Why M ?
 

i wonder, why the song M is named M?

i mean, the lyrics said its "maria..." but ayu could just simply used "MARIA" as the song title. maybe ayu afraid there'll be bad reputation since she used a name of religious? but artist such as hitomi and rinka ever used the title too. sorry if the question had been asked before.

I don't know really, but maybe there's a double-meaning to it? For example, "M" like "MARIA", "M" like "Marriage". Something like this.

Maybe Deli or another member will know more about it. ^^

Maybe for the shape of the letter.
It is really nice, lol.

No I think it's for MARIA, Ayu is christian I guess..

The song title was going to be something else, but then she changed it, and I think she didn't want to put a real name directly on the song, so she thought it was best just to use a letter. What was on ayu's head we may never know. But the "M" is definitely related to Maria (Virgin Mary). The song lyrics were kinda written like a prayer, like she's caling for the saint to hear her problems.

well i can't agree really. I heard that she didn't know anything about Maria, and someone tells her a legend and she was improved how strong this woman was, (also with Free&Easy with Joan D'arc)
All those Christian signs are more exotic for japanese people. I read that in Japan only 1%-5% per cents of Christian

Maria is Catholic.

At least, I'm Christian and Maria isn't OMGIMPORTANT. It's more focused on Jesus & God. Yea.

Ayu believes in God but she can't be placed in one category of religion.

I always thought "M" had a double-meaning. But even if it doesn't, "M" sounds a lot more perplexing and mystical then "MARIA". Maybe it's just Ayu playing with her creativity. Like "&". I never got why she named that single that anyways...

Really? Only 1-5%?? Then which religion to most japanese people follow??

^

Buddhism.

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2055.html

But Ayu for a fact isn't a real buddist.

And yea, only 2 mil ppl in Japan are Christian. Most believe in an afterlife without believing in a specific religion.

^
The native religion of Japan is shinto and buddhism was introduced by one of the clans competing for power waaay back brining it from the mainland.

Ayumi Hamasaki is most likely not christian, but much like other japanese and non cristians may regard the chirstian (which includes catholics) literature as legends and stories that may or may not have inspirational value, much the same way we may read folk literature of other cultures.

Actually, I just remembered we can't discuss religion on this forum so shall we leave it at that? ^^

I can't even begin to express how ignorant and actually wrong this statement is but as you said no need to get into discussion.
*Just for clarification I did not call melrose ignorant because of their religious views but the actual statement by using such things as OMGIMPORTANT and just the overall response.
Anywho i think its for a variety of reasosn one major maybe being that hitomi released Maria earlier the same year.

^Everyone's different. Leave it at that.


But anyway, hitomi did? That's actually interesting :laugh She just HAD to go and one-up hitomi by putting a special symbol lol.

Omigosh, me too. :laugh

thats probably the answer.

Still confused, but as far as i know, even Ayu isn't a christian, Ayu have super motivation words like in religion states..
Maybe she reads Bible too??

I read somewhere but I can't remember where sadly. She might also be referring to Mary Magdalene, who Ayu thought was a saint, but she was also just another woman like Ayu herself.

People usually bring this hypothesis up which is extremely unlikely. Japanese people came into contact with the christian religion most likely the first time with the portuguese (or spanish) ship travels when they were searching for spices by traveling through the continents. Thus they were exposed to catholicism (there are even some stories about shiro amakusa and whatever that tried to preach catholicism into japanese ppl and was hunted down) a few centuries ago. Ever since then, the japanese people were exposed to christianism through catholicism, and then they got to assimilate "Maria" (Mary in Portuguese) which is how most catholics all over the world call Virgin Mary. Because of that, in Japan, the name "Maria" is almost always a reference to Virgin Mary (never to Mary Magdalene as some ppl usually try to imply). Now, even those who are very religious often know who Virgin Mary is but I know a lot of people who are christian and barely know much about Mary Magdalene (and when they mention Mary Magdalene, they never call her just Mary, but they always say her full name). Now, let's just think about Japan, in which the majority aren't even Christian, if someone actually gets to know of someone named "Maria" from the bible, will they thik of Virgin Mary, the well known saint for the catholics (also well known in otgher christian religious, despite not being considered a saint), or Mary Magdalene, who happens to be one among hundreds of many other people described in the bible? Virgin Mary, imo. Also praying for saints is something catholics do. Ayu is praying for a saint in the song "M" (as can be seem in the PV since she kneels and join her hands together and close her eyes and says "Maria" or something like that, and the lyrics are quite clear). The saint most catholics pray to is "Maria", which is Virgin Mary. I've never seem a catholic praying for Mary Magdalene, ever.:shrug

Ah yeah I see where you're coming from. That makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the detailed explanation. I'll try and find where I read it. This was never confirmed by Ayu herself though right, or it was?

maybe that mysterious M was for one of her friend called m something so to keep it anonymous she didnt put the full name .

or since she have A H M maybe she was planning to do other single untill you obtain hamasaki

i highly doubt about the second possibility although it would have been funny if she did

i think it's the same as 'A' symbol that ayu use for her name...maybe ayu don't even know the exact name and if you realize,the title was using italic font (i don't know the specialize NAME) instead plain simple font

p/s:sorry,bad english