Every Upanishad begins with a Shanti Mantra or a Peace Chant. Some of the popular Shanti mantras include “Om Poornamadah poornamidam…” which is the Shanti Mantra of the the Ishavasya Upanishad as well as Brhadaranyaka Upanishad. Another popular Shanti mantra is “Om Sah navavatu…” which is the Shanti Mantra of the Taittiriya Upanishad, KaThopanishad and [...]

Towards the end of the SandhyAvandanA, I remember reciting the following:

bhArgava, chyavana, ApnavAn, aurava, jamadajnya, pancha rShi pravarAnvita
vatsa gotrOtpannaha
AshvalAyana sUtra, shAkala shAKhAdhAyih
gautama sharmaH
ahaM bho abhivAdaye
Which translates to:
Hailing from the lineage of the five excellent rShi’s namely BhArgava, chyavana, ApnavAn, aurava, jamadajnya,
Born into the vatsa GOtra,
following AshvalAyana’s sutras, student of the the shAkala shAKha,
I Gauthama Sharma,
Offer [...]

A couple of months ago, I had posted an entry titled Dharmayuddha@Kurukshetra.in where I wrote about the rules of engagement in the Mahabharata war. In the penultimate paragraph, I mentioned the following:
One might want to question the validity of terming Kurukshetra war as the “Dharmayuddha“, since both the parties resorted to deviate from the accepted [...]