The Cult of Tara

144 MAGIC AND RITUAk IN TIBET
the recitation of special mantras and the performance of hand gestures.
Mantras especially have attracted scholarly attention, and
Gonda 205
has written an excellent article on them. As Malinowsky
says of spells in general, mantras are "a mode of action and an expression
of human will ... a translation of the urge of human desire
into words." 206
But mantras are more than this: they are, as we have
seen, the very speech of the god. As Rosen writes: 20
'
However, the effectiveness of curses and blessings, such as those
of Balaam, does not depend merely on verbal magic, on the belief
that the words uttered are forces let loose in the world for evil or
good. Belief in the effectiveness of such utterances is something
much more complex. They are regarded as efficacious not only
because they are words of power, but because they are held literally
to effect what they signify, because they are embodied activity.
In short, as Dorothy Emmet has suggested, such verbal acts are
in a way "performative utternaces," in which saying is doing.
Thus, for example, a visualization for subjugation is accompanied
by a mantra such as OM KURUKULLE such-and-such a person
VASAM ANAYA HRlH SVAHA ! "OM Kurukulla, lead such-andsuch
a person into my power HRlH SVAHA I" Or the mantra for
the dissolution of oneself or of an object into Emptiness is, as
we have seen, OM SVABHAVA-SUDDHAH SARVA-DHARMAH
SVABHAVA-SUDDHO 'HAM ! "OM Pure of essence are all events,
pure of essence am I!" One of the most widely used of these mantras
of injunction is the 100-syllable mantra of Vajrasattva, which the
practitioner recites during the preliminary practices of his solitary
contemplation, or in the course of a ritual itself (either at the very
beginning or before praying to the deity), to purify all his past sins:
OM VAJRASATTVA SAMAYAM ANUPALAYA VAJRASAT­
TVA TVENOPATISTHA DRDHO ME BHAVA SUTOSYO ME
BHAVA ANURAKTO ME BHAVA SUPOSYO ME BHAVA
SARVA-SIDDHIM ME PRAYACCHA SARVA-KARMA-SUCA
ME CITTAM SREYAH KURU HUM! HA HA HA HA HOH 1
BHAGAVAN SARVA-TATHAGATA-VAJRA MA ME MUKCA
VAJRI-BHAVA MAHASAMAYASATTVA AH 1
"OM Vajrasattva, guard my vows ! Vajrasattva, let them be firm!
Be steadfast for me, be satisfied, be favorable, be nourished forme!
Grant me all the magical attainments! Indicator of all karma:
make glorious my mind HUM ! HA HA HA HA HOH ! Blessed
One, diamond of all the Tathagatas: do not forsake me, make me
diamond 1 Great being of the vow AH !"