Prajñāpāramitā

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Key Term	Prajñāpāramitā
Hover Popup Choices	Perfection of Wisdom
In Tibetan Script	ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་; ཤེས་ཕྱིན་
Wylie Tibetan Transliteration	shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa; shes phyin
Devanagari Sanskrit Script	प्रज्ञापारमिता
Romanized Sanskrit	prajñāpāramitā
Chinese Script	般若波羅蜜多
Chinese Pinyin	bōrě bōluómìduō
Japanese Transliteration	hannyaharamitta
Korean Script	반야바라밀다
Korean Transliteration	Banyabaramilda
English Standard	Perfection of Wisdom
Term Type	Noun
Source Language	Sanskrit
Definitions

A class of Mahāyāna sūtras which represents some of the earliest known literature of this genre of Buddhism. There are around forty texts associated with this category, though the most widespread is the exceedingly brief Prajñāpāramitāhṛdayasūtra, popularly known as the Heart Sūtra. This class of literature is typically associated with the second turning of the dharma wheel and especially with the teachings on emptiness (śūnyatā). As such, these texts were the primary scriptural source for the philosophy of the Madhyamaka school.

The six or ten types of practices which lead an individual to Buddhahood. The practice of perfections is particularly important in Mahāyāna Buddhism in which the entire path of the Bodhisattva to reach full enlightenment is included in the six or ten perfections. The six perfections are that of giving, of discipline, patience, zeal, meditation, and wisdom. The perfection of skill-in-means, aspirations, power, and pristine wisdom are added to them to make ten perfections.