Gayatri Ghanapatha

Meaning:

Oṁ bhū oṁ bhuvaḥ om̐̐ suvaḥ oṁ mahaḥ oṁ janaḥ oṁ tapaḥ om̐̐ satyam .

Seven vyahritis( invocations to the seven worlds)

Oṁ tat saviturvareṇ(i)yaṁ bhargo devasya dhīmahi .
Dhiyo yo naḥ pracodayāt ..

May we attain the most excellent splendour of the Sun god Savitr, who inspires us (to reach that goal).

om āpojyotīraso'mṛtaṁ brahma bhūrbhuvassuvarom ..

Om is water, light, taste, immortality, Brahman, the earth, the netherworld, and the heavens.

This hymn is found in the Taittiriya Aranyakam. ie. Prapathaka 35 of Chapter 10.

Pathakrama:

Oṁ tat savitus-savitus tat tat savitur vareṇyaṁ vareṇyam̐̐ savitus-tat tat savitur-vareṇyam .
Savitur-vareṇyaṁ vareṇyam̐̐ savitus-savitur vareṇyaṁ bhargo bhargo vareṇyam̐̐ savitus-savitur vareṇyaṁ bhargaḥ .
Vareṇyaṁ bhargo bhargo vareṇyaṁ vareṇyaṁ bhargo devasya devasya bhargo vareṇyaṁ vareṇyaṁ bhargo devasya .
Bhargo devasya devasya bhargo bhargo devasya dhīmahi dhīmahi devasya bhargo bhargo devasya dhīmahi .
Devasya dhīmahi dhīmahi devasya devasya dhīmahi . dhīmahi iti dhīmahi .
Dhiyo yo yo dhiyo dhiyo yo no no yo dhiyo dhiyo yo naḥ .
Yo no no yo yo naḥ pracodayāt pracodayāt no yo yo naḥ pracodayāt .
Naḥ pracodayāt pracodayāt no naḥ pracodayāt .. Pracodayat iti pracodayāt ..

Notes:

The Proper Gayatri mantra is found in Rigveda Mandala 3 Chapter 62.10. This Version of Gayatri contains the seven vyahritis before it and the 'apojyoti' verse after it. Chanting this mantra gives many positive benefits. This rendering is rendered in the Ghanapatha method.

About Ghanapatha: 

  The oral tradition of the Vedas consists of several pathas, or methods of chanting the Vedas. This tradition of Vedic chanting is considered the oldest unbroken oral tradition in existence. These different pathas ensured that the texts would be kept unaltered by comparing the different recited versions. There are eleven ways of chanting the Vedas: Samhita, Pada, Krama, Jata, Mala, Shikha, Rekha, Dhwaja, Danda, Ratha, and Ghana.

  The simplest of these pathas is reading the verses as is or Samhita patha. The next form was Pada patha. In this patha, the verses are split up into words, dissolving internal . The next form is Krama patha which involves reading two words at a time. These three were called Prakritipathas i.e. natural pathas, since the word order is maintained.

  The next eight pathas were called Vikritipathas i.e. complex pathas. For giving examples of their sequences, let a sentence in Pada patha be: a, b, c, ... y, z.

The simplest of these is Jata patha. The words are first recited in their original order, then repeated in the reverse order, and finally repeated again in the original order. The sequence is: ab ba ab, bc cb bc, cd dc cd, de ed de, ...
The Shikha patha is Jata patha with three words in each cycle: abc cba abc, bcd dcb bcd, cde edc cde, ...
The Dhwaja patha is slightly more complex. It involves a sequence of words being recited by pairing the first two and last two words. The sentence in Dhwaja patha would be: ab yz, bc xy, cd wx, ... xy bc, yz ab. 


  The sequence of Ghanapatha is as follows: ab ba abc cba abc, bc cb bcd dcb bcd, cd dc cde ecd cde,.... The density of this patha has given it the name 'ghana'(dense). This is considered the most difficult patha to master and also the best among the pathas. This is because every word except the first two and last two words appear thirteen times in a Ghanapatha method. Since the order of the words does not matter much in Sanskrit, chanting a mantra in Ghanapatha is equivalent to chanting the Mantra thirteen times.