The Heart Sutra

THE  HEART  SUTRA <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:place>Om</st1:place>  Homage to the Perfection of Wisdom           the Lovely, the Holy ! Avalokita, the Holy Lord and Bodhisattva, was moving in the deep course of the Wisdom          which has gone beyond.        He looked down from on high,          He beheld but five heaps,     and He saw that in their own-being             they were empty. Here, O Sariputra, form is emptiness     and the very emptiness is form ;    emptiness does not differ from form,    form does not differ from emptiness,    whatever is emptiness, that is form,       the same is true of feelings, perceptions, impulses, and consciousness. Here, O Sariputra, all dharmas are marked with emptiness ;     they are not produced or stopped,       not defiled or immaculate,       not deficient or complete. Therefore, O Sariputra,     in emptiness there is no form      nor feeling, nor perception,    nor impulse, nor consciousness ; No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind ; No forms, sounds, smells, tastes, touchables           or objects of mind ; No sight-organ element, and so forth, until we come to : No mind-consciousness element ; There is no ignorance, no extinction of ignorance,        and so forth, until we come to :         There is no decay and death,       no extinction of decay and death.     There is no suffering, no origination,            no stopping, no path.      There is no cognition, no attainment           and no non-attainment. Therefore, O Sariputra, it is because of his non-attainmentness that a Bodhisattva,     through having relied on the Perfection of Wisdom,           dwells without thought-coverings.          In the absence of thought-coverings           he has not been made to tremble,           he has overcome what can upset,         and in the end he attains to Nirvana. All those who appear as Buddhas            in the three periods of time fully awake to the utmost, right and perfect Enlightenment because they have relied on the Perfection of Wisdom. Therefore on-e should know the prajnaparamita as the great spell, the spell of great knowledge,       the utmost spell, the unequalled spell,         allayer of all suffering, in truth --           for what could go wrong ?            By the prajnaparamita          has this spell been delivered. It runs like this :   gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha.    ( Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone altogether beyond,     O what an awakening, all-hail ! -- )         This completes the Heart of perfect Wisdom. (Translated by <st1:place>E. Conze</st1:place>)<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>