불교의 진언에 나타난 음차번역 고찰

A Study on the Translation by Sound in Buddhist Mantra: Nīlakaṇṭha Dhāraṇī (नीलकण्ठ धारनी)

This paper concerns the translation by sound, either transcription or transliteration, which has become ubiquitous in the recent decade, particularly in the field of technology, science, and specialty translation. Traditionally, mantras or dharanis in Buddhist scriptures have been believed by practitioners to have special powers. The mantras, as a language of spiritual expression, require a source-language-oriented translation, which allows only the translation by sound without decoding its meaning. Various kinds of mantras are still used in the Buddhist rituals, of which Nilakantha dharani, Great Compassion Mantra in English is one of the most popular mantras. The translation of Nilakantha dharani is made up of 396 Siddham words, or 78 phrases, which might be the longest and the most popularly recited mantra by the Buddhist circles. Thus it is worth reviewing its translation to Korean, comparing its Chinese version and the Sanskrit version edited by Chandra. As a result, this paper confirms that the sound of the source text is almost perfectly transcribed by the Korean version, in spite of its alternation by the language intrinsic properties.