Kangyur — General Sūtras – page 5

Toh 437: The Practice Manual of Kurukullā

Summary The Practice Manual of Noble Tārā Kurukullā is the most comprehensive single work on the female Buddhist deity Kurukullā. It is also the only canonical scripture to focus on this deity. The text’s importance is therefore commensurate with the importance of the goddess herself, who is the chief Buddhist deity of magnetizing, in particular the magnetizing which takes the form of enthrallment. The text is a treasury of ritual practices connected with enthrallment and similar magical acts—practices which range from formal sādhana to traditional homa ritual, and to magical methods involving herbs, minerals, etc. The text’s varied contents are presented as a multi-layered blend of the apotropaic and the soteriological, as well as the practical and the philosophical, where these complementary opposites combine together into a genuinely spiritual Buddhist work.

Toh 438: Praise to Tārā with Twenty-One Verses of Homage and Their Benefits

Summary Praise to Tārā with Twenty-One Verses of Homage is a liturgy that consists of twenty-seven verses of praise and reverence dedicated to the deity Tārā. The first twenty-one verses are at once a series of homages to the twenty-one forms of Tārā and a poetic description of her physical features, postures, and qualities. The remaining six verses describe how and when the praise should be recited and the benefits of its recitation.

Toh 445: The Garland of Vajras

Toh 446: The Questions of the Four Goddesses

Toh 450: Compendium of Vajra Gnosis

Toh 452: Victory by Means of Non-dual Sameness, a Sovereign Practice

Toh 453: The Beginning Chapter of the Supremely Great Vajra

Toh 463: The Secret Revelation of Vajrapāṇi

Toh 466: The Net of Magical Illusion

Toh 471: The Myth Chapter

Summary The Myth Chapter concisely relates the story of Vajrabhairava’s subjugation of Yama and his entourage. The text describes how Vajrabhairava crushes the city of Yama and forces its inhabitants to surrender. He then binds them under oath and empowers them to serve as protectors of his teachings. The text also presents the root mantra of Vajrabhairava, which encapsulates the essential life force of Yama and his followers.

Toh 471: The Myth Chapter

Summary The Myth Chapter concisely relates the story of Vajrabhairava’s subjugation of Yama and his entourage. The text describes how Vajrabhairava crushes the city of Yama and forces its inhabitants to surrender. He then binds them under oath and empowers them to serve as protectors of his teachings. The text also presents the root mantra of Vajrabhairava, which encapsulates the essential life force of Yama and his followers.

Toh 472: The Rite of the Musk Shrew

Summary This short ritual work belonging to the tantric cycle of the deity Vajrabhairava presents a vidyāmantra and series of rites that use ingredients derived from a musk shrew.

Toh 479: The Compendium of Realities

Toh 482: The Great Sovereign of Practices, the Victory Over the Three Worlds

Toh 484: The Coercive Activities

Toh 487: The Supreme

Summary This text is classified as a Yogatantra. In India, this tantra was originally united with the following text in the Kangyur (Toh 488) as a single text. But in the Tibetan Kangyur they are represented as two individual texts, since different teams of translators rendered the two parts into Tibetan at different times. The teacher of the tantra is Vairocana. In this text the Buddha Vairocana first teaches seventeen pure states observed by bodhisattvas as they accomplish the perfection of insight. Next, over twelve chapters, Vairocana emanates a large number of maṇḍalas and he reveals the rituals and practices associated with these awakened environments.

Toh 493: The Sūtra of the Secret Jewel Ornament

Toh 495: The Practice Described as the Taming

Toh 496: The Vajrapāṇi Empowerment

Toh 500: Moving Through the Three Vajra Levels, a Sovereign Practice

Toh 503: The Noble Great Vehicle Discourse “The Detailed Account of the Previous Aspirations of the Seven Thus-Gone Ones”

Summary The Detailed Account of the Previous Aspirations of the Seven Thus-Gone Ones opens in Vaiśālī, where the Buddha Śākyamuni is seated with a saṅgha of eight thousand monks, thirty-six thousand bodhisattvas, and a large gathering of gods, spirit beings, and humans. As Śākyamuni concludes his teaching, the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī rises from his seat and requests that the Buddha give a Dharma teaching that will benefit all the human and nonhuman beings who are present in the assembly. Specifically, he asks Śākyamuni to teach them about the previous aspirations of seven buddhas, their buddhafields, and the benefits that those buddhas can bring to beings who live in the final five hundred years, when the holy Dharma is on the verge of disappearing. Śākyamuni agrees to this request and proceeds to give a detailed account of the previous aspirations of those seven buddhas to benefit beings who are veiled by karmic obscurations, tormented by illnesses, and plagued by mental anguish and suffering.

Toh 504: The Noble Great Vehicle Sūtra “The Detailed Account of the Previous Aspirations of the Blessed Bhaiṣajya­guru­vaiḍūrya­prabha”

Summary The Detailed Account of the Previous Aspirations of the Blessed Bhaiṣajya­guru­vaiḍūrya­prabha centers on the figure commonly known as the Medicine Buddha. The text opens in Vaiśālī, where the Buddha Śākyamuni is seated with a large retinue of human and divine beings. The bodhisattva Mañjuśrī asks Śākyamuni to teach the names and previous aspirations of the buddhas, along with the benefit that buddhas can bring during future times when the Dharma has nearly disappeared. The Buddha gives a teaching on the name and previous aspirations of the Buddha Bhaiṣajya­guru­vaiḍūrya­prabha, and then details the benefits that arise from hearing and retaining this buddha’s name.

Toh 521: The Noble “Essence of Dependent Arising”

Summary This brief dhāraṇī text presents a translation and transliteration of the well-known Sanskrit ye dharma formula, the essence of the Buddha’s teachings on dependent arising. The text also describes several benefits of reciting this dhāraṇī, including the purification of negative actions.

Toh 535: Recollecting the Name of Moonlight

Summary Recollecting the Name of Moonlight contains the dhāraṇī of the Buddha Moonlight. The benefits of recollecting the Buddha Moonlight’s name every morning after rising are that one will remember all one’s lives of the past forty thousand kalpas, one will not fall into the lower realms after death, and one will attain the attributes of awakening.

Toh 536: Recollecting the Common Essence of the Tathāgatas

Summary Recollecting the Common Essence of the Tathāgatas includes a short dhāraṇī and a brief statement on the benefit of its recitation for the purpose of purifying karmic obscurations.

Toh 537: Recollecting the Names of the Buddha Ratnaśikhin

Summary Recollecting the Names of the Buddha Ratnaśikhin includes a short dhāraṇī and the brief statement that if it is recited at the time of death, one will avoid lower rebirth and be reborn in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three.

Toh 545: The Noble Dhāraṇī “Spoken by Mañjuśrī Himself”

Summary Spoken by Mañjuśrī Himself provides an incantatory practice taught by Mañjuśrī. The dhāraṇī has two sections: the first extols Mañjuśrī as a tathāgata, an arhat, and a perfectly awakened buddha, and the second invokes a bhagavatī who is praised as an illuminator and supplicated for protection.

Toh 546: The Noble Dhāraṇī “Mañjuśrī’s Sworn Oath”

Toh 547: The Dhāraṇī “Mañjuśrī’s Promise”

Summary Mañjuśrī’s Promise begins without preamble with a Sanskrit praise text in the form of a dhāraṇī that resembles other traditional encomiums that exult in the purity, grace, and triumph of bodhisattvas. The scripture then enumerates the benefits accrued by a single recitation of this dhāraṇī, which include the purification of evil deeds accumulated over eons, and the many rewards for its extensive recitation, namely erudition, exceptional powers of memorization, and finally the sight of the body of Mañjuśrī himself.

Toh 548: The Noble Epithets of Mañjuśrī

Summary The Epithets of Mañjuśrī is a concise scripture consisting of a salutation to Mañjuśrī that highlights the qualities of his speech, a thirty-six-syllable Sanskrit dhāraṇī, and a one-sentence statement of the benefit accrued by twenty-one recitations thereof.

Toh 549: The Noble Lord Mañjuśrī’s Dḥāraṇī for Increasing Insight and Intelligence

Toh 551: The Blessed One’s Praise of Sharp Mañjuśrī

Summary The Blessed One’s Praise of Sharp Mañjuśrī is a praise in twelve verses that describes in detail the physiognomy, ornamentation, vestments, and general splendor of Mañjuśrī’s various manifestations as a bodhisattva and as a tathāgata.

Toh 552: The Eight Maidens’ Praise of Mañjuśrī, Lord of Speech

Summary This scripture is a praise to the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī. The eight maidens indicated by the title may be inferred as each speaking a different verse, together providing a range of perspectives.

Toh 555: The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra “The Supremely Victorious King of Sūtras, The Sublime Golden Light”

Summary The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light has held great importance in Buddhism for its instructions on the purification of karma. In particular, much of the sūtra is specifically addressed to monarchs and thus has been significant for rulers—not only in India but also in China, Japan, Mongolia, and elsewhere—who wished to ensure the well-being of their nations through such purification. Reciting and internalizing this sūtra is understood to be efficacious for personal purification and also for the welfare of a state and the world. In this sūtra, the bodhisattva Ruciraketu has a dream in which a prayer of confession emanates from a shining golden drum. He relates the prayer to the Buddha, and a number of deities then vow to protect it and its adherents. The ruler’s devotion to the sūtra is emphasized as important if the nation is to benefit. Toward the end of the sūtra are two well-known narratives of the Buddha’s previous lives: the account of the physician Jalavāhana, who saves and blesses numerous fish, and that of Prince Mahāsattva , who gives his body to a hungry tigress and her cubs. This is the longest version of The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light preserved in the Kangyur. It comprises thirty-one chapters and was translated into Tibetan primarily from Yijing’s Chinese translation in the early ninth century.

Toh 556: The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra “The Lord King of Sūtras, The Sublime Golden Light”

Summary The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light has held great importance in Buddhism for its instructions on the purification of karma. In particular, much of the sūtra is specifically addressed to monarchs and thus has been significant for rulers—not only in India but also in China, Japan, Mongolia, and elsewhere—who wished to ensure the well-being of their nations through such purification. Reciting and internalizing this sūtra is understood to be efficacious for personal purification and also for the welfare of a state and the world. In this sūtra, the bodhisattva Ruciraketu has a dream in which a prayer of confession emanates from a shining golden drum. He relates the prayer to the Buddha, and a number of deities then vow to protect it and its adherents. The ruler’s devotion to the sūtra is emphasized as important if the nation is to benefit. Toward the end of the sūtra are two well-known narratives of the Buddha’s previous lives: the account of the physician Jalavāhana, who saves and blesses numerous fish, and that of Prince Mahāsattva, who gives his body to a hungry tigress and her cubs. This is the second-longest version of The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light preserved in the Kangyur. It comprises twenty-nine chapters and was translated into Tibetan primarily from Sanskrit.

Toh 557: The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra “The Lord King of Sūtras, The Sublime Golden Light”

Summary The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light has held great importance in Buddhism for its instructions on the purification of karma. In particular, much of the sūtra is specifically addressed to monarchs and thus has been significant for rulers—not only in India but also in China, Japan, Mongolia, and elsewhere—who wished to ensure the well-being of their nations through such purification. Reciting and internalizing this sūtra is understood to be efficacious for personal purification and also for the welfare of a state and the world. In this sūtra, the bodhisattva Ruciraketu has a dream in which a prayer of confession emanates from a shining golden drum. He relates the prayer to the Buddha, and a number of deities then vow to protect it and its adherents. The ruler’s devotion to the sūtra is emphasized as important if the nation is to benefit. Toward the end of the sūtra are two well-known narratives of the Buddha’s previous lives: the account of the physician Jalavāhana, who saves and blesses numerous fish, and that of Prince Mahāsattva , who gives his body to a hungry tigress and her cubs. This is the shortest version of The Sūtra of the Sublime Golden Light preserved in the Kangyur. It comprises twenty-one chapters, was translated into Tibetan primarily from Sanskrit, and is the only version for which a complete Sanskrit manuscript survives.

Toh 558: The Sūtra “Destroyer of the Great Trichiliocosm”

Summary Destroyer of the Great Trichiliocosm is one of five texts that together constitute the Pañcarakṣā scriptural collection, popular for centuries as an important facet of Mahāyāna-Vajrayāna Buddhism’s traditional approach to personal and communal misfortunes of all kinds. Destroyer of the Great Trichiliocosm primarily addresses illnesses caused by spirit entities thought to devour the vitality of humans and animals. The text describes them as belonging to four different subspecies, presided over by the four great kings, guardians of the world, who hold sovereignty over the spirit beings in the four cardinal directions. The text also includes ritual prescriptions for the monastic community to purify its consumption of alms tainted by the “five impure foods.” This refers generally to alms that contain meat, the consumption of which is expressly prohibited for successful implementation of the Pañcarakṣā’s dhāraṇī incantations.

Toh 559: The Queen of Incantations: The Great Peahen

Summary The Queen of Incantations: The Great Peahen is one of five texts that together constitute the Pañcarakṣā scriptural collection and has been among the most popular texts used for pragmatic purposes throughout the Mahāyāna Buddhist world. Although its incantations ( vidyā ) are framed specifically to counteract the deadly effects of poisonous snakebites, it also aims to address the entire range of possible human ailments and diseases contracted through the interference of animals, nonhuman beings, and humoral and environmental imbalances, along with a range of other misfortunes, such as sorcery, losing one’s way, robbery, natural disaster, and criminal punishment, to name but a few. In the text the Buddha Śākyamuni advocates for the invocation of a number of deities within the pantheon of Indian gods and goddesses, including numerous local deities who dwell throughout the subcontinent. He stipulates that just “upholding” or intoning these names along with the mantra formula that accompanies each grouping will hasten the deities to the service of saṅgha members administering to the pragmatic medical needs of their own and surrounding communities.

Toh 560: The Essence of the Peahen, Queen of Spells

Toh 561: The Noble Queen of Incantations: The Great Amulet

Summary The Noble Queen of Incantations: The Great Amulet , one of five texts that constitute the Pañcarakṣā scriptural collection, has been among the most popular texts used for pragmatic purposes throughout the Mahāyāna Buddhist world. As its title suggests, The Great Amulet prescribes the use of amulets into which the incantation is physically incorporated. These devices are then worn around the neck or arm, attached to flags, interred in stūpas and funeral pyres, or otherwise used anywhere their presence is deemed beneficial. Wearing or encountering the incantation promises a range of effects, including the prevention and healing of illness, the conception and birth of male offspring, and control over the world of nonhuman spirit entities. The text also protects against consequences of negative deeds, delivering evildoers from negative rebirths and ensuring their place among the gods. The promise of augmenting merit even extends in one passage to an increase of mindfulness and liberation from saṃsāra.

Toh 562: The Sūtra of Great Cool Grove

Summary The Sūtra of Great Cool Grove , one of five texts that constitute the Pañcarakṣā scriptural collection, has been among the most popular texts used for pragmatic purposes throughout the Mahāyāna Buddhist world. This sūtra promises protection for the Buddha’s “four communities”—monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen—against a range of illnesses and obstacles originating from the hosts of spirit entities who reside in remote wilderness retreats. The text centers specifically on threats of illness posed by the capricious spirit world of “nonhumans,” known collectively as grahas or bhūtas , who feed off the vitality, flesh, and blood of members of the Buddhist spiritual community engaging in spiritual practice at those remote hermitages. The sūtra is proclaimed by the Four Great Kings, each of whom reigns over a host of bhūtas, with the goal of quelling the hostile forces who assail those diligently practicing the Buddha’s teachings. Also included are ritual prescriptions for properly performing the sūtra and descriptions of the many benefits that ensue.

Toh 566: The Maṇḍala Rites of Noble Mārīcī: A Ritual Manual Consisting of Seven Hundred Essential Lines from the Twelve-Thousand Line Tantra of Mārīcī’s Arising

Summary The Maṇḍala Rites of Noble Mārīcī contains a collection of elaborate instructions for the visualization and depiction of a number of maṇḍalas and forms of the goddess Mārīcī and her retinue of vidyā goddesses.

Toh 567: Jayavatī, the Great Queen of Spells

Toh 571: The Spell of Jāṅgulī

Toh 572: The Queen of Spells, Aṅgulī

Toh 575: The Six Syllable Spell

Toh 585: The Noble “Quintessence of ‘The Stem Array’ ”

Summary This text consists of a short dhāraṇī said to encompass a famous sūtra in the Kangyur, The Stem Array (Toh 44–45), and the benefits of its recitation.

Toh 587: The Noble “Quintessence of ‘The Great Peahen’ ”

Summary This text consists of a short dhāraṇī said to encompass a famous text for protection in the Kangyur, The Great Peahen (Toh 559), and the benefit of its recitation.

Toh 590: The Noble Invincible Great Queen of Spells for Averting Called “Sitātapatrā Born from the Uṣṇīṣa of All Tathāgatas”

Summary This text presents a spell ( vidyā ) featuring the female deity Sitātapatrā (White Umbrella Goddess), which issues from the uṣṇīṣa of the Buddha Śākyamuni as he rests in samādhi among the gods of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three. The text details a litany of dangers, illness, and threats and provides spell formulas that can be recited to avert them. Sitātapatrā and her spell have enjoyed a long history and sustained popularity as a source of security against illness and misfortune, and her spell is widely used in contemporary Buddhist communities to this day.

Toh 591: The Noble Dhāraṇī “The Supreme Accomplishment of Invincible Averting, Sitātapatrā Born from the Uṣṇīṣa of the Tathāgata”

Summary This text presents a spell ( vidyā ) featuring the female deity Sitātapatrā (White Umbrella Goddess), which issues from the uṣṇīṣa of the Buddha Śākyamuni as he rests in samādhi among the gods of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three. The text details a litany of dangers, illness, and threats and provides a spell formula that can be recited to avert them. Sitātapatrā and her spell have enjoyed a long history and sustained popularity as a source of security against illness and misfortune, and her spell is widely used in contemporary Buddhist communities to this day.

Toh 592: The Noble Dhāraṇī “The Invincible Sitātapatrā Born from the Uṣṇīṣa of the Tathāgata”

Summary This text presents a dhāraṇī featuring the female deity Sitātapatrā (White Umbrella Goddess) that provides a magical means to avert a litany of dangers, illness, and threats. Sitātapatrā and her spell have enjoyed a long history and sustained popularity as a source of security against illness and misfortune, and her spell is widely used in contemporary Buddhist communities to this day.

Toh 593: The Noble Dhāraṇī “The Invincible Sitātapatrā Born from the Uṣṇīṣa of the Tathāgata”

Summary This text presents a dhāraṇī featuring the female deity Sitātapatrā (White Umbrella Goddess), which issues from the uṣṇīṣa of the Buddha Śākyamuni as he rests in samādhi among the gods of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three. The text details a litany of dangers, illness, and threats and provides a spell formula that can be recited to avert them. Sitātapatrā and her spell have enjoyed a long history and sustained popularity as a source of security against illness and misfortune, and her spell is widely used in contemporary Buddhist communities to this day.

Toh 607: The Jeweled Rosary, The Unconquerable

Toh 610: The King of Spells of Dramiḍa

Toh 618: The Sūtra of Taking Back Vitality

Toh 619: The Spell for Cleansing the Eyes

Toh 620: The Sūtra for Assuaging Eye Disease

Toh 621: The Sūtra for Assuaging Hemorrhoids

Toh 627: Not Taking Back Vitality

Toh 642: The Noble One Hundred and Eight Names of Mañjuśrī

Summary One Hundred and Eight Names of Mañjuśrī belongs to a class of texts praising a select deity through a series of one hundred and eight names, each conveying a distinctive feature of the deity’s appearance, realization, or activity as supreme teacher. The present text includes a brief mantra and concludes with a brief description of the benefits of retaining, reciting, and recollecting the names throughout one’s life, especially at the time of death.

Toh 644: The Sūtra of the Eight Maṇḍalas

Toh 647: The Bali Ritual to Relieve the Female Preta Flaming Mouth

Summary This short text narrates Ānanda’s nocturnal encounter in the Banyan Grove in Kapilavastu with a gruesome female preta, or “hungry ghost,” with a burning mouth. The ghost tells Ānanda that he will die imminently and be reborn in the realm of the pretas unless he satisfies innumerable pretas with offerings of food the following morning. Terrified, Ānanda goes quickly to the Buddha and asks for advice. The Buddha then teaches Ānanda a dhāraṇī and an associated food offering ritual that together will satisfy innumerable ghosts and will cause offerings to the Three Jewels to multiply. The Buddha then instructs Ānanda to memorize and widely propagate this practice.

Toh 649: Essence of Meteoric Gnosis

Toh 653: The Mahāsūtra, the Sūtra of the Great Assembly

Toh 656: The Mahāsūtra, the Āṭānāṭīya Sūtra

Toh 663: The Practice of Vasudhārā

Toh 672: Śrīdevī Kālī’s One Hundred and Eight Names

Summary In Śrīdevī Kālī’s One Hundred and Eight Names , the Buddha Śākyamuni recites fourteen verses about the goddess Śrīdevī Kālī, a samaya mantra for the goddess, and a number of verses on the qualities and virtue that will result from keeping the names of Śrīdevī Kālī in mind.

Toh 672: Śrīdevī Kālī’s One Hundred and Eight Names

Summary In Śrīdevī Kālī’s One Hundred and Eight Names , the Buddha Śākyamuni recites fourteen verses about the goddess Śrīdevī Kālī, a samaya mantra for the goddess, and a number of verses on the qualities and virtue that will result from keeping the names of Śrīdevī Kālī in mind.

Toh 673: The Praise by Indra

Toh 673a: tshe dpag med kyi yang snying

Summary This extremely brief text provides a mantra of the Buddha Aparimitāyus, thus seeming to confirm its existence as a mantra on its own as well as being part of the dhāraṇī contained in the most widely used version of The Aparimitāyurjñāna Sūtra .

Toh 674: The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra of Aparimitāyur­jñāna

Summary The Buddha, while at the Jetavana in Śrāvastī, tells Mañjuśrī of a buddha realm far above the world, in which lives the Buddha Aparimitāyur­jñāna. He states that those who recite, write, hear, and so on, the praise of this buddha, or make offerings to this text, will have numerous benefits, including a long life and a good rebirth. As vast numbers of buddhas recite it, the mantra, or dhāraṇī , of this buddha is repeated numerous times. This is the best known of the two versions of this sūtra in the Kangyur.

Toh 675: The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra of Aparimitāyur­jñāna

Summary The Buddha, while at the Jetavana in Śrāvastī, tells Mañjuśrī of a buddha realm far above the world, in which lives the Buddha Aparimitāyur­jñāna. He states that those who recite, write, hear, and so on, the praise of this buddha, or make offerings to this text, will have numerous benefits, including a long life and a good rebirth. As vast numbers of buddhas recite it, the mantra, or dhāraṇī , of this buddha is repeated numerous times. This is the lesser known of the two versions of this sūtra in the Kangyur, but possibly represents the earlier translation.

Toh 678: Calling Amitābha to Mind

Toh 680: Essence of Sukhāvatī

Toh 682: The Sūtra, The Essence of Amoghapāśa

Toh 686: The Noble Sovereign Ritual of Amoghapāśa

Summary The Amogha­pāśa­kalpa­rāja is an early Kriyātantra of the lotus family. Historically, it is the main and largest compendium and manual of rites dedicated to Amoghapāśa, one of Avalokiteśvara’s principal emanations, who is named after and distinguished by his “unfailing noose” ( amoghapāśa ). The text is primarily soteriological, with an emphasis on the general Mahāyāna values of compassion and loving kindness for all beings. It offers many interesting insights into early Buddhist ritual and the development of its terminology.

Toh 689: Procedures for the King of Practices of Amoghapāśa

Toh 690: Detailed Procedures for the Thousand-Armed, Thousand-Eyed Avalokiteśvara

Toh 695: The Essence of Avalokiteśvara

Toh 700: The Practice of Lokeśvara

Toh 705: The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara [1]

Summary This is one of two short texts with the same title, The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara , each of which enumerates the hundred and eight “names” of Avalokiteśvara, which are more like descriptive epithets. The first part of the text describes his many excellent qualities. The second part of the text describes the benefits that result from praising Avalokiteśvara with these names.

Toh 705: The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara [1]

Summary This is one of two short texts with the same title, The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara , each of which enumerates the hundred and eight “names” of Avalokiteśvara, which are more like descriptive epithets. The first part of the text describes his many excellent qualities. The second part of the text describes the benefits that result from praising Avalokiteśvara with these names.

Toh 706: The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara [2]

Summary This is one of two short texts with the same title, The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara , each of which enumerates the hundred and eight “names” of Avalokiteśvara, which are more like descriptive epithets. The first part of the text describes his many excellent qualities. The second part of the text describes the benefits that result from praising Avalokiteśvara with these names.

Toh 706: The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara [2]

Summary This is one of two short texts with the same title, The Noble Hundred and Eight Names of Avalokiteśvara , each of which enumerates the hundred and eight “names” of Avalokiteśvara, which are more like descriptive epithets. The first part of the text describes his many excellent qualities. The second part of the text describes the benefits that result from praising Avalokiteśvara with these names.

Toh 708: Aparājitā, who Grants Fearlessness

Toh 709: The Great Awareness of Aparājitā

Toh 711: Training in the Hundred Verses

Toh 712: Training in the Hundred Verses

Toh 722: The Prayer from the Practice of Avalokiteśvara that is like the Wish-Fulfilling Jewel

Toh 724: The Root Manual of the Rites of the Blessed Noble Tārā

Toh 727: The Hundred and Eight Names of Tārā

Toh 728: The Hundred and Eight Names of the Goddess Tārā

Summary In this sūtra, the goddess Tārā recites a dhāraṇī before an assembly of gods, asuras, and spirits of various types, which brings them peace and stills their speech. The assembled beings then sing praise for Tārā in the form of one hundred and eight epithets of the goddess. Tārā gives a pithy teaching on the importance of seeking liberation and on the right attitude needed for this endeavor. Finally, the goddess gives encouragement and extols the power of the dhāraṇī.

Toh 731: The Noble Sūtra “Tārā Who Protects from the Eight Dangers”

Summary In this sūtra, the goddess Tārā warns the gods of the desire realm about the miseries of saṃsāra and offers a pithy Dharma teaching to free them from harm. Tārā begins by vividly portraying the various kinds of suffering endured by beings in each of the six realms of saṃsāra and then points out the futility of reciting mantras without maintaining pure conduct. She goes on to encourage the listeners to engage in virtue, which puts an end to saṃsāra, and she bestows on them a dhāraṇī that will help them to achieve this goal, a praise of her qualities, and a request for her divine protection that they should recite. Finally, she enjoins the audience to read and practice the teaching and share it with others.

Toh 734: Pratyaṅgirā, The Noble Conquerer

Toh 735: The Sūtra of Parṇaśabarī

Toh 738: In Praise of the Glorious Goddess Sarasvatī

Summary In Praise of the Glorious Goddess Sarasvatī presents a series of lyrical verses in praise of the deity Sarasvatī, the patron goddess of spoken and written eloquence. With evocative imagery and inspiring language, the praise pays tribute to Sarasvatī’s unimpeded speech, memory, and knowledge, and to her physical majesty and compassionate nature. The praise includes petitions requesting Sarasvatī to grant the devotee a level of eloquence and learning equal to that of the goddess herself. In the tradition of the Great Vehicle, the praise aligns the attainments of eloquent speech, strong memory, and great learning with the intention to use them for the benefit of other beings.

Toh 740: The Sūtra of Mahālakṣmī

Toh 740: The Noble “Sūtra of Mahāśrī”

Summary The Sūtra of Mahāśrī is a short sūtra revealed to Avalokiteśvara in the pure land of Sukhāvatī. In essence, it is a dhāraṇī centered on twelve epithets of the goddess of wealth and a short ritual instruction concerning its recitation. The spell is said to provide protection, wealth, and good social standing.

Toh 741: The Twelve Names of Śrī Mahādevī

Toh 741: The Twelve Names of the Goddess Śrī

Summary The Twelve Names of the Goddess Śrī is a short text revealed to Avalokiteśvara in the pure land of Sukhāvatī. In essence, it is a dhāraṇī centered on twelve epithets of the goddess of wealth. The spell is said to provide prosperity.