Setting
Adoration to the Omniscient!
Thus have I heard: At one time the Bhagavat dwelt at Râgagriha, on the hill Gridhrakûta, with a great assembly of Bhikshus and a great assembly of Bodhisattvas. At that time the Bhagavat was absorbed in a meditation, called Gambhirâvasambodha. And at the same time the great Bodhisattva Âryâvalokitesvara, performing his study in the deep Prajñâpâramitâ (perfection of wisdom), thought thus: 'There are the five Skandhas, and these he (the Buddha?) considered as something by nature empty.'
Form is emptiness
Then the venerable Sâriputra, through Buddha's power, thus spoke to the Bodhisattva Âryâvalokitesvara: 'If the son or daughter of a family wishes to perform the study in the deep Prajñâpâramitâ, how is he to be taught?'
On this the great Bodhisattva Âryâvalokitesvara thus spoke to the venerable Sâriputra: 'Whatever son or daughter of a family wishes to perform the study in the deep Prajñâpâramitâ, he must think thus:
There are five Skandhas, and these he considered as by their nature empty. Form is emptiness, and emptiness indeed is form. Emptiness is not different from form, form is not different from emptiness. What is form that is emptiness, what is emptiness that is form. Thus perception, name, conception, and knowledge also are emptiness. Thus, O Sâriputra, all things have the character of emptiness, they have no beginning, no end, they are faultless and not faultless, they are not imperfect and not perfect.'
Negation
'Therefore, O Sâriputra, in this emptiness there is no form, no perception, no name, no concepts, no knowledge. No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind. No form, sound, smell, taste, touch, objects. There is no eye, &c., till we come to there is no mind, no objects, no mind-knowledge. There is no knowledge, no ignorance, no destruction of knowledge, no destruction of ignorance, &c., till we come to there is no decay and death, no destruction of decay and death; there are not the four truths, viz. that there is pain, origin of pain, stoppage of pain, and the path to it. There is no knowledge, no obtaining, no not-obtaining of Nirvâna.'
The bodhisattva's awakening
'Therefore, O Sâriputra, as there is no obtaining (of Nirvâna), a man who has approached the Prajñâpâramitâ of the Bodhisattvas, dwells (for a time) enveloped in consciousness. But when the envelopment of consciousness has been annihilated, then he becomes free of all fear, beyond the reach of change, enjoying final Nirvâna.
All Buddhas of the past, present, and future, after approaching the Prajñâpâramitâ, have awoke to the highest perfect knowledge.'
The mantra
'Therefore one ought to know the great verse of the Prajñâpâramitâ, the verse of the great wisdom, the unsurpassed verse, the peerless verse, which appeases all pain — it is truth, because it is not false — the verse proclaimed in the Prajñâpâramitâ:
Gate gate pâragate pârasamgate bodhi svâhâ.
(O wisdom, gone, gone, gone to the other shore, landed at the other shore, Svâhâ!)'
Thus ends the heart of the Prajñâpâramitâ.