His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama: Supplication removing all sorrow from the world Prayer to the Eight Medicine Buddhas

(The Protectors [of beings] of great degeneration)

1. You who, having perfected all that is to be realized or abandoned, excellently teach dependent arising and fondly love the wretched migrators of great degenerations;

I respectfully bow to You, O Blessed One, King of Shakyas (1)!

2. I reverently bow to you, O Assembly of Sugatas, the Medicine Buddhas:

At the feet of the glorious King of an excellent name (Tsenlek) (2), and to the King of Melodious Voice (Drayang Gyalpo) (3), and at the feet of the Sugata Pure Gold (Serzang) (4), and of the Sorrow-less Sugata (Nya-ngan-Mechok) (5) and of the Sugata Proclaimer of Dharma (6), at the feet of the Omniscient King (7) and of the King of Lapis-lazuli (8).

3. To the Dharma – which is the actual Supreme Refuge, the true cessation and the true paths of the three vehicles,

The remedy pacifying the chronic disease of true suffering and the true origin of trans-migrators; the supreme lamp dispelling the darkness of ignorance, I respectfully prostrate with my three doors at all times.

4. I take refuge, prostrate and offer praise

To the Sangha of Aryas and ordinary beings In the ten direction, to Manjushree, Kyab-drol and so forth

As well as to all objects worthy of homage.

5. You, the Assembly of the eight Medicine Buddhas,

Today by virtue of my and other’s sorrowful and respectful mind [And by] the great power of [your] generation of mind Wishing for the benefit of trans-migrators of great degeneration,

Do what you can so that what I am supplicating for becomes true!

6. Both myself and others, seeing that, although equally wishing to be rid of misery,

Not knowing its cause, we constantly and unceasingly run

Only towards misery’s cause itself, [I pray]:

Eliminate the problems [of this time] of degeneration and their causes!

7. You, having removed all kinds of different unfavourable conditions, Which cause damage in the three realms of the world and rise up as billows from the sea,

May all of us always live a life supported by Dharma, in wealth, virtue and happiness, Having left not even the name of [those unfavourable conditions]..

8. Bestow [on us] your blessings so that all diseases caused by the power of karma and mental afflictions in general, as well as by the lack of physical and mental conscientiousness, Unprecedented illnesses, [brought about] by the disorder of the elements and the name of which, when merely heard, generates fear and anxiety,

Thoroughly disappear.

9. [We] having obtained bodies endowed with [the 8] leisure and [the10] opportunities as well as all [favourable] conditions in order for the Path of the Supreme Vehicle to ripen correctly in our mental continuum,

Bestow [on us] your blessings so that the two aims

Of all migrators [ourselves and others] In all of our lives be spontaneously accomplished.

LONG MANTRA Om namo bhagavate vajrasara pramardane/ tathāgatāya / arhate samyaksambuddhāya / tadyathā /om vajre vajre mahā vajre / mahā teja vajre / mahā vidyā vajre / mahā bodhicitta vajre/ mahā bodhi mandopa / samkramana vajre / sarva karma avarana vishodhana vajre swaha

SHORT MANTRA Tadyatha om bhaişajye bhaişajye bhaişajya-samudgate swaha 10. I entreat You: by the force of our praise and supplication prayers to You, Wherever we and others reside, May Dharma and all auspiciousness increase And illness, destitution, conflict and fighting be pacified.

Colophon “I, the Buddhist monk Tenzin Gyatso, have composed this prayer according to/following the request by Ngawang Thekciok—ex-abbot of Sera Mey’s Gyalrong College, who is endowed with a sincere and steady faith and, having perfected his studies, diligently commits himself to practice and also, I myself have seen that in the present situation there was benefit and good reason to do that.

This prayer has been completed in the auspicious 15th day of the tenth month of Wood Monkey 2131 (Tibetan Year), corresponding to 26th of November 2004.”

Translated in Dharmasala, from Italian into English, in April 2017, by Getsul-ma Tenzin Oejung, on the basis of the previous translation from Tibetan into Italian by Mariateresa Bianca. English edit by Margot Jarrett.