Glorious Wisdom’s Excellent Qualities – The Praise to Mañjuśrī

Glorious Wisdom’s Excellent Qualities – The Praise to Mañjuśrī

Every school going children in Bhutan will know this prayer to praise the Lord Manjushri who is the embodiment of all the Buddha’ wisdom. We use to pray every morning in the school assembly before the start of school.

The picture below is the painting of Manjushri who is often depicted with his right hand holding a double-edged flaming sword and his left hand holding a lotus flower on which rests the Prajnaparamita the Great Wisdom Sutra. The Sutra on the lotus flower symbolizes wisdom as pure as lotus. The sword represents the sharpness of wisdom that to cut through illusion. 

Homage to the Lord Mañjughoṣa!

Your wisdom is brilliant and pure like the sun, free from the clouds of the two obscurations.

You perceive the whole of reality, exactly as it is, and so hold the book of Transcendental Wisdom at your heart.

You look upon all beings imprisoned within saṃsāra, enshrouded by the thick darkness of ignorance and tormented by suffering,

With the love of a mother for her only child. Your enlightened speech, endowed with sixty melodious tones,

Like the thundering roar of a dragon awakens us from the sleep of destructive emotions and frees us from the chains of karma.

Dispelling the darkness of ignorance, you wield the sword of wisdom to cut through all our suffering.

Pure from the very beginning, you have reached the end of the ten bhūmis and perfected all enlightened qualities. Foremost of the Buddha’s heirs,

Your body is adorned with the hundred and twelve marks of enlightenment. To Mañjughoṣa, the ‘Gentle-voiced’, I prostrate, and pray: dispel the darkness from my mind!

Arapacanadhi – Heart Mantra of Manjushri