The One Vehicle as the Key to unlock the meaning of the Heart Sutra

The Lotus Sutra reveals a revolutionary principle: all of the Buddha’s teachings—every doctrine, practice, and realization—are skillful means (upaya) leading to a single destination. The One Vehicle (Skt. ekayana) does not invalidate the provisional teachings that preceded it; rather, it recontextualizes them, revealing their true purpose and illuminating them as aspects of a complete whole. As the Lotus Sutra declares in the “Expedient Means” chapter: “The Buddhas, the World-Honored Ones, wish to open the door of Buddha wisdom to all living beings, to allow them to attain purity. That is why they appear in the world.”

The Three Vehicles—the ways of the shravaka (voice-hearer), pratyekabuddha (solitary realizer), and bodhisattva—are not rejected but gathered up into the One Vehicle, like rivers flowing into an ocean. The Dharma body (dharmakaya) encompasses all partial expressions of truth. Each teaching, given at its appropriate time and place, serves the ultimate purpose of bringing all beings to Buddhahood.

This essay applies this principle of the One Vehicle to understand the Heart Sutra and the broader Prajnaparamita (Perfection of Wisdom) teachings. Rather than viewing the Heart Sutra’s teaching of emptiness as contradicting or superseding the Lotus Sutra’s affirmations of the unborn-undying suchness of reality and universal Buddhahood, I seek to show how the wisdom teachings function as skillful means within the complete dharma. The Heart Sutra’s via negativa—its systematic dismantling of conceptual attachments—prepares consciousness for the Lotus Sutra’s via transformativa—the revelation of what actually is.

From the Lotus perspective, the Perfection of Wisdom teachings serve an essential function: they liberate practitioners from clinging to provisional formulations, from reifying the very teachings meant to free them. The Heart Sutra’s declaration that there is “no attainment” prevents practitioners from grasping at enlightenment as an object to be possessed. Yet this emptiness teaching itself must not become a final resting place. As Zhiyi, founder of the Tiantai school, taught through his doctrine of the Three Truths: emptiness, conventional existence, and the middle way are not three separate realities but three simultaneous aspects of each moment.

What follows, then, is not a critique of the Heart Sutra but an illumination of it—an exploration of how its profound wisdom teaching finds its ultimate meaning when understood within the Lotus Sutra’s revelation of the One Vehicle. We compare these texts historically, textually, philosophically, and practically, concluding with a meditation that brings their insights into lived experience.

HISTORICAL DATING

Lotus Sutra (Saddharma Pundarika Sutra)

The Lotus Sutra was likely composed in India over several stages, with the earliest core portions dating to approximately the 1st century BCE to 1st century CE. Modern scholarship confirms a four-stage compositional theory, though as Stephen F. Teiser and Jacqueline Stone note, there is “consensus about the stages of composition but not about the dating of these strata.” The text shows clear signs of stratification, with Chapter 1 and some later chapters (particularly the “original gateway” chapters 15-28, including the crucial Lifespan chapter) possibly added in the 2nd century CE. Seishi Karashima’s recent refinements of Kogaku Fuse’s influential 1934 four-phase theory focus on distinguishing verse layers from prose additions. The earliest Chinese translation by Dharmaraksha appeared in 286 CE, and Kumarajiva’s definitive translation followed in 406 CE.

Heart Sutra (Prajnaparamitahrdaya)

The Heart Sutra has a far more contested and fascinating dating history. While traditionally attributed to Indian origins, contemporary scholarship increasingly demonstrates it was composed in China, likely in the mid-7th century CE. Jan Nattier’s watershed 1992 research argued it was created as an extract and reworking of the Large Perfection of Wisdom Sutra (Mahaprajnaparamita), possibly by Xuanzang himself or in his circle.

Recent scholarship by Jayarava Attwood (2019-2024) has substantially strengthened Nattier’s hypothesis through exhaustive analysis of 22 points of comparison, many of them new. Attwood has narrowed the provisional dating to 654-656 CE, based on the text’s relationship to Kumarajiva’s translations and evidence from the Fangshan Stele dated to 661 CE. The research demonstrates that two key passages in the Chinese Heart Sutra were copied character-by-character from Kumarajiva’s Chinese translation of the Large Sutra (T 223), and that the Sanskrit Heart Sutra contains distinctive Chinese idioms (such as collective negation of lists using one negative particle) rather than the individual negations typical in Sanskrit Prajnaparamita texts. The Sanskrit also uses non-idiomatic vocabulary like ksaya instead of the standard nirodha for “cessation,” suggesting unfamiliarity with traditional Indian Buddhist terminology.

However, this thesis remains contested. Japanese scholars including Harada Waso, Fukui Fumimasa, and Ishii Kosei continue to reject Nattier’s hypothesis based on historical accounts and manuscript evidence, arguing for an Indian origin. The debate remains active in contemporary Buddhist studies.

If the Chinese composition hypothesis is correct, the Heart Sutra postdates the Lotus Sutra by 600-700 years—a remarkable chronological gap that fundamentally shapes how we understand their relationship.

TEXTUAL PASSAGES COMPARED

On Emptiness and Form:

Heart Sutra: “Form is emptiness, emptiness is form; emptiness is not other than form, form is not other than emptiness.”

Lotus Sutra (Chapter 2, Expedient Means): “The true aspect of all dharmas… Such a reality as this… only a Buddha together with a Buddha can fathom. That is to say, all dharmas consist of such a form, such a nature, such an embodied substance, such a power, such a function, such a cause, such a condition, such an effect, such a recompense, such a beginning-and-end-complete.”

The Heart Sutra’s famous dialectic collapses form and emptiness into identity. The Lotus Sutra instead enumerates the “ten suchnesses” (junyoze), affirming the concrete particularity of phenomena as themselves the expression of ultimate reality.

On Attainment:

Heart Sutra: “No attainment and also no non-attainment… Therefore, because there is no attainment, the bodhisattvas… have no hindrance in their minds.”

Lotus Sutra (Chapter 2): “The Buddhas, the World-Honored Ones, wish to open the door of Buddha wisdom to all living beings… wish to show the Buddha wisdom to living beings… wish to cause living beings to awaken to the Buddha wisdom… wish to induce living beings to enter the path of Buddha wisdom.”

The Heart Sutra negates attainment through the logic of emptiness. The Lotus Sutra affirms the positive reality of awakening and entrance into Buddha wisdom—all beings will attain it.

On Duration and Reality:

Heart Sutra: “No origination, no cessation, no purity, no defilement, no increase, no decrease.”

Lotus Sutra (Chapter 16, Lifespan): “Since I attained Buddhahood, an extremely long period of time has passed… constantly dwelling here preaching the Dharma… Yet the living beings see that after a few kalpas I have entered parinirvana… I appear to enter nirvana, but in truth I do not become extinct.”

The Heart Sutra presents emptiness as timeless negation. The Lotus Sutra presents the Buddha’s unborn-undying nature as a skillful means—he appears to enter extinction but actually abides in the unborn-undying suchness of dharmakaya.

MEANING AND CONTENT

Philosophical Framework:

The Heart Sutra represents the culmination of Prajnaparamita literature, distilling its essential teaching: all dharmas are empty of inherent existence. Its method is via negativa—systematically dismantling the constructs of conventional Buddhist teaching (the five aggregates, twelve sense fields, eighteen elements, Four Noble Truths, even wisdom and attainment). The goal is to liberate consciousness from clinging to any conceptual framework. If the Chinese composition theory is correct, this represents not an Indian innovation but a Chinese distillation and digest (chao jing) of earlier Perfection of Wisdom teachings—a uniquely Chinese contribution to Buddhist philosophy that was then “back-translated” into Sanskrit and accepted as authentic throughout Asia.

The Lotus Sutra, by contrast, is a narrative-philosophical revelation of ultimate meaning through the doctrine of expedient means (upaya). Rather than negating conventional teachings, it reframes them as provisional stages leading to the One Vehicle. Its method is via transformativa—transforming our understanding of what appeared to be final truths into stepping-stones toward something greater.

Soteriology:

The Heart Sutra’s soteriology is implicit: realizing emptiness removes mental hindrances and fear, allowing the bodhisattva to “go beyond.” Its focus is epistemological transformation through wisdom (prajna). Matthew Orsborn’s recent research has clarified that the phrase traditionally rendered “because there is no attainment” (apraptitvat) more accurately reflects the original Large Sutra’s “by means of the yoga of non-apprehension” (anupalambhayogena)—suggesting a meditative state rather than a metaphysical claim about non-existence.

The Lotus Sutra’s soteriology is explicit and universal: all beings without exception will attain Buddhahood. This includes those previously deemed incapable—women, evil persons, disciples of the Two Vehicles. Its focus is ontological transformation through faith and the power of the Buddha’s vow.

Temporal Orientation:

The Heart Sutra operates in a timeless present of non-dual awareness. Past, present, and future are equally empty.

The Lotus Sutra unfolds cosmic time: the Buddha’s original enlightenment lies in the infinite past, his teaching operates throughout limitless time and space, and all beings’ future Buddhahood is assured through the Buddha’s continuous pervasive presence.

Function in Practice:

The Heart Sutra serves as a contemplative text for insight meditation, chanted to cultivate wisdom-consciousness. Its mantra (gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha) functions as a wisdom-seal. Notably, it is “the single most commonly recited, copied, and studied scripture in East Asian Buddhism,” recited across sectarian boundaries—with the significant exceptions of Shin Buddhists and Nichiren Buddhists, who focus on their respective primary texts.

The Lotus Sutra, particularly in the Nichiren tradition, serves as the supreme object of devotion—not merely a text to be understood but reality itself to be enacted through faith and practice. The Odaimoku functions as the crystallization of the Lotus Sutra’s essence.

THE GATE MANTRA AND CHAPTER 14: PROGRESSIVE PRACTICE AS GOING BEYOND

One of the most striking parallels between the Heart Sutra and the Lotus Sutra emerges when we examine the Heart Sutra’s famous concluding mantra through the lens of the Lotus Sutra’s Chapter 14, “Peaceful Practices” (Anrakugyo-hon). This chapter, which appears in the “original gateway” section of the Lotus Sutra, outlines the way of practice for bodhisattvas who propagate the sutra in the difficult age after the Buddha’s passing.

The Heart Sutra’s Mantra:

Gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha

This is traditionally translated as: “Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone completely beyond, to awakening, hail!” The mantra presents a progressive movement through four stages of “going” that culminates in bodhi (awakening).

Chapter 14’s Four Peaceful Practices:

The Lotus Sutra’s Chapter 14 describes four spheres (shi anrakugyo) of bodhisattva practice:

1.        The Peaceful Practice of the Body (shin anrakugyo) - The realm of physical action. The bodhisattva practices patience, avoids places of danger and distraction, and dwells in a place of peace. This is the foundation.

2.        The Peaceful Practice of Speech (ku anrakugyo) - The realm of verbal expression. The bodhisattva refrains from speaking of the faults of other teachings or practitioners, does not name or speak ill of any person, and praises all who practice any form of the dharma.

3.        The Peaceful Practice of Mind (i anrakugyo) - The realm of mental attitude. The bodhisattva views all beings without jealousy or deceit, does not look down on beginning practitioners, and recognizes that all who hear even a single verse of the Lotus Sutra will certainly attain Buddhahood.

4.        The Peaceful Practice of Vows (gogan anrakugyo) - The realm of aspiration. The bodhisattva awakens great compassion for all beings, thinks “These are all future Buddhas,” and vows to teach them the way to supreme enlightenment.

The Structural Parallel:

When we place these side by side, a remarkable correspondence emerges:

Gate (gone) - The Body Practice

The first “gate” corresponds to the foundational practice of establishing correct physical conduct. This is the initial “going”—leaving behind the householder’s life of distraction and establishing oneself in dharma practice. The body is trained, stabilized, made ready.

Gate (gone, repeated) - The Speech Practice

The second “gate”—the repetition emphasizes continuity and deepening—corresponds to the verbal realm. Having established the body in practice, speech is now purified. The practitioner learns to speak without malice, without creating division, without praising self or blaming others. This is a deeper “going” because speech reveals and shapes consciousness.

Paragate (gone beyond) - The Mind Practice

Here the mantra shifts: para means “beyond” or “to the other shore.” This corresponds to the mental practice, where the bodhisattva transcends ordinary discriminating consciousness. Chapter 14 describes this as seeing all beings without jealousy or deceit, recognizing their Buddha-nature. The mind goes beyond conventional judgments to see reality directly. This is the emptiness realization the Heart Sutra points toward—but now understood not as mere negation but as the wisdom that perceives Buddha-nature in all.

Parasamgate (gone completely beyond) - The Vow Practice

Samgate intensifies paragate—“completely beyond,” “gone to the furthest shore.” This corresponds to the arising of the bodhisattva’s great vow. Having purified body, speech, and mind, the practitioner makes the complete commitment: to save all beings, to see all as future Buddhas, to teach the path to supreme enlightenment. This is “completely beyond” because it transcends even the subtle self-concern that might remain in personal practice. The vow places one fully on “the other shore”—committed to universal liberation.

Bodhi svaha (to awakening, hail!) - The Realization of the One Vehicle

The mantra culminates in bodhi (awakening) with svaha (a ritual exclamation meaning “hail!” or “so be it!”). This is the realization toward which Chapter 14’s four practices lead: the complete actualization of Buddhahood, not as a distant goal but as present reality. The four practices, when perfected, are the Buddha’s wisdom manifesting through the practitioner.

The Integration:

From the One Vehicle perspective, the Heart Sutra’s mantra is not merely an incantation but a map of practice. Each “going” represents a stage of transformation:

•          The first two gate establish the foundation (body and speech)

•          Paragate achieves the wisdom of emptiness (mind)

•          Parasamgate perfects the bodhisattva’s compassionate vow (aspiration)

•          Bodhi svaha declares the realization: this very practice-body is Buddha

Chapter 14 of the Lotus Sutra provides the concrete content for what the Heart Sutra’s mantra articulates abstractly. The “going beyond” is not an escape from the world but a progressive transformation of how we engage it—with our bodies, our words, our thoughts, and ultimately our fundamental vow.

Moreover, Chapter 14 makes explicit what the Heart Sutra leaves implicit: this “going beyond” happens in the midst of difficulty. The chapter is specifically addressed to practitioners in the evil age (aku-jiko), when true dharma is attacked and practitioners face persecution. The “peaceful practices” are not withdrawal from struggle but a way of engaging it without being contaminated by hatred, fear, or despair.

The Heart Sutra’s mantra, then, is not merely a statement about metaphysical emptiness. When illuminated by the Lotus Sutra’s teaching, it becomes a practice instruction: cultivate body, speech, mind, and vow through progressive stages, and the “complete going beyond” naturally manifests as awakening. The emptiness the Heart Sutra proclaims is not different from the Buddha-nature the Lotus Sutra reveals—both are realized through this fourfold practice of “going.”

This is why, in the meditation practice concluding this essay, we can chant Namu Myoho Renge Kyo while holding the Heart Sutra’s teaching—because the daimoku itself crystallizes this same progressive practice. Each character corresponds to a stage of realization, and the whole expresses the complete “going beyond” that is simultaneously the manifestation of original enlightenment.

A NOTE ON THEIR RELATIONSHIP

It is striking that so little comparative scholarly work exists examining these two sutras side by side, despite their prominence in East Asian Buddhism. The traditions that emphasize one tend to de-emphasize the other: Zen and Chinese scholastic schools embrace the Heart Sutra’s emptiness teaching; Nichiren and Tiantai traditions focus exclusively on the Lotus Sutra’s universal Buddhahood. This suggests not competition but complementarity—they address different dimensions of Buddhist realization and appeal to different temperaments and practice orientations.

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GUIDED MEDITATION: THE SEVEN CHARACTERS INTERPRETING THE HEART SUTRA

Prepare yourself: sit in a comfortable, stable posture. Let your breathing settle naturally. Bring to mind the image of the seven characters: 南無妙法蓮華經 (Namu Myoho Renge Kyo).

NA (南)

“No eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind…”

Begin with NAM—devotion, bowing, the surrender of the separate self. As the Heart Sutra negates the six sense organs, you release your attachment to perceiving from a fixed position. NAM is the opening, the willingness to let conventional coordinates dissolve. Feel yourself bowing to what is beyond your small self’s knowing.

MU (無)

“No origination, no cessation, no purity, no defilement…”

Rest in MU—nothing, no-thing, the great negation. Here the Heart Sutra’s method becomes explicit: the systematic emptying of all grasping points. MU is not nihilism but the clearing away of false refuges. Every conceptual structure the mind builds to secure itself—gone. MU is the space created by NAM’s bowing, the radical openness that precedes all affirmation. In this boundless “no,” paradoxically, all possibility resides.

MYO (妙)

“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form…”

Opening the heart to MYO—the mystic, the wonderful, the inconceivable. Here is the Heart Sutra’s central dialectic: form and emptiness in non-dual interpenetration. MYO points to this very paradox as wonderful rather than problematic. The mutual identity the Heart Sutra proclaims is not mere logic but the mystic reality of dharma-nature. Rest in the wonder of this impossibility that is nevertheless so.

HO (法)

“All dharmas are marked with emptiness…”

Contemplate HO—dharma, law, reality-as-it-is. The Heart Sutra declares “all dharmas” empty, neither born nor destroyed. HO encompasses both the conventional dharmas the sutra negates and the ultimate Dharma that cannot be grasped. This is the Dharma-body (dharmakaya) beyond all characteristics, yet present as the very “suchness” of each thing. Let your awareness settle into dharma-nature itself.

REN (蓮)

“In emptiness there is no suffering, no origination…”

Visualize REN—the lotus, blooming in muddy water yet unstained. The Heart Sutra offers the Four Noble Truths as emptiness, and then the lotus transforms them. Suffering exists yet is not defiling; the mud of delusion becomes the soil of enlightenment. The lotus grows from the very negations the Heart Sutra proclaims. Your life, with all its difficulty, is the lotus stem rising.

GE (華)

“No ignorance and no ending of ignorance…”

Meditate on GE—the flower, the blossoming, the manifestation. The Heart Sutra negates the twelve links of dependent origination, from ignorance to old-age-and-death. Yet this negation itself is a flowering of understanding. The flower and the fruit appear simultaneously, like the Lotus Sutra’s teaching: cause and effect in one moment. In the recognition that “no ignorance” exists substantially, wisdom flowers immediately.

KYO (經)

“The Prajnaparamita Sutra…”

Rest in KYO—sutra, thread, continuity, teaching. Within the Lotus all sutras find their meaning. The thread runs through all teachings, connecting them. The Heart Sutra’s emptiness teaching is not separate from the Lotus Sutra’s unborn-undying suchness—both manifest the one reality from different angles. Feel the thread of dharma connecting all wisdom teachings.

The Integration

“Gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svaha!”

Chanting Namu Myoho Renge Kyo while holding the Heart Sutra’s teaching in awareness. Each repetition takes you beyond (gate), beyond again (paragate), beyond the beyond (parasamgate). Yet this “going beyond” is not to somewhere else—it is the realization of NA-MU-MYO-HO-REN-GE-KYO as your original nature.

When the Heart Sutra says “no attainment,” the Odaimoku validates this very moment, this very body-mind, is suchness of Dharmakaya. These are not contradictions but complementary doorways: one negates what you think you are, the other affirms what you actually are.

Rest in this: the emptiness of all dharmas is not different from the fullness of the Lotus. The wisdom that sees through all forms is not separate from the compassion that embraces all beings. Form is emptiness—NAM-MU. Emptiness is form—MYO-HO-REN-GE-KYO.

When you conclude your meditation, bow in gratitude. The two sutras, like two wings of one bird, have carried you to this moment of presence.

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———. “In Defence of the Hypothesis that the Heart Sutra was Composed in Chinese: A Response to Harimoto (2019).” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 42 (2019): 9-58.

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———. “What Have We Proven About the Heart Sutra?” Jayarava’s Raves (blog), September 2024. http://jayarava.blogspot.com/2024/09/what-have-we-proven-about-heart-sutra.html.

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