Toh 602The Dhāraṇī that Makes Erecting One Reliquary Like Erecting Ten Million

An Exposition of the Scripture on Multiplying the Merit of Building Stūpas

Background

This scripture belongs to the collection of dhāraṇīs in the Vajrayāna tradition recorded in the Kangyur—the canonical collection of Tibetan Buddhism. Its background derives from a central tantric principle: through reverent practice with appropriate dhāraṇīs and rituals, practitioners can multiply the meritorious effect of a virtuous deed countless times.

In Buddhism, building a stūpa—a place where relics or scriptures are enshrined—is regarded as an act of supreme merit because it symbolizes the bodhisattva path and the wondrous perfection of the Buddha’s Dharma. However, not everyone has the material means or time to erect a magnificent stūpa. This scripture therefore provides a tantric means: through an efficacious dhāraṇī, the act of building one small stūpa may be contemplated in meditation (dhyāna) and undertaken with sincere resolve so that its merit becomes equivalent to that of building ten million stūpas.

This is not “cheating,” but a revelation of the nature of mind according to Vajrayāna teachings: mind creates everything. When the mind is trained and directed through dhāraṇī and meditation, it has the power to transform corresponding reality.

Main Content

The scripture centers on transmitting a special dhāraṇī that activates and multiplies the merit of building a stūpa. In the tantric tradition, dhāraṇīs are not ordinary prayers but sacred sounds that contain the transcendent power of the Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and Dharma protectors.

Practitioners are instructed to take refuge in the Three Jewels, purify their minds through cultivating the four immeasurables—loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—and then build a stūpa or purely recite the dhāraṇī. Through sincerity, by focusing their intention on the meaning of the action, and by verbally reciting the dhāraṇī in the proper manner, practitioners’ minds become connected with the wisdom of the Buddhas. The distance between one stūpa and ten million stūpas is erased, for it exists only within the discriminations of the conditioned mind.