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Mingalaba (Burmese: မင်္ဂလာပါ; MLCTS: mangga.lapa [miɴɡa̰làbà]; variously romanised as mingalarpar, mingalabar, or mingalar par) is the formal Burmese greeting.[1] It is typically accompanied by a slight bow,[2] or more formally, an Añjali Mudrā gesture, wherein the palms are folded together.[1] The phrase "mingalaba" is typically rendered in English as "may you be blessed" or "auspiciousness to you."[3]
The greeting mingalaba is a relatively modern creation. The phrase first emerged during British rule in Burma in the 19th to 20th centuries, coined as a Burmese language equivalent to 'hello' or 'how are you.'[4] In the late 1960s,[5] the Burmese government institutionalized the phrase in the country's educational system. Burmese pupils now greet their teachers with mingalaba at the beginning of each school day.[3]
Mingalaba itself is a phrase, decomposed into mingala + ba. The first word "mingala" (မင်္ဂလာ) originates from the Pāli term maṅgala, which means auspicious, lucky, prosperous, or festive.[6] The word also appears in a well-known Buddhist scripture called the Maṅgala Sutta.[4] Burmese culture recognizes Twelve Auspicious Rites or "Mingala." In Burmese, "mingala" is affixed to several Burmese terms, including "to wed" (မင်္ဂလာဆောင်) and "housewarming" (အိမ်တက်မင်္ဂလာ).[7] The second word, "ba" (ပါ), is a grammatical particle suffixed to Burmese verbs to denote politeness.[7]
Look up မင်္ဂလာပါ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
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