Prayer to Mañjushri

I PROSTRATE TO YOU, Holy Mañjushri, my Lama and Protector, 

Whose intelligence like a dazzling wash of sun

Dissolves the clouds of ignorance and dissipates the two obscurations.

The volumes of scripture pressed close to your heart 

Bespeak your mind’s unmatched knowledge of all things true and their extent.

And your love for beings, like a mother’s for her only child, 

Swells on seeing us tormented by suffering and ignorance 

As we grope our dim way in this spiral of cyclic existence.

I bow down to You, Lord Mañjushri, dispeller of mental darkness,

Whose wisdom frees us from the iron shackles of our former bad deeds,

And whose speech, a treasure of sixty pure qualities, like a dragon’s roar,

Jars this groggy mind astonished from its sleep of mental affliction.

You, who hold your sword aloft to rout the dark of ignorance 

And lay waste the roots of suffering,

Reveal your pristine body with one hundred and twelve marks adorned,

Ornaments of a prince Bodhisattva, 

Sure sign of attainment of the tenth bhumi.

OM AH RA PA TSA NA DHI

May the light of your loving wisdom

Banish forever the gloom of my mental stupor and

Inspire me with quick intelligence and insight to penetrate 

The profundity of the scriptures and their commentaries.

Whenever I wish to see something

Or have questions about the slightest thing, 

May I meet without obstruction

Protector Mañjushri himself.

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Translated from the Tibetan by Vincent Montenegro