Sutras have both a generic and a specific title. The generic title is simply "Sutra", while the specific title distinguishes one sutra from another. The Heart of Prajna Paramita Sutra is the specific title of this sutra. "Prajna Paramita" is the dharma, "Heart" is the analogy, "Sutra" is the sutra. The Heart of Prajna Paramita is the heart within the heart. No other sutra in the Prajna Division has this name. I have already explained the specific title, the Heart of Prajna Paramita, by an eight-line verse. Now the word "Sutra" will be fully explained.

What is a sutra? A sutra is defined as "path", the path necessarily passed through in cultivation of the Way. If you wish to cultivate, you must move along that path; if you don't want to cultivate, following it is unnecessary. But, if you do want to cultivate, "Sutra" is the path you must take. Now, if people don't walk on a path, it becomes wild and overgrown with vegetation. For example, you may have been able to recite the Heart of Prajna Paramita Sutra without referring to a text, but then four or five months pass without your reciting it, and you forget it. That forgetting is the path becoming overgrown. However, if you walk the path, if you cultivate the Way, then it won't become overgrown, but every day will become smoother and brighter. 

What is the benefit of reciting sutras? Reciting sutras doesn't yield any benefits. You waste a lot of time and use a lot of energy to recite a sutra. For instance, what is gained by reciting the Heart Sutra in front of the Buddha? You read it from beginning to end, waste energy, spirit, and time, but don't see any return from it. Ah, cultivators, don't be so stupid! The benefits which you can see are not real; all appearances are empty and false. To grasp at a form, at what you can see, is not a benefit. That is why reciting sutras isn't beneficial.

Don't search for benefits. Recite the sutra once and your own nature is cleaned once. When you recite the Heart Sutra once, you have the feeling that you understand a little of its meaning; recite it twice or three times, and each time you understand a little more. Reciting sutras helps the wisdom of your own nature to grow. How much? You can't see it; nevertheless, you can have a kind of feeling about it. Therefore, it is not possible to talk about the benefits of reciting sutras.

Moreover, each time you recite the sutra your afflictions decrease. You shouldn't get upset during recitation by thinking, "You over there, you recited it wrong. You recited it too fast; I can't keep up with you. The sounds that you make when you recite are really unpleasant, so I don't like to listen to it." No, don't waste your effort in those directions. When reciting sutras or mantras, everyone should chant together. It isn't necessary for everyone to know the language the sutra is being recited in; but able to read the sutra or not, everyone should recite along together. For everyone to practice together, though, doesn't mean your looking for my faults, and my looking for your faults. If there are really faults, everyone should find them. And if you yourself don't find your own faults because they are too big, then your cultivation will not be attuned to receive a response.

Reciting sutras is a great help to one's own nature in developing wisdom. Reciting the Diamond Sutra develops wisdom; reciting the Heart Sutra develops even more wisdom. You say that there aren't any benefits gained from reciting sutras, yet the benefits are very great. It's just that you don't see them. You don't see them? Then they are real benefits. Anything that you can see is just the skin.

The word "sutra" has four other meanings: that which strings together; that which attracts; that which is permanent; and a method. "Stringing together" refers to the connecting of all the meanings which were spoken to make a sutra, as if a piece of thread were used to string them together.

A sutra "attracts" in that it can make use of opportunities for the transformation of sentient beings. This particular sutra is capable of responding to the causal opportunities of all sentient beings and of giving each a medicine to cure that being's own particular disease. Just as a strong magnet can attract iron from a great distance, a sutra, like a magnet, draws in all sentient beings. We sentient beings are like iron, hard and stubborn, with large tempers and many faults. But as soon as we are pulled into the magnet, we begin to be slowly softened so that our faults fall away. That is the meaning of "that which attracts".

A sutra is "permanent" because it is eternally unchanging dharma, and has neither beginning nor end. Not one word can be omitted from or added to a sutra; thus it is eternal. In ancient times and in the present, living beings have cultivated and will continue to cultivate according to this sutra.

A sutra is a "method" followed in cultivation of the Way. In the three periods of time, past, present, and future, one cultivates according to this Dharma. What is honored in the three periods of time alike is called the method. What is unchanging in the past and present is called the permanent.

Sutra also has the meaning of a marking-line. In ancient China carpenters used a tool called the ink-cup and line. It consisted of a string which was inked black. When the carpenters wanted to be sure that their construction was straight and true, they would stretch the string out, pull it back, and snap it to, in order to make a straight black guideline.

To sum up, a sutra is a set of rules. To recite sutras is to follow the rules. If you don't recite sutras, then you don't follow the rules. Since you are now studying prajna, you certainly should respect the rules of prajna. If you do, you will certainly develop your wisdom.

I have spoken in general about the title of the sutra, and now I will talk about the translator. For everything we understand of this sutra, we should give great thanks to the translator. If he had never existed, we should be unable to see the sutra or even to hear its name. If that were the case, how would we be able to cultivate according to the methods prescribed in it? It would be impossible to find its path of cultivation. Therefore, we should thank the person who translated the sutra, since from that time up to the present moment, every generation has benefited from his compassionate teaching and transforming. It follows that the merit derived from translating sutras is inconceivably great.