Visible Mantra book now available: Visualising & Writing Buddhist Mantras

Jayarava, an Order Member based in Cambridge UK, creator of the Triratna News blog and prolific blogger, writes with news of his third book. He says - “I have now published another book - the book of my mantra website.

“Visible Mantra: Visualising and Writing Buddhist Mantras 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. This was originally envisaged as a reference for Order Members for visualising their mantras and seed-syllables, but grew well beyond the initial idea.

“The book includes all the mantras from my Visible Mantra website (www.visiblemantra.org), plus a few more. Each is presented in four scripts: Siddhaṃ (Bonji 梵字), Lantsa (aka Rañjana), Devanāgarī, and Tibetan (dbu can), plus seed-syllables, dhāraṇī and Pāli chants. All are accompanied by meticulously researched notes and comments, and background reading drawn from my blog. It’s an invaluable resource for Buddhist artists, calligraphers and practitioners”.

The book is available on-line via Jayarava's page on Lulu - www.lulu.com/spotlight/VisibleMantraPress

Jayarava’s previous book, of equal interest to members of the Triratna Buddhist Community, is Nāmapada. Also available from Lulu, this is a guide to Sanskrit and Pali names used in the Triratna Buddhist Order and contains definitions and etymologies for almost 500 words and affixes, background on the Sanskrit and Pali languages, and relevant points of grammar and morphology.