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The Heart Sutra, a discussion.
Cinorjer
Veteran
The Heart Sutra is one of the most widely quoted, chanted, and revered writings of the Mahayana schools of Buddhism. It is also one of the shortest, making it a prime candidate for posting and discussion on a board. I wonder if anyone would like to discuss what this Sutra says? I'll copy it after a short intro.
The Heart Sutra is thought to be written somewhere between 200 and 600 AD, although dating of sutras is always problematic. Many scholars think it was written by a Chinese monk soon after Buddhism was established in that country.
For reference when you read it, Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara is the Bodhisattva of Compassion.
"Prajna Paramita" literally Perfection of Wisdom, is the name given to the collection of sutras used at the time, so the entire line is a poetic way of saying "studying the dharma"
The Bodhisattva is addressing Sariputra, who was an early, much mentioned disciple of Buddha and who died before Buddha did, so this is a literary device often used, passing along a teaching in the form of a dialog between Gods and Buddha or in this case, Bodhisattva and Arhat.
And the translation of the mantra at the end would probably best be given as "Gone, gone beyond, together awoken, amen!" (svaha is just something sanskrit tacks onto the end of a recitation, apparently)
The Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, when practicing deeply the Prajna Paramita, perceives that all five skandhas are empty and is saved from all suffering and distress.
"Shariputra, form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form.
That which is form is emptiness, that which is emptiness form.
The same is true of feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness."
"Shariputra, all dharmas are marked with emptiness; they do not appear or disappear,
are not tainted or pure, do not increase or decrease.
Therefore, in emptiness no form, no feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness.
No eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind; no color, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch,
no object of mind; no realm of eyes and so forth until no realm of mind consciousness."
"No ignorance and also no extinction of it, and so forth until no old age and death
and also no extinction of them. No suffering, no origination,
no stopping, no path, no cognition, also no attainment with nothing to attain."
"The Bodhisattva depends on Prajna Paramita and the mind is no hindrance;
without any hindrance no fears exist. Far apart from every perverted view one dwells in Nirvana.
In the three worlds all Buddhas depend on Prajna Paramita
and attain Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi."
"Therefore know that Prajna Paramita is the great transcendent mantra,
is the great bright mantra, is the utmost mantra,
is the supreme mantra which is able to relieve all suffering
and is true, not false."
"So proclaim the Prajna Paramita mantra, proclaim the mantra which says:
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha."
The Heart Sutra is thought to be written somewhere between 200 and 600 AD, although dating of sutras is always problematic. Many scholars think it was written by a Chinese monk soon after Buddhism was established in that country.
For reference when you read it, Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara is the Bodhisattva of Compassion.
"Prajna Paramita" literally Perfection of Wisdom, is the name given to the collection of sutras used at the time, so the entire line is a poetic way of saying "studying the dharma"
The Bodhisattva is addressing Sariputra, who was an early, much mentioned disciple of Buddha and who died before Buddha did, so this is a literary device often used, passing along a teaching in the form of a dialog between Gods and Buddha or in this case, Bodhisattva and Arhat.
And the translation of the mantra at the end would probably best be given as "Gone, gone beyond, together awoken, amen!" (svaha is just something sanskrit tacks onto the end of a recitation, apparently)
The Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, when practicing deeply the Prajna Paramita, perceives that all five skandhas are empty and is saved from all suffering and distress.
"Shariputra, form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form.
That which is form is emptiness, that which is emptiness form.
The same is true of feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness."
"Shariputra, all dharmas are marked with emptiness; they do not appear or disappear,
are not tainted or pure, do not increase or decrease.
Therefore, in emptiness no form, no feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness.
No eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind; no color, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch,
no object of mind; no realm of eyes and so forth until no realm of mind consciousness."
"No ignorance and also no extinction of it, and so forth until no old age and death
and also no extinction of them. No suffering, no origination,
no stopping, no path, no cognition, also no attainment with nothing to attain."
"The Bodhisattva depends on Prajna Paramita and the mind is no hindrance;
without any hindrance no fears exist. Far apart from every perverted view one dwells in Nirvana.
In the three worlds all Buddhas depend on Prajna Paramita
and attain Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi."
"Therefore know that Prajna Paramita is the great transcendent mantra,
is the great bright mantra, is the utmost mantra,
is the supreme mantra which is able to relieve all suffering
and is true, not false."
"So proclaim the Prajna Paramita mantra, proclaim the mantra which says:
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha
gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha."
0
Comments
Here is the translation by Venerable Yifa, this English version may seem alot more easier to read?
The Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, while practicing the profound prajnaparamitra, clearly saw that all five skandhas are empty, thus overcoming all suffering.
Sariputra,
form is no different from empty,
empty no different from form,
form is just empty,
empty just form,
sensation, perception, volition and consciousness are also like this.
Sariputra, this is the emptiness of all dharmas:
They neither arise nor cease,
are neither defiled nor pure,
neither increase nor decrease.
For this reason within emptiness there is no form,
no sensation, perception, volition or consciousness;
no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body or mind;
no sight, sound, scent, taste, touch or thought;
no seeing,…even no thinking;
no ignorance nor end of ignorance,…even
no aging and death, nor end of aging and death;
no suffering, origin, cessation or path;
no wisdom and no attainment.
Because nothing is attained,
bodhisattvas maintain prajnaparamita,
then their heart is without hindrance,
and since without hindrance, without fear;
escaping upside-down, dream-like thinking,
and completely realizing nirvana.
All buddhas of all times maintain prajnaparamita,
thus attaining anuttara-samyak-sambodhi,
Hence know, prajnaparamita is
the all-powerful mantra,
the great enlightening mantra,
the unexcelled mantra,
the unequalled mantra,
able to dispel all suffering.
This is true, not false.
Therefore proclaim the prajnaparamita mantra.
Recite the mantra thus:
Gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha!
Chinese masters tend to state that the Buddha has spoken the sutra, using Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva as an example, rather than the Bodhisattva teaching Sariputra.
At first, I was quite taken with the English meanings and permutations of the various chants. But slowly, the meanings seemed to drift away, with mere fragments (eg. "form is emptiness; emptiness is form") remaining. Nowadays, The Heart Sutra is like an old friend, a focal point and a breath of always-fresh air. If someone asked me what it meant, I would have to look it up.
Mods please delete if this is too far off topic. Thanks.
(Verses on the Faith Mind) basically sum up what i read and meditate on. they are simple but at the same time very complex.
lovely text. curious to see what discussion will unfold.
Thats literally how we think all the time. It's like us thinking we have been insulted when it's not the case or misinterpeting other's speech or intentions, thus upside down thinking.
Dream like thinking is when we fantasise about happy stuff all day long and gets arrogant when we get praises we don't really deserve.
imo, the Heart Sutra instructs the sphere of nothingness
imo, the Heart Sutra is certainly not perfect but, instead, gravely flawed
it is just describing the sphere of non-thinking, which is not Buddha-Dhamma
the Buddha declared there was only one person who could teach the Buddha-Dhamma equal to him, namely, Sariputta
my impression is the Avalokitesvara is like a child or student, excitedly reporting to their parents or teacher want they learned in kindergarten
many Mahayana sutras disparage Sariputta in their recharacterisation of Buddhism because Sariputta was considered by the Buddha to be his supreme heir
my impression is the inclusion of Sariputta in the sutra is just Mahayana politics
I try to refine what I read to being as pure and straight from the horses mouth if I can, if no then I do not take much notice of it.
.
Hopefully it will clear up misunderstandings about the Heart Sutra and prevent further comments about Buddhist sutras being "flawed".
how can you justify that one sutra is more authentic than another sutra?
you can't because no one knows what the buddha said or did. thus we can only use what is true.
either the sutra speaks to you or it doesn't. if it doesn't then find out why it doesn't. then you learned something. yay.
what is so "wrong" with the heart sutra? it seems to speak about emptiness in a pretty straightforward manner. everything is empty. isn't that an universal buddhist teaching? isn't that what the heart of buddhism is all about? emptiness?
?
So what if you win a debate on the internet that some Buddhist sutras are wrong? Do you really gain anything in your practice? Mahayana and Theravada paractioners are still going to do their thing.
Infact the Heart sutra says that emptiness is the same as forms and vice versa, they can't exist without one another. By only talking about emptiness one can easily turn nihilist.
my opinion is it is a matter of experience
for example, should the state of liberation be something permanent or impermanent?
if it is permament then how can we live believing there is no eye, no ear, no sight, no sound, no scent, no taste, no touch, no thought, no suffering, no cessation, etc,?
how can we contine to live with complete freedom by dwelling in the state of no thought, permanently?
i am just voicing my opinion, that is all
can we live with the view that phenomena are selfless?
if so, can we also live with the view there are no phenomena?
I agree intellectual understanding alone, and conceptual understanding is not enough. One has to experience.
Nibbana has been described to me as the extinction of desire, the extinction of hatred, and the extinction of delusion. The Buddha referred to Nibbana as the calming of all conditioned things, giving up of all defilements, cessation of craving, and detachment..... clearly, my experience has not reached this state, not even close I suspect, and I wouldn't presume to know much about it - yet glimpses of not self, no thought, no seperate phenomona do occur for me as a result of practice, consistent with teachings on shunyata I have been privelged to receive from qualified teachers, including public teachings by HHDL on Nagarunja's commentary on Bodhichitta.
Some versions just drop the preamble, because it's always been a mystery. Sutras have never been reluctant to bring Buddha into the picture, with the usual "I heard that the following is what Buddha said to such-and-such on this occasion" so people have wondered what the author had in mind, or if something got dropped in the earliest copies, or the entire first line got tacked on to an earlier piece of teaching.
And I think this one sutra might have been meant for the Theravadans in mind. My own personal opinion is that the Bodhisattva is a stand-in for the Mahayana and Shariputra is supposed to represent Theravadans. This sutra then encapsulates the whole Emptiness thing that helped cause the split in the first place. Theravadans tend to logic and are always suspicious of what doesn't seem to make sense in their mission to attain Enlightenment. This sutra first says form is no different from emptiness, then that within emptiness there is no form, then even says there is nothing to attain. It has all the hallmarks of an esoteric teaching, because it can't mean what it seems to be saying and seems to need some secret key to penetrating the language, something else Theravadans have a huge problem with ever since the story of the silent handing over of the flower took hold. This sutra seems designed to make a Theravadan grit his teeth, doesn't it? And I have to admit, they have a point. If the Dharma was nothing but nonsense, Buddhism wouldn't have survived a year after Buddha's death. It's the logic and sense to the Noble Truths that is the foundation of Buddhism.
But then we have something like this Heart Sutra. I remember when I first read it. "Oh, one of those ZEN things again. Up is down and one hand claps and all that. Gotta go to a Zen Master to get the key to what it all means." But it's not so much esoteric in my mind, as using words skillfully to point to what can't be expressed in words.
Browning says, in </>Rabbi ben Ezra" , if memory serves,
"Grow old alone with me
The best is yet to be
The last of life for which the first was made."
More and more I give thanks for the snatches and tatters of scriptures, hymns and poems that lurk in the cluttered attic of memory. And give thanks at the same time to the teachers and a school system that obliged me, every evening, to learn 'by heart'. The whole of a text may escape me, even its a. Only the phrase that entered my heart remains.
as i originally questioned: "are all views suffering?"
if so: "can we live a life free from views?"
for example, if a child asks us: "can i play with the alligator that lives in the creek?", will our mind suffer because we express our view to the child?
a buddha can attach to a view, but it's like grasping at air. keep trying.
for example, the buddha gained enlightenment when he was 35 years old
did the buddha spend the rest of his life with no form, no feeling, no perceptions, no intentions & no consciousness?
thus the buddha was like everyone else. he just was completely aware of reality and it's emptiness, which is also a fullness.
nirvana is freedom to do whatever one wants. if that means to hide in emptiness until the world knocks on your door. so be it. if it means to go around and speaking the dharma. so be it. if it means working at the local wallmart as a clerk for the rest of your life. so be it.
buddhas are everywhere doing lots of funny stuff. some weird and some quite mundane.
the buddha expresses his inner wisdom of emptiness. it does not talk about how he functions.
is this view not itself suffering or disturbing to the mind?
for me, it is very well articulated
once one attains nirvana they have a home away from what can disturb, which is no other than ones own wind blowing against the still pool. sure the buddha can be disturbed, but he has a home always within.
Four:
One to scew it in.
One to not screw it in.
One to both screw it in and not screw it in.
One too neither screw it in nor not screw it in.
The Buddha managed to live with the view that phenomena are selfless, that there are no phenomena, etc. It can be done, it was done. I imagine one maintains the mundane perspective of life, while knowing it's an illusion and remaining unattached to it. It becomes a tool to allow one to exist in the mundane world, but not be "of" the mundane world. This allowed the Buddha to teach to his disciples, whose perception was still grounded in the mundane world, while maintaining his enlightened state while he taught. Perhaps like people who are raised in one culture at home, but have to live in a radically different dominant culture outside the home. One learns to "walk in two worlds". In his own way, this is what the Buddha did.
(Sorry about repeated material above. Edit issues...)
What evidence do we have to show the Buddha lived with the view that there are no phenomena?
Where did the Buddha ever say there is no earth, no wind, no water, no fire, no space, no consciousness, no mind, no Nibbana, etc, ?
Avalokitesvara might have asserted this but what record do we have the Buddha spoke the same?
Have you managed to live with the view that there are no phenomena?
Or is your view of Buddha just another unverified superstition you are blindly worshipping?
are you possibly confusing the Buddha for Lao Tse?
Did Avaloketishvara assert anything, or was it the Buddha who was doing the asserting? No one has reached agreement on that point. How easily you become confused, Grasshopper! The Buddha himself said that although he had come to understand much about life and reality (I'm paraphrasing), he only taught that which is relevant to the ending of suffering. He was silent with regards to much, possibly most, of his wisdom.
:coffee:
To the Buddha, "emptiness" did not mean there are no phenomena, like a vacuum
However, you appear to be using the terms "emptiness" and "nothingness" synonomously To Buddha, the Four Noble Truths are "wisdom". To Buddha, any knowledge that can end suffering is "wisdom". For example, the Buddha included comprehension of arising & passing away (impermanence) in his definition of "wisdom". The Buddha taught the entirety of his "wisdom".
He remained silent however about things that were not "wisdom", that were unrelated to the cessation of suffering, that were mere knowledge. For example, possibly the Buddha knew the number of hairs on your head or knew that frogs eat certain kinds of dragonflies. Of that, he remained silent.
All the best
Further, if the Heart Sutra was "perfect", as claimed here, then interpretation would not be required. If it does not speak directly then it cannot be the words of a Buddha. The Buddha's supramundane discourses do not require interpretation. The Heart Sutra appears clear in its understanding. It appears to assert Nirvana is non-thinking.
Thank you, this latter passage is what I was referring to, regarding his remaining silent. Both passages are good. And yet he spoke about there being 31 realms of existence, other universes, etc. How does that contribute to Liberation?
en.wikipedia/wiki/Heart_Sutra
"The sutra is in a small class of sutras not attributed to the Buddha. In some versions ... the Buddha confirms and praises the words of Avalokitesvara, although this is not included in the pre-eminent Chinese version..."
Origin: "Likely to have been composed in the 1st C. CE in Kushan Empire territory by a sarvastavadin monk... The Tibetan canon uses the longer version."
My quoting of this latter passage completely refuted your prior misrepresentation of it.
In other words, it was The Compassion Warrior that was confused.