Ok, I have seen on some sites about him, usually filled with wholly inaccurate info, that his name means "Devil's child", and they break it down by syllable.

I did some searching for the name and found no such reference. I found one that said it is a Hawaiian name that means "loved one" (fitting), but not one reference to the devil stuff.

Any info on this?

It is also predominately a female name, which doesn't jive with me. It sounds very middle of the road, so to say. Like Neo, or similar.

The only other time I heard of the word mana was when it was spelt Manna and was used for magic games, or in old and new computer fantasy games. It is magical energy (also fitting;)

ive also seen very similar things, like when you type Mana on wikipedia you get a whole bunch of stuff like that.

personally i think if there is a reason behind his choice of name it is most likely to be the reason concerning magical energy, eg in the Tales games (symphonia, phantasia etc) Mana is the life force of the world and a lot of the games have an underlying theme of trying to replenish the diminishing supply of Mana.

Another reason could be that he just thought it sounded really cool at the time :P :P which lets face it, it does :D :D

or yeah, it does sound pretty gender neutral (hadnt thought of that before), maybe to fit with the whole theme he had of a male playing the female role in lives and PVs etc

As a total coincidence, I have seen Mana (video games) always appear as indicated by the color blue.

haha, yeah, it does

I heard my grandma the other day, when we we're watching "the day the earth stood still", in the part when those little things stop and fall down, she started saying that they were falling like "mana" (not shure if that's the way it's wrtten or even if it's in english, sorry I speak spanish) then I asked "what do you mean?" and then she told "Mana, is the food that Jesus (not shure, I don't remember very well ¬¬, or was it Moses?) gave to the people in form of rain, and they could just pick up what they were going to eat that day, they couldn't pick up more, or save it for another day

correct me if I'm wrong, I'm shure I am xD

but I don't think this has something to do with the reason he chosed it... I suppose

his name supposedly came from this kanjis: 魔名 (i hope you could see them... :unsure:)

魔 means evil, demon, spirit, devil. And in romaji is read like "ma"

名 means name and it's read as "na" or it could be as well "mei" but the meaning changes a little.

yeah, but thats Mana with an accented na
in other words, you say ma-NAH

thats the only time I paid attention in religion class XD

Where did you find that about the kanjis? By the way it does not show up on my screen. ma, seemed to have several descriptions, all but one considered "bad", the exception being spirit.

I hope he just liked the name from fantasy stuff concerning magical energy, cause I really like the name. It is neutral sounding.

Here is a good way to solve this.

Does he ever show his name in Kanji? If so, does it match the above?

Add on: I just copied and pasted the boxes that represented the kanji on my screen and put it in an online translator and found consistantly they relate to spirit, energy, even love.

Interesting. Of course the online translators could just be junk.

I find this intriguing.

^ the Kanji thing is all over some fansites about Mana. I think he should said it sometime by himself in some interview... but i'm not sure and i can't remember or look for it now.

Mana does not write in Kanji his name, he wrote it in romaji or Katakana.

It's sad you can't see the kanjis. If you have a kanji translator you should find out easily, not to mention he uses these Kanjis several times.

he uses the kanji [魔] "ma" for example in 魔道書 "Madousho" which literally means "book of magic" or it also could means "book of evil" or "book of heresy"

he used it at his birthday event name: 魔導集会 "Madoushoukai" which means something like "evil meeting"

i think only by the meaning of the kanjis we can guess why he uses it ^^

Interesting.

I will continue looking, and hope others here can get some info.

One translation I got was something like pure or genuine, dark, which sounds more like him.

Ohh interesting... Mmm... (thinking)
Is true that I've been thinking about Mana's name have a great meaning if it's written in kanji...
But a few months ago, I found in an anime magazine (I cant' remember the name n.nUUu) But I think it was a preview for the 'Wedding Peach' manga n.n I know that is a character from there, and it was a girl name n.nU It was: 'Mana' could be written with the kanji's of 'Love' and 'Beautiful'
http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa204/tohori/ai.jpg this means 'Love'=Ma
http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa204/tohori/bi.jpg and this is 'Beatiful'=Na
Also they have different means depending on wich context you were using it n.nu
But I like to think that it could be XD
Or, if it's true that his name is 'Manabu' I wondering on wich kanjis use for that n.n

Maybe to foreigners the name "Mana" seems very gender neutral, but to someone who has been studying Japanese language and culture for a very long time now, the name Mana sounds VERY feminine. I've even mentioned Mana around past Japanese teachers as well and they have asked me "Is that a boy or a girl?" Mostly they asked because I indicated he is a Japanese guitarist, but for Japanese people, I can understand how it can be very misleading.

I would have to agree with lips_blood_red on the idea of the kanji before anything else. The name wouldn't derive from the biblical meaning, since after all its spelled "Manna" and has a completely different pronunciation from the Japanese name "Mana". Also, I kinda doubt it has meaning from video games since that seems kinda far fetched that Mana would choose his name off of video game potions (sorry, but I think if he was going to coin his own name from a video game, he'd probably pick something a little more creative).

I'm mostly inclined to believe the kanji idea, since Mana is first and foremost Japanese. He can pick reasoning off of kanji and their multiple translations and underlying meanings and can ultimately combine them to create both a meaning and a name. It is true that the kanji for Mana reads 魔名 as he has written it time and time again throughout Madoushos, Ma cherie booklets, magazines, and various other materials. While its not the primary way he spells his name, he still does use the kanji reading from time to time.

thanks for feedback ^^

So it is a feminine sounding name in the Japanese culture.

Is it a common name though? (I know how silly that sounds).

Can you say what the kanjis mean?

does the first symbol mean, evil, spirit, devil?

and the second means?

Or is it like what Natsuma_Kuramori stated?

I know it might have something to do with context.

Well, punching in the Kanji 魔名, into an online Japanese to english translator that seems much better than Bablefish (it did a fair job translating lamentful miss, though not on the mark) and the kanji translate to Manitou name. Now I took manitou and googled it and found that manitou means for the most part spirit.

So Spirit name.

But the word manitou may mean something entirely different in Japan for all I know.

Mana means beloved in Japanese. You add it to the beginning of someones titles (i.e Manaobasan = beloved uncle) It is however, mainly used as an affectionate term for females :]

Mana is also a source of energy in Diablo. It's like, HP, but sexy... I mean, they call it mana.

XD

Sources on the Japanese meaning: yahoo, japanese translators, my own knowledge of Japanese :] :shadowx:

hehehe

that sounds like Mana = libido

xDDDD

agree then!