Prelude to the Heart Sutra

(This prelude is taken from the service of the Northern California Shingon Temple. It is recited during the service before chanting the Heart Sutra.)

The unsurpassed, profoundest, and most exquisite Truth is difficult to encounter, even in one billion kalpas.* Now we are about to see, listen to, and hold the sutra containing the Truth. May we understand the true meaning of the Buddha's message.  

Hannya Shin Gyo, the Heart Sutra is the essence of Buddhism and Esoteric Buddhism in particular. If I uphold, recite and expound this sutra and offer it to others, I can be freed from suffering and can attain Buddhahood. If I practice the teaching given herein and contemplate its meaning, I can find the Path to Awakening. This sutra is the lamp of the world that sheds light upon darkness. It is the raft that carries all sentient beings safely across the sea of birth and death. May I enter deeply into the meaning of the sutra and recite it earnestly.

Footnote: *Kalpa - A fabulous unit of time. For example, the time required for a celestial woman to wear away a ten cubic mile stone if she touched it with her garments once every hundred years.

** Provided here are both an english translation of the Heart Sutra and the Japanese version, in case you wanted to try chanting it in Japanese.

 

The Great Wisdom Perfection Heart Sutra

 

Avalokitasvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, doing deep prajna paramita, clearly saw that the

Five skandhas are sunyata, thus transcending misfortune and suffering.

Osariputra, form is no other than sunyata, sunyata no other than form.

Form is exactly sunyata, sunyata exactly form.

Feeling, thought, volition, and consciousness are likewise like this.

Osariputra, remember, Dharma is fundamentally sunyata.

No birth, no death, no thing is defiled, no thing is pure.

No thing can increase no thing can decrease. Hence, in sunyata, no form.

No feeling, thought, volition, consciousness,

No eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, mind,

No seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, thinking.

No world of sight, no world of consciousness.

No ignorance, and no end to ignorance.

No old age and death and no end to old age and death.

No suffering, craving, extinction, path

No wisdom and no attainment, indeed there is nothing to be attained.

The Bodhisattva relies on prajna paramita

With no hindrance in the mind, no hindrance, therefore no fear.

Far beyond upside-down views. At last Nirvana.

Past, present and future, all Buddhas, Bodhisattvas rely on prajna paramita.

And therefore reach the most supreme enlightenment.

Therefore know: Prajana paramita is the greatest dharani.

The brightest dharani, the highest dharani, the incomparable dharani.

It completely clears all suffering, this is the truth not a lie.

So set forth the prajna paramita dharani

Set forth this dharani and say:

Gone, gone, gone beyond! Gone completely beyond!

At last Enlightenment. Heart Sutra.

 

Bussetsu ma ka hannya haramita shingyo

Kanjizai bosa, gyo jin-hannya-haramita ji, shoken goun kai ku, do issai kuyaku.

Sharishi, shiki fu i ku, ku fu i shiki, shiki soku ze ku, ku soku ze shiki,

ju-so-gyo-shiki yakubu nyoze. Sharishi, ze shoho kuso fusho fumetsu, fuku fujo, fuzo fugen.

Zeko ku chu mu shiki mu ju-so-gyo-shiki; mu gen-ni-bi-zet-shin-ni;

mu shiki-sho-ko-mi-soku-ho; mu genkai naishi mu ishikikai; mu mumyo, yaku mu mumyo

jin naishi mu roshi, yaku mu roshi jin, mu ku-ju-metsu-do; mu chi yaku mu toku, imu shotokko.

Bodaisatta e hannya-haramita ko, shin mu kege; mu kege ko, mu u kufu; onri issai tendo muso

kugyo nehan. Sanze shobutsu e hannya-haramita ko, toku anokutara-sammyaku-sambodai.

Kochi hannya-haramita, ze daijinshu, ze daimyoshu, ze mujoshu, ze mutodoshu, nojo issai ku,

shinjitsu fu ko; ko setsu hannya-haramitashu, soku sesshu watsu:

Gyate, gyate, hara-gyate, hara-sogyate, boji sowaka. Hannya-shin-gyo.