Even as a child I was fascinated by written characters, as if they were sacred symbols. Later, during my research at Kyoto University, I found the original form of one of the Reiki symbols in the Siddham script (Bonji in Japanese), in temples. That became the basis for my master's thesis and my doctoral dissertation. In this article I'd like to give you an overview of where the four classical Reiki symbols come from and what's behind their names.
Seed syllables, kanji and talismans 悉曇
Siddham 悉曇 is an old Indian script in which the Buddhist sutras were written down in Sanskrit. It came to Japan by way of China, where these characters are also called bonji 梵字. Besides working as letters, individual Siddham characters carry a sacred meaning. They're then called seed syllables (Sanskrit: bīja; Japanese: shuji 種子). A seed syllable stands for a Buddha, a Bodhisattva or a protective deity and is regarded as that being's power in written form.
In the West we usually think of a symbol as a stand-in; a heart stands for love, for example. In esoteric Buddhism it works a little differently. There, the seed syllable of a Buddha is so closely tied to that Buddha that it's seen as the Buddha himself. Something similar applies to talismans (Japanese: ofuda 御札), which temples and shrines in Japan still write and consecrate today. The roots of this talisman tradition reach into Daoism, Shugendō, Shintō and Shingon Buddhism.
Of the four classical Reiki symbols, only one goes back directly to a Siddham seed syllable. Two are made of kanji, and one isn't a written character at all.
The four classical symbols 四符
Cho Ku Rei, the power symbol
Cho Ku Rei isn't a Chinese character. It's a spiral with one horizontal and one vertical stroke. Its basic functions in Reiki are strengthening and directing the Reiki force and bringing spiritual forces into matter. The boost comes from bringing the spiritual power into the here and now, very focused, in this exact moment, and combined with the other symbols it sets the direction, for example toward the person in distance Reiki. Many of its applications closely resemble the methods of the mountain ascetics (Japanese: yamabushi), and like them they go back to the Engi shiki, a collection of ritual texts from the Japanese imperial court of the 10th century. More in the article on Cho Ku Rei.
Sei He Ki, correcting habits that cause suffering
Sei He Ki was originally the Siddham seed syllable hrīḥ, which Usui probably altered slightly. This seed syllable stands for two beings of light at once, Amida Nyorai, the Buddha of the Western Paradise, and the thousand-armed Bodhisattva Senju Kannon. What's remarkable is the pronunciation. Sei heki has nothing to do with hrīḥ, and the Japanese reading of the seed syllable is kiriku. But if you write the Japanese sound sei heki in kanji, you get 正癖, "correcting habits that cause suffering." Put simply, the Indian seed syllable was given a Japanese pronunciation that tells you its function in Reiki. More in the article on Sei He Ki.
Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen, the distance symbol
This symbol joins five kanji into a single sign: 本者是正念. It's read in one go with the Buddhist reading, the way mantras and sutras are read in Japanese. The last two characters form the Buddhist word shōnen, which you can sum up as Buddha consciousness. My translation is: "The true nature is right mindfulness." In its shape the symbol resembles a stylized pagoda. More in the article on Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen.
Dai Ko Myo, the master symbol
The master symbol is made of three kanji: dai 大 (great), kō 光 (light) and myō 明 (bright, shining). Inside myō you'll find the sun 日 and the moon 月. In Reiki this symbol stands for the initiations and for awakening a person's Buddha nature. It leads straight to Dainichi Nyorai, the Great Sun Buddha of Shingon. More in the article on Dai Ko Myo.
Why you can't just look up the meaning 辞書
Many people who work with the Reiki symbols have found the five kanji in the distance symbol on their own with a character dictionary. If you've done that detective work, congratulations. But this is also where a trap lies. Each kanji has several meanings, and depending on which ones you pick, you end up with very different sentences. It's a bit like playing the lottery. Without the Buddhist reading and the context the characters come from, it's easy to read something into them that isn't there.
Were the symbols ever secret? 秘
A lot of people receive the symbols with the warning never to show them to anyone, or they'll lose their power. In Japan, though, the symbols were never secret. My own take is that the secrecy came in through Mrs. Takata, who brought Reiki to Hawaii shortly before war broke out between Japan and the United States. Japanese people weren't popular in America at the time, and to keep passing Reiki on and to protect her own life, she did several things, one of which was keeping the symbols secret. She never explained later why she did it.
The master symbol appears thousands of times in Buddhist sutras, the seed syllable Kiriku behind Sei He Ki is on countless pagodas and in almost every cemetery, and the distance symbol is a sentence you can read. The symbols keep working even when other people have seen them. Two decades after my book on the symbols came out, I'm still using them every day, and so is everyone else.
The symbols in Shingon Reiki 真言靈氣
In Shingon Reiki the symbols are practiced together with their background, that is, with the beings of light they stand for. Further along the path there are also initiations into the Siddham characters of great Buddhas and Bodhisattvas that go beyond the four classical symbols. How to actually practice with the symbols and mantras belongs in the initiation and in the community, where you can experience it directly and ask questions.
I've written about the origins of the symbols in detail in my chapters of the German-language Das große Buch der Reiki-Symbole, and you'll find an updated version in my book Reiki in der therapeutischen Praxis. Which of the four symbols has stayed with you the most so far?
Experience the symbols in practice
If you'd like, take a look at which way into Shingon Reiki fits you.
Your path in Shingon Reiki