Homage manuscript

This delightful manuscript is a multi scriptural and colourful display which pays homage to His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama bsten 'dzin rgya mtsho བསྟེན་འཛིན་རྒྱ་མཚོ། Perhaps dating from the midd 20th century, the scroll was written and presented by the monastic community at Dongrub Ling below the Himalayan town of Kalimpong, which was the last Indian trading post before Tibet on the historic silk route through to China. 

The coloured canopy ornamentation called sgo Khyim སྒོ་ཁྱིམ་ incorporates the eight auspicious symbols with drapes and tassels, is traditionally placed above important titles and verses, which in this case are composed of four lined poem in praise of the Dalai Lama. These are repeated in five different script styles, which from top to bottom are 

1. Lantsa Sanskrit, 

2. Wartu Sanskrit, 

3. Tibetan Uchen phonetics and 

4. Tibetan translation in a high form of Drutsa script, flanking each side is 

5. the vertical Horyig script that is translated from the Tibetan translation. 

The above image shows the full length of the scroll that the majority script is an Umeh form called Tsugtung or Tsugmakhyug, a quicker hand writing style that is attractively uniformed with long flourished vowel signs.

An enlarged detail of the end of the manuscript shows that certain key words have been inked in red, which is often used to highlight a name of even to string together a hidden sentence of significant meaning relating to the content of the document. 

A book of mantras

A resource for visualising and calligraphy of

Buddhist mantras and seed syllables.

The long awaited print version of the popular Buddhist mantra website: 

visiblemantra.org. 

This is a celebration of the visual forms of mantra and other varieties of sacred speech, drawing on Buddhist traditions from India, China, Japan, and Tibet. 

The book includes all the mantras from the website, plus a few more. Each is presented in four scripts: Siddhaṃ (Bonji 梵字), Lantsa (aka Rañjana), Devanāgarī देवनागरी, and Tibetan དབུ་ཅན།. Plus seed-syllables, dhāraṇī and Pāli chants. All accompanied by Jayarava's meticulously researched notes and comments, and background reading drawn from Jayarava's blog. 

An invaluable resource for Buddhist artists, calligraphers and practitioners.

To buy a copy, please follow the link here.

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The Mani Mantra

The Mani mantra of Avalokiteśvara arranged on a lotus Mandala.
Each of the letters are placed on each petal starting at the bottom
(Easterly quarter) running clock-wise:
oṃ ma ṇi pad me hūṃ 
In the center of the mandala is the seed syllable hri
Copyright Tashi mannox 2018 

"Mani-wood" The famous Hollywood sign adapted by Tashi July 2009.

It is said that on seeing the form of the Mani mantra, to hear the sound of the Mani mantra: oṃ maṇipadme hūṃ is to purify and liberate from the un-enlightened state of ignorance.


The meaning of the Mantra by His Holiness the Dalai Lama:

"It is very good to recite the mantra oṃ ma ṇi pad me hūṃ but while you are doing it, you should be thinking of it's meaning, for the meaning of the six syllables is great and vast. 
The first, oṃ is symbolic of the pure exalted body, speech, and mind of a Buddha. maṇi means jewel, symbolizes the factors of method-the altruistic intention to become enlightened, through compassion and love. padme meaning lotus, symbolizes wisdom. Just as a lotus grows from the mud, but is not sullied by the faults of mud, so wisdom is capable of putting you in a situation of non-contradiction whereas there would be contradiction if you did not have wisdom. ...Purity must be achieved by an indivisible unity of method and wisdom, symbolized by hūṃ which indicates indivisibility...
Thus together these syllables mean that in dependence on the practice of a path which is an indivisible union of method and wisdom, you can transform your impure body, speech, mind into the pure exalted body, speech, mind of a Buddha."

The practice of the Mani mantra and how to integrate pure perception on a spiritual path is explained further here.

In Tibet, whole hillsides are seen as a great opportunity to plot out huge images of the sacred mantra, often with white stones. Such constructions are believed to emanate  blessing across the land, if not as a constant reminder of the mantras sacred and positive meaning.

A enormous Mani mantra in East Tibet.

The mantra was also commonly carved on flat stones and piled up in great heaps that sometimes stretch for a mile or more. As an act of respect, a person would always pass with the mantras on their right, circling clock-wise.

Other such devotional activities, such as hand spinning prayer wheels filled with mantras minutely printed on tight coils of paper, is considered that with a good intention and the act of turning the wheel, the power of the mantra is activated, similarly mantra printed prayer flags utter their prays caught on the wind.

In our modern times the sacred Mani mantra could not be more applicable in meaning and benefit. For the meaning of the Mani mantra is steeped in Loving-kindness and understanding, each of the six syllables purifying and converting negative emotions into wisdom, which is a fundamental basis to our confused state of being, that transformed; can only lead to a happy state of mind.

A modern electric powered prayer wheel,
made by the Father of Tashi: Peter Mannox
precious jewels decorate the rings of the drum
between which the Mani mantra is illuminated
in gold Lantsa Sanskrit lettering.

Our modern world also allows prayer wheels to be driven by electricity. The prayer wheel pictured above, housed at the Samye Ling Temple in Scotland, contains billions of Mantras on micro film. For every one rotation of the wheel; there are seven Mani mantras dedicated to each Human being on the planet, the praying wheel turns continually day and night.

The earliest written version of the Mani mantra is know in the Lantsha and Wartu Sanskrit forms, used by Buddhist monks in India and Tibet in the 11th century.

The mani mantra in the ancient Wartu or Vartu Sanskrit.

© Tashi Mannox 2022

Lantsha Sanskrit Mani mantra.

© Tashi Mannox 2022

The beginning of the Tibetan written language was developed to accommodate the  migration of the Buddhist teachings from India to Tibet. The original Indian manuscripts were scribed in both Lantsha and Wartu, these were fundamental to the Buddhist textual tradition and very much their visual identity. Indeed Lantsha and Wartu is still today considered a sacred and classical written language, which is often upheld; painted and gilded high up on Tibetan temple walls, beams and pillars.

The Mani mantra arranged as a monogram, a very

condensed and convoluted form of

Lantsha Sanskrit called Kutaksyar.

© Tashi Mannox 2022

As the written form of a mantra is considered divine, there was much care and respect when translating Sanskrit to Tibetan. Moreover, most mantras where translated phonetically into Tibetan, maintaing as near correct as possible to the original quality of sound, which is considered integral to the meditation practice they belong to.

The classical Uchen script style is perhaps the most common and recognizable of the Mani mantra in Tibetan, a script style very similar in appearance to Sanskrit to an untrained eye,  so it is somewhat understandable that the Uchen style is often miscalled 'Tibetan Sanskrit'.

The Mani mantra is an early form of Tibetan called High Uchen

© Tashi Mannox 2022

Below follows a list of the Mani mantra in the main Tibetan script styles, these are shown without the traditional 'heading character' the addition of a heading character dose not change the meaning of the mantra, for more explanation on the heading character.

A more standard version of the Mani mantra in the Uchen script.

© Tashi Mannox 2022 

The Mani mantra in a short form called Tsugtung

© Tashi Mannox 2022

A script style derived from East Tibet, Kham, called Petsug or Khamyig

© Tashi Mannox 2022

A more cursive script form called Dru-tsa

© Tashi Mannox 2022

A quick style of hand-writing called Khyug

© Tashi Mannox 2022

The Mani mantra in three scripts,

From left to right:

vertically stacked in Uchen

Horyig seal script

Phags-pa

© Tashi Mannox 2022

The Horyig and Phags-pa scripts are related to Mongolian and where developed for the use of seals across Mongolia Tibet and China. A more in-depth explanation on the Phags-pa script is shown here, and for the Horyig script please click here.

The Mani mantra has in recent times become popular as a tattoo design. Because the mantra is a sacred word, there are advised guidelines as where and where not to place the mantra, this is not only to safe-guard the mantras integrity but also to curb any negative karma to others and ones self in miss-placing the mantra, such as up-side-down or back-to-front.

Many of the above mantras and more are available as high resolution downloadable images from the Tashi Mannox on-line store.

Tibetan script styles

བོད་ཡིག་གཟུགས་ཀྱི་སྐོར།

དབུ་ཅན་དང་དབུ་མེད།

A sample of a woodblock print showing both Uchen and Lantsa Sanskrit, the original script style of the Buddhist manuscripts of India in the 6th century.

Perhaps the most well known Tibetan script style in the West is the classical Uchen script དབུ་ཅན། recognisable by it's distinct angular appearance, especially in the straight heads of the letters that align horizontally; from which the rest of the letter hangs down from.

The name Uchen translates as 'with head', as apposed to another class of Tibetan script styles 'without head' called Umé དབུ་མེད།

དབུ་ཅན།

A page from a Sutra, illuminated in gold hand-painted Uchen lettering on a polished indigo/black stained paper. Traditionally it was considered a meritorious act of reproducing sacred scriptures as well as a way to preserve the 108 volumes of the Buddha’s teachings 'Kangur’ and the 224 volume commentaries 'Tengyur’ to both the ‘Sutras’ and ‘Tantras’. These vast manuscripts were often copied in pure gold ink by highly skilled scribes and held in the monasteries as treasures of veneration and as a symbol of the holy dharma

Historically the Uchen script style was developed to accommodate the translation from Sanskrit and the reproduction of the Buddhist teachings that migrated from India into Tibet around the 7th century A.D.  

As Buddhist literature was commonly reproduced in Tibet as wood block prints, the Uchen script was further adapted to lend its self as a more practical script style for hand carving the wood blocks. Because of this employment of the Uchen script; it is sometimes known as 'block script', which also describes its angular appearance, very much as a result of the nature of wood carving.

Woodblock printing Tibetan manuscripts, this ancient form of printing is still being practiced at the famous printing house in Dege, East Tibet.

Although Uchen is known as the classical script style and has an important role in Tibetan Buddhism, there are far less Tibetans that actually write Uchen. Tibetan handwriting is more practically practiced with the faster cursive Umé class of styles, as apposed to Uchen which takes much more care and time to construct.

"The Four Noble Truths" 

Japanese mineral paint on Bhutanese Tsasho bark fiber paper, 58x80 cm 

Above is a clear example of a hand painted Uchen script, this particular style is a 'high' form of Uchen, used mostly for the head page of illuminated manuscripts, this style derives from a text of the 15th-16th century from the great Tsurphu monastery in central Tibet, famously known as the seat monastery of the Karmapa's.

དབུ་མེད།

There are many different forms of the Umé scripts, when learning Umé there is a specific chronological order, from the more uniformed constructive forms called Tsugring ཚུགས་རིང། meaning long form and Tsugtung ཚུགས་ཐུང་། meaning short form, to the more cursive styles གཤར་མ། of which there is the every-day writing styles of Khyug dri འཁྱུག་བྲིས། meaning nimble writing and Kyug dri རྒྱུགས་བྲིས། meaning quick writing.

There are other intermediate script styles བར་བྲིས། such as Tsugmakhyug ཚུག་མ་འཁྱུག། a sub style between Tsugtung and Khyug yig. Petsug དཔེ་ཚུགས། often used for hand-written texts and books, of which is traditionally associated with different regions of Tibet, such as the Khamyig ཁམས་ཡིག། a script style referring to the Eastern Provence called Kham.

For the more artistic form of calligraphy Drutsa འབྲུ་ཚ། is used, this script style is particularly flamboyant and cursive in style, traditionally used for official documents and titles.

In old Tibet the monasteries where the great power houses of learning, they provided education starting at a young age, a number of schools and universities could be found within the grounds of the larger monasteries, where learning to read and write the Buddhist scriptures was an important part of the monastic education.

ཚུགས་རིང།

The first script style to be mastered is Tsugring or sometimes spelt sugring སུག་རིང། meaning long limb, indicating the distinct character of this script style as long height of the letters.

Much practice with a steady hand is needed to pull the long tails or limbs of the letters to a straight unwavering vertical line. As paper was an expensive commodity in Tibet, young monks practice on slates or black painted wooden pallets called "Jangshing", these are marked with construction lines at the desired proportion, then dusted with chalk.

A bamboo cut pen is then dipped into water, the letters are then marked through the chalk dust, to be practiced over and over re-chalking the pallet each time.

A young Tibetan monk practicing the Tsugring handwriting style, Photograph courtesy of Shannon O'Donnell.

Once the Tsugring script style is mastered, then the student moves onto the next script style of Tsugtung, (a shorter form of Tsugring) accomplishing each style respectfully; until the more quick/swift Khyug script styles are achieved, only then may a student be inclined to learn to write the Uchen style.

Corresponding script styles of the first five letters 
with the four vowel signs of the Tibetan alphabet

Here below is the first part of the Alphabet in the Tsugring script is shown with the construction lines as a guide for neat handwriting and to give the correct letter proportion.

The correct proportion of the Tsugring letters is determined by the thickness of the pen nib, 
this measures as 'one' unit, the main body of the letters is made up of two parts of 4 units, 
totaling 8, the long tails of the letters is a further 11 units.

ཚུགས་ཐུང་།

Tsugtung is similar to Tsugring in style, the main difference is that the letter height is overall shorted.

ཚུག་མ་འཁྱུག།

Tsugmakhyug is a sub script style that sits between Tsugtung and Khyug. It has a less formal appearance, with a more rounded letterform and shorter vowel signs.

དཔེ་ཚུགས།

The next script style is Petsug ,often used for the publication of books, as this script style has a distinctive short angular style with short vowel signs, this means that the lines of text can be placed closer together. It was commonly used in the Kham Province of East Tibet, which lends it another name Khamyig, meaning ‘writing of Kham’. 

འབྲུ་ཚ།

Drutsa is the most cursive of the Tibetan script styles, because of this it is used generally for artistic calligraphy. Perhaps more feminine in appearances, the rounded forms of the letters can be exaggerated and flourished to fit all shapes and orientations.

འཁྱུག་བྲིས།

Khyug is known as the quick writing style, used for swiftness needed for normal handwriting. Its cursive form with vowel signs that stand up freely yet joined up to the main body of text, means that a separation of a different colour is not easily possible.

Guru Padma

༄། པདྨ་འབྱུང་གནས་ལ་ན་མོ།

For Tibetans Guru Rinpoche or Padmasambhava in Sanskrit, is regarded as the second Buddha, who historically came to Tibet during the 8th century to transmit Vajrayana Buddhism. At that time Tibetans were known to be wild and unruly, a land to be subdued of its demons. Guru Rinpoche, meaning precious guru, tamed and established Buddhism in Tibet, founding the first monastic community at Samye in central Tibet. This formed the today's oldest tradition called the Nyingma school, which is very much the foundation of the other great schools of Tibetan Buddhism.

As a devotional practice, Guru rinpoche is considered to over-come inner and outer obstacles and therefore furthers ones spiritual progress inwardly and ones outer activity.

Padmasambhava has many names such as Guru Padma and Pema Jungne which mean lotus born. Iconographically he is often depicted seated on a lotus, as above, representing the purity and transformation. His pure land, as much a mind state of liberation, is the place of the copper-coloured Mountain in the North-West part of the sacred realm of Orgyen.

© Tashi Mannox 2022

In the above calligraphy; the mantra of Pema Jungne is shown at the top in a high form of the Tibetan Uchen script, below which is the same mantra in an ancient Lantsha Sanskrit, the original written language from which much of the Buddhist teachings and practices were translated from into Tibetan. The mantra, very much a supplication of the attainment of 'siddhi' and blessing of body speech and mind. In Sanskrit the mantra is pronounced:

oṃ āḥ hūṃ vajra guru padma siddhi hūṃ

The smaller text and as the same in the calligraphy below is known as the 'Seven Line Prayer' of Guru Rinpoche: tsig dun sol deb, this translates as:

hum, to the North-West part of Orgyen, seated in a long stemmed lotus with anthers, such wonder! called lotus born - Pema Jungne, who achieved the highest of spiritual accomplishments and who is accompanied by myriads of Dakinis. I will act according to your example. Please come and grant me your blessing. guru pema siddhi hum.

© Tashi Mannox 2010

Here the seven line prayer has been arranged surrounding the main 'hum' character, the seed syllable of Yidam Pema Jungne. This is a study piece demonstrating the Petsug script style and to work out the layout for the final art piece as shown below. It is often the case when executing a major calligraphy art piece, where a large amount of text needs to fit the confines of a space, the size of the lettering and spacing needs careful consideration and planning.

Tashi adding the finishing touches the multi coloured lotus flower.

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ས་མ་ཡཿ རྒྱ་རྒྱ་རྒྱཿ

☸

Pure Perception

“Sacred Mantra” 73x56 cm Chinese ink and Japanese mineral paint on Heavy watercolour paper, created by © Tashi Mannox 2010 for the III International Exhibition of Calligraphy 2010

The description of the above calligraphy art piece features two main elements of sacred calligraphy:

1. The Mani mantra in the White vertical Phags-pa script:

The neo-Mongolian/Tibetan Phags-pa script was devised as a uniformed style by the Tibetan Lama ‘Blo-gros rGyal-mtshan’, during the regime of the Great Kublai Khan 1260-1294.

Phags-pa was also known as the new Mongolian script called Horyig in Tibetan. This was imperially imposed as a national script of the Mongol empire of the Yuan dynasty 1271-1368 encompassing all of China.

This particular Phags-pa script style used by Tashi to represent the famous Mani mantra of compassion, originates in 1348. This was discovered scribed on stone tablets at Juyonguan in China, located at the nearest section of the Great Wall to Beijing.

Only fragments of this beautiful form of Phags-pa style survives today, great effort and research were made to resurrect the Mani mantra to a correct representation in this rare script style, much due to the guidance of Andrew West, who is an expert in ancient scripts of the Far East.

The Phags-pa script bears some resemblance to Tibetan but differs distinctly in that it is written vertically downwards in columns running from left to right, much like Mongolian. Units are often formed of several characters that are separated by spaces.

From top to bottom the Phags-pa script reads om ma ni pad me hum.

2. The wishing prayer occupies horizontal lines of dark indigo ink in the Tibetan Dru-tsa script style:

Dru-tsa is one of the several U-med script styles, which is traditionally used for more ornamental calligraphy. The cursive form of the characters lends its self well to a more free style calligraphy that can be skilfully expressed in longer elegant tails and vowel signs.

In contrast to the architectural structure of the Phags-pa script, is a wishing prayer to engender a pure perception of our world being a divine heavenly realm, that all beings are the embodiment of loving kindness; the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara and all sounds vibrate the sound of the six-syllable mantra. A full translation of this pure perception prayer is shown below:

Integrating everything into the spiritual path:

Each and every being in this universe is Avalokiteshvara, the embodiment of compassion,

Every sound heard hums the melody of the six sacred syllables,

This very place is truly the Pure Land of Great Bliss,

Devoid of any actual reality, like a magic show, like a dream.

It is as though we had already been reborn there.

As we cultivate “pure perception” with great joy, all veils are cleared.

One should practice “pure perception” in the way explained above.

Translation by Katia Holmes 2010

The blue ‘Utpala’ lotus represents transformation from relative to ultimate; on the open lotus is a white moon disc, which represents stainless purity. Emanating vertically from the seat of the lotus is the Mani mantra. The background of green to blue swirls suggest the water on the pond of Saṃsāra, the ocean of suffering for which compassion and understand is engendered.

oṃ maṇipadme hūṃ

The Mani mantra in 'high' Uchen script style, © Tashi Mannox 2010.

This year the Contemporary Calligraphy Museum hosts The III International Exhibition of Calligraphy 2010 in the historical Russian town of Velikly Novgorod. The main theme of the exhibition is 'Sacred Calligraphy', which the above piece called 'Sacred Mantra', was create by Tashi and donated to the Contemporary Calligraphy Museum especially for this particular calligraphy collection.

The exhibition extravaganza features art pieces of world class calligraphy artists from 43 countries, opens and runs September 10th -12th 2010.

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High Uchen script style on a base of Lapis-lazuli stone effect, this translates as

"(Spontaneously) Sacred Calligraphy". The most precious of Tibetan calligraphy is said to be embossed in gold on tablets of Lapis-lazuli stone, of which this art piece emulates. © Tashi Mannox 2010.

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