Vajrabhairava
(Image)
Thangka, painting
Cotton support with opaque mineral pigments in waterbased (collagen) binder
18.25 x 28.0 inches
Central or Eastern Tibet
Ca. 17th century
Indeterminate style
Museum #: 92.065
By Cathleen Cummings
26 May, 1998
Vajrabhairava is a wrathful manifestation of Manjusri, the Bodhisattva of
Wisdom. His is the enduring, adamantine wisdom of ultimate reality which
triumphs over suffering and death. He is known also as Yamantaka because
he is the conqueror of Yama, the Lord of Death, who appears with the face
of a buffalo. Of Vajrabhairava's nine heads, the central one is that of
the buffalo, symbolic of his defeat over Yama. The top-most head is that
of Manjusri himself. Because of his manifold power Vajrabhairava was called
upon to oppose all enemies of the doctrine, to keep the uninitiated away
from the tantras.
In his thirty-four arms Vajrabhairava bears symbols of the thirty-four elements
of highest enlightenment. In his principal right and left hands he holds
the flaying knife and the kapala, a skull cup filled with blood.
A freshly flayed elephant skin, symbolic of vanquished ignorance, is held
in his upper-most pair of hands. Bluish-black in color, Vajrabhairava stands
in an aura of flame and with the might of his sixteen legs he tramples upon
the enemies of Buddhist doctrine. The garland of freshly severed heads around
his neck is a sign that he has overcome egotistic instincts. Although sometimes
represented as a Solitary Hero, here Vajrabhairava is shown with his consort
Vajravetalia, and their union is the coming together of wisdom and compassion
from which enlightenment is born.
Vajrabhairava is one of the most important transformative deities of the
Gelukpa sect and is especially closely connected with Tsong-kha-pa, the
founder of the Gelukpa lineage who is pictured at the top of this painting.
Surrounding Vajrabhairava are many of the other guardians and protectors
of Buddhism. At top right is Four-Armed Mahakala, and at top left is Grgi-mGonpo,
Mahakala in his form as "protector of the tent." Vajrabhairava
at center is flanked by Manjusri to his right and Vajrapani to his left.
Below the central figure are more wrathful protectors; from viewer's left
to right they are: Six-Armed Mahakala; Palden Lhamo, and Yama with his consort
Yamari. Along the bottom of the painting are four more guardians, Vaisravana,
Pita Jambala, Yon-gyis bdagpo ("the perfection of giving"), and
a fourth two-armed figure identified by inscription as "ltram nag"
("the hard black one"), an obscure form of Mahakala.
References:
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