on "Sat Naam" I originally did TM -Transcendental Meditation – for thirty years and several years ago came across the mantra Sat Naam in a book. It seemed to resonate within me when I saw it before I even knew what it meant. When I use it I feel a deep satisfaction that I don’t feel with my TM mantra. I am not sikh but have read the Shri Guru Granth which clearly seems to say that the most primal name of God is Sat Naam. The place I have doubt is that I recieved initiation in TM where Sat Naam just came internally. I have some Sikh friends who didn’t realize that Sat Naam was the Naam until I showed them some passages from the SGGS. They now meditate with this mantra.
When I first started 30 years ago I didn’t know anything about meditation. I had an experience where I experienced God as Love in any instance that we know as love. I then started searching. I realized that God was completely beyond any thought or concept we could have of Him. That was when I discovered Transcendental Meditation. TM was very helpful in teaching my mind to go to the deepest level and transcend but now I wanted to find out how to transcend on the Name of God as I understood it. Over the years I searched for the bija of the One True God which I believe is the only Reality. All else is just a reflection of that Reality as the hill is just a reflection of the valley, you can’t have one without the other. That is how I was inwardly led to Sat Naam and the teachings of Guru Nanak. You might be interested to know that Sat Naam is the Sanskrit translation of the Name of God in the Hebrew, Christian and Islamic traditions.
JUDAISM
God said to Moses: I AM WHO AM. He said: Thus shalt thou say to the
children of Israel: HE WHO IS, hath sent me to you. God is saying He is the identity of existence.
Sat Naam means the Name or Identity of Absolute Existence. Sat means
Absolute: Existence, Truth, Being, and Good, while Naam means the name of, or identity of. Sat Naam is therefore the Sanskrit translation of the Name of God, as understood in the scripture of Judaism and the Old Testament of Christianity..
CHRISTIANITY
John 14:6
"Jesus saith to him: I am the way, and the truth, and the life"
When Jesus says He is the Truth, he is saying his identity is Truth. Sat Naam means the Name or identity of Absolute Truth. Sat Naam is therefore the Sanskrit translation of the Name of Jesus, as understood in of Christianity. It is also the way to the Truth, for by transcending on Sat Naam we follow it to it’s source.
ISLAM
A Name of God, in the Qur’anic verses is stated: "That is because God, He is the Truth" (22: 6) and "God, He is the manifest Truth" (24: 25). Again translated into Sanskrit, Sat Naam.
I am enjoying talking with someone that sees the implications in calling upon God by his only True Name. Since receiving the Gurprasadi Naam from a lving Master, Dassan Das ji, I find my meditation is much deeper.
J