Himalayan Art Resources

Item: Mandala of Hevajra (Buddhist Deity)

ཀྱེ་རྡོ་རྗེ། ནང་ལྷ། 喜金刚(佛教本尊)
(item no. 31209)
Origin Location Tibet
Date Range 1300 - 1399
Lineages Sakya and Buddhist
Material Ground Mineral Pigment on Cotton
Collection Private
Notes about the Central Figure

Classification: Deity

Interpretation / Description

Hevajra Mandala (Shalu Monastery).

Vajravidarana is a male meditational deity. He can appear as white and peaceful, green and semi-peaceful/semi-wrathful, or blue and wrathful. Four different forms are found in the Kriya classification of Tantra and one wrathful form with a seventy-five deity mandala in the anuttarayoga classification of Tantra.

Although a meditational deity, Vajravidarana is very much a deity of purification and belongs to the group known as the Five Cleansing Deities. The form with a Seventy-five Deity Mandala is also included as a branch initiation and practice in the Margapala (Lamdre) Tradition of the Sakyas.

The principal attribute of Vajravidarana is a double vajra held in the right hand. In peaceful form, Vajravidarana is almost identical in appearance with the meditational deity Vajrasattva. The two deities are differentiated by the double or single vajra and in painting by the colour of the body. Vajravidarana is often depicted with three eyes while Vajrasattva generally has only two.

Jeff Watt [image added 2-2012]

Related Items
Thematic Sets
Collection: Tamashige Tibet Collection
Buddhist Deity: Hevajra Main Page
Buddhist Deity: Hevajra Mandalas
Collection of Tamashige (Mandala Paintings)
Buddhist Deity: Hevajra & Ten Wrathful Ones