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Tantric Dimension of the Hare Krishna Mantra
Hare is pronounced hah-ray, and the similarity to the cheer hurrray is not accidental. (When all the schoolkids shout 'hurray' for their team, they are joining their spirits to each other and the team. In saying 'Hare', we can be joining our spirits with the Godhead, but not in the same way. We can mean by 'Hare' the relationship to Godhead as it should be. 'Hare' can connote the current state of one's relationship with Godhead. He/She always knows what you mean. It is good, for example, to sometimes be the way He/She most prefers it -- we are not His/Her contemporaries, but are indeed His/Her children. A good example of appropriate behavior and attitude in the presence of Krishna and Rama is found here. )
The assumption is that the sound raises ones spirits. The ‘ah’ sound is found very often in spirituality, as in the name ‘God’. Hare, besides being an address, suggests “Hari”, one of the names of Vishnu, the form of the Godhead who is imagining the universe, and hence sustaining it. According to Wikipedia, Hare can be interpreted either as the vocative of Hari or of Hară, a name of Radha, Krishna’s eternal consort, who is Herself a form of Rama.
You might subjectively inflect "Hare" to mean "The way it's supposed to be", in your relationship with God, your attitude, your degree of devotedness, etc.
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