21 Taras Short Dharani 108 Times: for Illness, Danger, Disaster, Wish-Granting, Averting War

Tara taught the concise version of the 21 Praises to Tara, as a healing and protection method to the great Lord Atisha. When his life was threatened by disease she appeared to him and told he would be completely cured if he recited the 21 Taras Dharani 10,000 times (the 21 Praises to Tara).
Because Lord Atisha was so weak from illness, and desperate he asked for a condensed practice with equal result.
"ཅེས་བྱ་བ་འདི་ནི་མཉམ་མེད་ཇོ་བོ་རྗེ་སྙེ་ཐང་དུ་བཞུགས་སྐབས་སྐུ་གཟུགས་བསྙུན་ནས་རྗེ་བཙུན་སྒྲོལ་མར་གསོལ་བ་བཏབ་པའི་ཚེ། རྗེ་བཙུན་སྒྲོལ་མ་ཉི་མ་གཅིག་ལ་སྒྲོལ་མའི་བསྟོད་པ་ཁྲི་གཅིག་སྨིན་སྒྲུབ་བྱོས་ཞེས་ལུང་བསྟན་པ་ན། ཇོ་བོ་རྗེས་ཉིན་གཅིག་ལ་མི་འབྱོར་བས་ཐབས་ཅི་ཞིག་འཚལ་ཞེས་ཞུས་པས། དེའི་ལན་དུ་སྒྲོལ་མའི་བསྟོད་པ་ཤིན་ཏུ་བསྡུས་པ་འདི་ཉིད་རྗེ་བཙུན་སྒྲོལ་མ་རང་གིས་དངོས་སུ་གསུངས་པས་བྱིན་རླབས་ཤིན་ཏུ་ཆེ་བ་ཡིན་ནོ།། །།
"When the incomparable Lord Atiśa was staying in Nyethang, he suddenly became quite ill. He supplicated Tārā and requested her intervention. The noble goddess appeared before him and told him that to cure his sickness he must recite the Praise to the Twenty-one Forms of Tārā at least ten-thousand times in a single day. Atiśa replied that it would be impossible for him to do so and asked if there weren't another way. Tārā replied by granting him this extremely concise praise; coming from Tārā herself, this praise is said to be highly blessed." (Lotsawa House)
ARTWORK: Lasha Mutual's artwork is available through her website: https://lashamutual.com/ Please support her wonderful Dharma activities! (Music by Buddha Weekly, see below for music availability)
Lord Atisha was able to recite the shorter praise 10,000 times and was cured. The concise praise is effective even if chanted 3 times, 7 times, 27 times or 108 times as a daily practice, especially in the original Sanskrit language (as presented here.) In times of urgent need — disease, disaster, danger or economic disaster, any circumstance shortening our life (and therefore our Dharma activities) — it is best to continue accumulating daily until you reach at least 1000, and for supremely difficult or mortal circumstances, 10,000 times. It is also a complete practice of Tara’s praise in a concise, easy-to-remember chant. As a lifetime commitment, it is considered supremely powerful to accumulate 1 million recitations.

The concise Dharani to the 21 Taras, also known as the Praise of the Mantra, is only four short lines. It is most effective when chanted in original Sanskrit, which we present here in our chant. (The translated Tibetan versions are available online (text below), and the English version is below in this text.) Here, we chant the Concise Tara Praise Dharani 108 times. For people who are ill, or need protecton, of need fulfilment of wishes, it is recommended to chant at least 7 times, 21 times, 27 times, 108 times of 1008 times. In the case of Lord Atisha, who was in danger of his life, he chanted 10,000 times.

At the beginning of your session, you always chant the prostration praise to Tara once as we’ve done in this video. This is:

Om namo bhagavatyai
āryaśrī ekaviṃśati tārāyai

Then as many times as possible chant the concise mantra, ideally in original Sanskrit (as in the video) while visualizing (if possible) the 21 Taras. Each recitation of the four lines is, according to Tara's teaching (and our faith) the equivalent of the entire 21 Tara's praises:

namas tāre ture vīre
tuttāre bhayanāśini ture
sarvārthade tāre svāhā
kāre namo’stute

In English this is:
Homage to Tara the Swift and Courageous,
You drive away all our fears with TUTTARE,
Saviouress fulfilling all aims with TURE,
With syllables SVAHA, we offer homage.


You recite the initial prostration at least once:
ཨོཾ་རྗེ་བཙུན་འཕགས་མ་སྒྲོལ་མ་ལ་ཕྱག་འཚལ་ལོ། །
om jetsün pakma drolma la chaktsal lo
Oṃ. I submit obeisance to Tārā—she who is both exalted and revered.
then the praise continuously:
The praise in Tibetan is:
ཕྱག་འཚལ་སྒྲོལ་མ་ཏཱ་རེ་དཔའ་མོ། །
chaktsal drolma taré pamo
ཏུཏྟཱ་ར་ཡིས་འཇིགས་ཀུན་སེལ་མ། །
tuttara yi jik kün selma
ཏུ་རེ་དོན་རྣམས་ཐམས་ཅད་སྟེར་མ། །
turé dön nam tamché ter ma
སྭཱ་ཧཱ་ཡི་གེར་བཅས་ལ་རབ་འདུད། །
soha yiger ché la rab dü

MUSIC: by Buddha Weekly, available as 21 Taras Short Dharani on your favorite music streaming platform such as Youtube Music, Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon and others.
In the video the visualization is courtesy of the amazing art of Lasha Mutual.

When pronouncing the Sanskrit, as we have here, when you see the letter ś this is pronounced more or less as in the English “sh”. The plain s is still pronounced as in “s” in English. The syllables are usually pronounced this way:
“a” sounds like “ah”
“i” syllables are pronounced as in in “ee”
“e” is never silent at the end of a word (as in English) but is pronounced as in “eh”. For example Tare is prounouned “tah-reh”.

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