BURGER SCOOT

This was originally published back in April of 2017, when I couldn’t get enough of yoga: my wife saw the transformation of our bookshelves from “Carol’s Reading Group History” to Jack’s “Who needs to practice yoga when you can just buy books on the subject!”

Namaste: (pronounced \NAH-muh-stay). The word comes from Sanskrit and literally means “bowing to you” or “I bow to you,” and is used as a greeting. Sanskrit is the ancient and classical literary language of Hinduism which today serves as a learned language and lingua franca among scholars.” – Merriam-Webster.com

Namaste: “The light in me celebrates the light in you.” — The definition I got when I asked my first yoga teacher what the word meant.

The first time I heard the word “Namaste” was—fittingly—at the end of my very first yoga class. The teacher said it, and the class repeated it back to her. I instantly liked the word. It sounded as if it were the perfect word to say, our heads bowed, sitting with our legs crossed Indian-style, and our hands in a prayer pose.

For all I knew, Namaste could have meant “Go fuck yourself,” but it didn’t. After I rolled up my mat and put it away with the blocks and blanket, I put on my flip-flops and walked over to the teacher to say, “Thank you for your practice,” like everyone else, but I also asked what Namaste means. She smiled warmly and said it was Sanskrit for “The light in me celebrates the light in you.” If she had said something like “goodbye” or “until next time,” I would have been disappointed, but she didn’t. The word meant something as beautiful as the sound of the word.

I spend much of the time in the shower at that gym, surrounded by a bunch of naked men with a smile on my face, thinking of Namaste. I toweled off and got dressed, singing my own Namaste song. I said it out loud all the way home on my scooter–my helmet reverberating with the sound naamaaastaaaaae. Why did I love and still love the word so much? I think it’s one of those words you can say while shaking hands, hugging, or making love, and know it would fit perfectly for those occasions. For any truly heartfelt occasion.

For me, the English language doesn’t have a word with the emotional punch of Namaste. As a Christian, I cannot find an English word in the faith that compares. If I go to the common Greek words used in my faith, I run into trouble: “Agape” is beautiful in its meaning, “the highest form of love,” but it doesn’t sound like that. It brings to mind the image of a small aquarium fish — like the kind I bought for my son Peter when he was a kid, and after it died, I flushed it down the toilet — only to find, just before it disappeared, that it was feigning death. (Oops, glad I performed the burial at sea while Peter was in school!)

Recently, I learned the impossible Greek word “koinonia,” which means, roughly, “communion” or “joint participation.” My pastor decided to liven up our weekly church schedule, changing our Sunday Evening Service and Wednesday Prayer Meeting to two in-home Bible studies: the Sunday Evening Service became Koinonia Central Bible Study, and the Wednesday Prayer Meeting became Koinonia East Bible Study. As the person who creates the weekly church bulletin, I must spell this word correctly and often. I didn’t–many times–and then, finally, I did. Copy & Paste is a lifesaver.

Hebrew has some words that are easier on the tongue than the above Greek. I have a Jewish yoga teacher who rarely says “Namaste” at the end of practice, but often says “shalom,” which means “peace,” among other nice things. There’s also the lovely-sounding word “Shiloh,” which means “a place of peace.” I loved this word before I knew it was Hebrew. My mother–a big Neil Diamond fan–used to play this song, among others, when I was a kid. Finally, I would say “Immanuel, “God with us,” is nice, but before I was saved, I worked at an independent cinema, so my first exposure to “Immanuel” was “Emmanuelle,” a French erotic film. So, when the word gets thrown around in Christmas sermons, I must stay focused, if you know what I mean.

I practice yoga four times a week, so I hear a lot of other Sanskrit words, but aside from Shavasana (Corpse Pose) and the root Asana (pose or posture), I have never committed any other Sanskrit words to memory. Part of this is because I’m lazy, but no other Sanskrit word holds the same hold on me as Namaste. Perhaps it is nothing more than the first new word I heard after my first yoga class–a class that made me feel better than I had in years.

I was buying lunch at a bodega recently when I noticed a sign on the counter. It said: “Namaste,” followed by a longer English translation than the one at the top of this post–the only translation I have ever known. Instead of “Thank you,” I said “Namaste!” to the woman who bagged my lunch. I immediately felt embarrassed as I left the store. Still, I shook off the shame and smiled. It was nice to see the world outside of my practice. A few months later, I would widen my usual tunnel vision and see that the signage on the front of that building had changed from the old name (Tootsies) to Namaste. I thought the stand was just a nice gesture. I guess not. Some marketers probably thought it was a good hook. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you can sully up a wonderful word.