Derge Kangyur/Tengyur e-text, Esukhia/Barom edition — public domain (mechanical reproduction)
This short liturgical text, titled The Eight-Line Praise of the Glorious Mahākāla, functions as a devotional invocation of the wrathful deity Mahākāla. The text employs a structure based on the association of specific seed syllables (mantras) with the deity's actions and attributes. It depicts Mahākāla as a dark blue, fierce being adorned with human remains, who utilizes sonic power to subdue negative forces and protect practitioners. The work argues for the deity's dual nature: while he appears terrifying and causes affliction to the three realms, his actions are governed by compassion, specifically in the capture and protection of those requiring spiritual training. By reciting these verses, the reader commits to a practice of invoking a protector deity to remove obstacles and enforce spiritual discipline through the power of mantra and wrathful manifestation.
Provenance
About this text
A eulogy in praise of the deity Mahākāla, the Śrīmahākālasyāṣṭapadastotra is attributed to the Indian author Nāgārjuna. Preserved in the classical Tibetan tradition, the work appears in the Tengyur, volume ཤ, where it extends over two pages and is categorized within the Other Wisdom Tantras. In the Tibetan language, it is known as the dpal nag po chen po'i bstod pa rkang pa brgyad pa. The work enacts a devotional invocation of a wrathful protector, utilizing a structure that associates specific seed syllables with the deity's attributes and actions. It depicts Mahākāla as a dark blue being adorned with human remains who employs sonic power to subdue negative forces and protect practitioners. The text argues for the deity's dual nature, presenting a figure who causes affliction to the three realms while simultaneously employing a lasso of compassion to protect those requiring spiritual training. A scholar or serious reader consults this text today to examine the use of mantra and wrathful manifestation in the pursuit of peerless intelligence and the removal of spiritual obstacles.
Cite thisAnuvāda, “A Praise of the Glorious Mahākāla in Eight Verses” (Toh 1773), machine draft, 2026.https://naxiai.com/tibetan/works/toh1773
Summary & commentary
Significance
The work is significant as an example of the protector cults within Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, illustrating the use of wrathful imagery to represent the transmutation of aggression into compassion. For the modern reader, it provides insight into the role of seed syllables in ritual performance and the specific iconography of the Dharmapala tradition.
Structure
Passages
Section
Description
1-3
Invocation and Description
The text opens with titles and homage, followed by a description of Mahākāla's appearance, his use of mantras to subdue the wicked, and his role as a compassionate protector.
Themes
Wrathful Iconography (2)
Mantra and Sonic Power (1-3)
Compassionate Protection (3)
Summary, significance and provenance note generated by gemma4:31b from the translation and the catalogue record.
AnuvādaA Praise of the Glorious Mahākāla in Eight Verses·
In the language of India: Śrīmahākālāṣṭapadastotra-nāma. In the language of Tibet: Dpal nag po chen po’i bstod pa rkang pa brgyad pa zhes bya ba (The Eight-Line Praise of the Glorious Mahākāla). Homage to the glorious Mahākāla! Oṃ, may it be accomplished!
Hūṃ hūṃ phaṭ! With this fierce sound, you are able to fill the entirety of the three realms without exception. Ha ha ṭa ṭa! Uttering these, you constantly strike great terror into the hosts of Māra. Kaṃ kaṃ kaṃ! Adorned with a garland of skulls upon your head, your body is like the black beak of a crow.
Brūṃ brūṃ brūṃ! With the supreme frown of a wrathful one, you strike fear with your terrifying, gaping mouth as you devour flesh. Your hair and beard are intensely yellow; O Protector of the Field, may you grant us protection!
Raṃ raṃ raṃ! Your red eyes flash and roll; krūṃ krūṃ krūṃ! You gaze with eyes that resound. Your eyebrows are yellow and your fangs bared; O Protector of the Field who delights in a corpse-seat, may you protect the field!
Ha ha hūṃ and kīli kīli! Uttering these, your left hand holds a skull-cup together with a khaṭvāṅga. Ru ru ru! Holding a stream of flowing blood in your hand, you delight in drinking it. Khaṃ khaṃ khaṃ! With your fierce right hand, you sport with a curved knife and a sword against the obstructors. Ḍaṃ ḍaṃ ḍaṃ! O Protector of the Field together with your retinue, who subdues with this ḍamaru, protect us!
Extremely fierce, your terrifying body is adorned with a garland of heads, resembling Yama.
Seizing the wicked who roar with the force of patience, uttering "kṣāṃ kṣāṃ kṣāṃ," you alone trample the manifold; you who utter "ka ka ha ha" are the color of a dark blue rain cloud. Your body is completely adorned with ornaments of human flesh and entrails, which you consume in your mouth. With fierce hands, you seize the entire host of bhūtas and vetālas—those with desirable forms and those with hideous forms—and swiftly slay them, drinking the streams of blood flowing from their heads.
With the mantra-speech "hrīṃ kṣuṃ śrīṃ," you utterly incinerate obstacles with the mantra "paca paca." In your play, you dispel play; you, the Field Protector, guard the lake filled with men. Residing in the midst of a great mass of fire that moves individually, uttering "pheṃ pheṃ phaṭ," you protect the embodied ones of the families and certainly guard the fields of practitioners. Day by day, you destroy the obstacles and sins of cattle, attaining the stainless like the sun in water.
Uttering "caṃ caṃ caṃ," you illuminate the world with marvelous light through the power of fierce differentiation. Uttering "kraṃ kraṃ kraṃ," by your departure, you certainly destroy the enemies and the afflictions. Uttering "saṃ saṃ saṃ," you who are the nature of the assembly, the Field Protector who upholds the samaya and the ears, protect us! Uttering "baṃ baṃ baṃ," you who move like Yama, look upon the manifold like stainless water. Uttering "yaṃ yaṃ yaṃ," you who move swiftly with the force of wind, know the afflictions that harm the world.
With the sounds "Kliṃ Kliṃ Kliṃ," you take the form of a fierce being who causes the three realms to be afflicted throughout day and night. With the sounds "Paṃ Paṃ Paṃ," you capture the animals with the lasso of compassion and protect those to be trained with your hands. Lord of Mantras, you who possess a mantra-body, you grant the fruit of peerless intelligence to the mantra-practitioners of the heart. O protector of the realms, may you protect the bodies of all wandering beings without exception for a long time.
Any practitioner or master who, possessing intelligence and power, recites these eight mantras during the three sessions of the day will become endowed with merit. They will attain long life, glory, fame, wealth, and increasing splendor, as well as peerlessness. Furthermore, the hosts of obstacles upon the earth and even in the higher realms will be perpetually diminished.
The "Eight-Line Praise to the Glorious Mahākāla," composed by the master Ārya Nāgārjuna, is hereby complete.
Translation status: Not among 84000's published translations, and not in progress there. Translations published elsewhere have not been searched for, so one may exist. (source: 84000 catalogue + registry; checked 2026-11-10).
Set in Newsreader and EB Garamond; Tibetan in Noto Serif Tibetan; Chinese in Noto Serif SC.