This video is a deep-dive on the Heart Sutra and its applications in Buddhist folk magic. In Chinese, the Heart Sutra is called Bore Boluomiduo Xing Jing 般若波羅蜜多心經, and then “Xin Jing 心經” for short, transliterated from the Sanskrit Prajñā Pāramitā Hṛdaya.

And this supplemental blog post contains some resources to help with the practicum, additional info that I had wanted to include in the presentation but due to time constraints didn’t, and other related miscellany.

Download the Heart Sutra Study Sheet

Click on the above hyperlinked title or HERE to download a PDF print-out of the Heart Sutra, with the Traditional Chinese, pin yin for the Chinese, Davanagari Sanskrit, its romanization, and English translation.

At some point most Buddhist kids were forced to memorize the Heart Sutra. (For me it was in Chinese.) And when we would ask the grown-ups what does this mean? they’d tell us, that’s not important, you don’t have to know, just do as I say, and memorize it. At least I’m going to attempt to give you an explanation! =D

I probably can’t recite the entirety of the Heart Sutra by heart (ha…ha…) today, I can barely remember where I put my socks, but that 18-syllable Magical Mantra part (or Prajna Paramita Mantra for the more formal name of it), that’s deep in the muscle memory.

While we didn’t get the deep-dive explanation of what the Heart Sutra means, we were told this particular story about it: Once upon a time, Indra, Celestial King of the Devas, was being chased and attacked by a persistent and powerful demon. The Sakyamuni Buddha (Buddha of the Present Eon) taught Indra to recite the Heart Sutra for removing obstacles. Indra’s recitations of the Sutra quickly defeated this powerful demon and, also, empowered him so much so that no demon thereafter dared mess with him.

And so from as early as I can remember, we were taught that the Heart Sutra possessed a particularly magical quality to it. Any time you needed to be the one holding the power and control, or needed to be liberated and freed from something that was holding you down, or blocking your way, recite the Magical Mantra.

There’s also a famous fictional reference to the Heart Sutra in the beloved 16th century novel Journey to the West when Tripitaka receives the Heart Sutra from a mysterious monk and is told that the Sutra can protect from dangerous supernatural entities and demons. That, too, is ingrained in our cultural understanding of the Heart Sutra.

And by extension, it’s also used to null and void curses and hexes, and in occult practice, can be used to nullify a bad oath or an unconscionable spiritual contract. The broader implication here being that the Magical Mantra liberates us from binding influences. My mother believes deep, intense ritual with the Heart Sutra can break family or generational curses.

The Practicum

Part I of the presentation gave a practicum for applying the Magical Mantra recitation to remove an obstruction in your life, release unwanted attachments, and clear barriers that are currently in your path.

Start by identifying what roadblock, challenge, or unwanted influence or negative attachment you want to remove. Before commencing the recitations, make sure you’re clean, wearing clean clothes (I had recommended monochrome, going with all black, all white, all gray, etc.), and consecrating your meditation space with incense. I also recommend crafting an anointing oil with the same ingredient as your incense and anointing yourself and your space with it.

Then perform the 108 recitations of the Magical Mantra (i.e., the Prajna Paramita Mantra from the Heart Sutra). Here’s the audio and the visual aids for the 108 recitations:

You’ll see how with each recitation, pictured at the center are the Three Poisons of Samsara. Project that which is plaguing you onto the Three Poisons image and, with each recitation, the obstacle or pain you have been suffering from shrinks and dissipates with the Three Poisons image. Then, the very last visual to conclude the recitations has empty space at the center, with the Three Poisons (and your obstacle) having been completely dissipated.

Throughout the 108 recitations, visualize the obstruction gradually losing its power and influence. You’re slowly but steadily chipping away at it, and with each additional recitation of the Magical Mantra, it is getting weaker, smaller, less substantial, having less of a hold over you until it is completely gone into the beyond.

Also, while you’re doing this meditative recitation, frame your thoughts around that central thesis that form is void, meaning that which you perceive to be substantial can be made null and void through your mental focus and powers; and the void is form, meaning

The magical premise here is that, by fully realizing that the obstruction’s essential nature is void, you can weaken its perceived hold in your reality and dissipate it from your reality. Likewise — and this part probably plunges into the occult — that which you can actualize in the void, you can bring into physical, present reality (what I referred to in the video lecture as “conventional reality 世俗諦.”)

If you’re using the video guide, then you’ll want to direct 100% of your focus and concentration to the above, and not to the count, because the video itself is tracking the count. Then, when you hear the three rings of the bell at the end, that’s when you fully visualize the obstruction gone, and take in the understanding that in its place now is just cleared, clean and pristine, empty space.

Above, the inner circle features the first eight syllables of the Magical Mantra, starting at the top and going counter-clockwise, in ancient seal script: Jiedi Jiedi Buo Luo Jiedi (揭諦揭諦 波羅揭諦). Because of the eight, they’re assigned correspondences to the Ba Gua eight trigrams. Hence, the symbolic visuals in the Mantra recitation video.

The outer ring, from the top and going counter-clockwise, is the final ten syllables: Buo Luo Seng Jie Di, Puti Sha Pohe (波羅僧揭諦 菩提莎婆訶), corresponding to the Ten Heavenly Stems, representing a complete solar cycle.

For the chanting video I provided I layered English translations of the Mantra to help with comprehension: Gone, gone, gone and beyond; perfection in the gone and beyond. Thus, Awakened. Hail!

To close out the 108 recitations, you’ll hear the bell chime 3 times. If you’re closing your eyes while listening to the recitations, the bell chimes are your signal to return to ordinary consciousness.

The background in that video features thangka art of the Three Eons of Buddhas (三世佛, Sān Shì Fó). Past Buddha is Dipamkara Buddha 燃燈佛, the Buddha Who Lights the Lamp; Present is Sakyamuni Buddha 釋迦牟尼佛, Great Sage; and the Future Buddha is Maitreya 彌勒佛, The Benevolent One.

Prajna Paramita Mudra

In Chinese magical practices, be that Buddhist or Taoist leaning, there is a hand mudra associated with the Heart Sutra, sourced from The Sacred Dharani 陀羅尼集經 (Tuoluoni Ji Jing) [or The Dharani Collection], which dates back to the Tang dynasty. The medieval Chinese translation was done by Atikuta 阿地瞿多, a Buddhist monk from central India living in Chang’an around 600 AD.

In The Sacred Dharani, there is a hand mudra called the Prajna Paramita Mudra 般若無盡藏印 Bōrě wújìn cáng yìn, which then through folk practice, becomes associated with the Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra:

以二大指各捻二小指甲上，平屈三小指，下節、中節相背博之，二中指、二無名指各相背博，直竪向上，各屈二頭指相背，令平中節，背相著，與二小指相稱，令平如高座上安置經藏，當心著之。

Roughly translated, the text describes the hand mudra as follows:

Place the two thumbs against the nails of their corresponding hand’s little fingers, curling the little fingers, and bringing their middle and lower sections into contact, back to back.

Hold the middle and ring fingers of both hands upright and touching.

Bend the index fingers toward one another so that their middle joints meet back to back, aligned with the little fingers.

Arrange the hands as though they form an elevated seat upon which a treasure of sacred texts may rest, and hold this mudra formation near your heart.

As you recite the sutra, visualize the entire treasury of Buddhist sacred texts emerging from the cavern of your hand mudra and entering your heart-mind.

Note: There is also guidance in here that one should be wearing clean clothing and doing the sutra recitations in consecrated space.

The Written Amulet

Copying the Heart Sutra by hand is believed to accumulate karmic merit, and also, strengthen the practitioner’s powers and abilities. And if you’d like to copy down the entire Heart Sutra in ancient seal script, there is no better reference than this one:

The text reads right to left, top down.

Above I’ve highlighted the location of the 18-syllable Prajna Paramita Mantra within the Heart Sutra, written in seal script.

You can click on the above image file or here to download the ZIP FILE of the above JPGs of each character in the 18-syllable mantra, in Deng Shiru’s calligraphy.

Or the above for an oracle bone influenced seal script version of the same 18 characters. ZIP FILE here for download.

In my video I mentioned how, if you’re artsy, you might carve (the reverse) of the 18 seal script characters of the Prajna Paramita Mantra onto a rubbery linoleum block and do your own printmaking of paper talismans featuring the Mantra, similar to the historical version from Japan I showed.

Or try your hand at Chinese calligraphy and write out all 260+/ish characters to create a magical wall hanging. Specific to Buddhist folk magic, you’ll often see the characters written in concentric circles.

Heart Sutra: Full Text

You’ve heard me say this before — I really like CBETA (Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association) for primary source texts. Here’s the link to the Heart Sutra (般若波羅蜜多心經), translation by Tripitaka, the Master Xuanzang 唐三藏法師玄奘 (Taishō Tripiṭaka Vol. 8, No. 251).

And here it is:

般若波羅蜜多心經

唐三藏法師玄奘譯

觀自在菩薩，行深般若波羅蜜多時，照見五蘊皆空，度一切苦厄。

舍利子！色不異空，空不異色；色即是空，空即是色。受、想、行、識，亦復如是。

舍利子！是諸法空相，不生不滅，不垢不淨，不增不減。

是故空中無色，無受、想、行、識；無眼、耳、鼻、舌、身、意；無色、聲、香、味、觸、法；無眼界，乃至無意識界。

無無明，亦無無明盡，乃至無老死，亦無老死盡。

無苦、集、滅、道，無智亦無得。

以無所得故，菩提薩埵，依般若波羅蜜多故，心無罣礙；無罣礙故，無有恐怖，遠離顛倒夢想，究竟涅槃。

三世諸佛，依般若波羅蜜多故，得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。

故知般若波羅蜜多，是大神咒，是大明咒，是無上咒，是無等等咒，能除一切苦，真實不虛。

故說般若波羅蜜多咒，即說咒曰：

揭諦揭諦，波羅揭諦，波羅僧揭諦，菩提薩婆訶。