I: The Invocation of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas

Reading 1 of 3

[Instructions to the Officiant]: The invoking of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas for assistance, when [any one is] dying, is [thus]:
Offer up to the Trinity whatever actual offerings can be offered [by the dying person, or by his family], together with mentally-created offerings: and, holding in the hand sweet-smelling incense, repeat, with great fervency, the following:
O ye Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, abiding in the Ten Directions, endowed with great compassion, endowed with foreknowledge, endowed with the divine eye, endowed with love, affording protection to sentient beings, condescend through the power of your great compassion to come hither; condescend to accept these offerings actually laid out and mentally created.