The Karma Pakshi Main Page has been updated. Karma Pakshi is well known for being the only Karmapa to have a goatee depicted in art. He has three basic iconographic appearances: [1] Dharma teaching gesture, [2] two hands across the knees, and [3] the right hand holding a vajra and the left a peg (kila).
The Taglung Tangpa Chenpo page has been updated. Tashi Pel (1142-1210) was the founder of Taglung Monastery (1180) in central Tibet, north of Lhasa, the head monastery for the Taglungpa sub-lineage of the Marpa/Dagpo Kagyu School.
A Sarvadurgati Parishodhana Mandala Page has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
The Sarvadurgati Parishodhana Tantra Main Page has been updated with more images and links. There are twelve main mandalas associated with this visually complex Tantra.
The Amitabha/Amitayus Buddha Main Page has been updated. It certainly is the most difficult of the buddha pages to maintain because of the one buddha having two different names and two different appearances that sometimes but not always go with the two meanings of the two different names.
In the Mahayana Tradition of Buddhism a buddha is described as having three bodies: a form body (nirmanakaya), an apparitional body (sambhogakaya) and an ultimate truth body (dharmakaya). Amitabha and Amitayus are the same entity/person, the first is described as the form body (nirmanakaya) and the second the apparitional body (sambhogakaya). The ultimate truth body (dharmakaya) is without visual representation.
A Vairochana Buddha Sculpture Page has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
A Vairochana Buddha Paintings Page has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
Vairochana Buddha can best be understood in three different ways: [1] as the principal character in a number of Buddhist sutras, [2] as a meditational deity used in ritual practices, [3] as a familiar image depicted in early painting and sculpture. Vairochana is also one of the pre-eminent Buddhas in Tantric Buddhism along with Akshobhya and Amitabha. In some Sutra and Tantra explanations Vairochana is seen as a universal form of Shakyamuni Buddha and therefore especially important in the early development and history of Tantric Buddhism.
A Cityscape Selection has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
The Charya Tantra Classification although predominantly following the Kriya system of Three Buddha Families, Tatagata, Padma and Vajra, has very few actual texts and very few deities and mandalas. Not all of the Tibetan Traditions agree on the text titles found under the Charya classification. The Sakya Tradition includes The Manjushri Mulakalpa and Siddhaikavira Tantras as Charya. Most other schools classify those texts as Kriya Tantra.
Amoghasiddhi Buddha has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
Amoghasiddhi Buddha is primarily associated with Vajrayana Buddhism and originates in the Tantric Literature of the Yoga and Anuttarayoga Tantra classes. The sculptural images generally fall into two groups, either as Buddhas with monastic robes and without ornaments known as nirmanakaya appearance or Buddhas in Bodhisattva Appearance with crowns and ornaments and known as sambhogakaya appearance.
The majority or paintings depicting Amoghasiddhi are predominantly understood within the context of dozens or hundreds of surrounding figures. These compositions belong to painting sets of five or more compositions that depict all of the deities described in the mandalas of the Vairochana, Tattvasamgraha or Sarvadurgati Parishodhana Tantras of the Charya and Yoga classifications of Tantric literature.
"Arising in the northern direction is Amoghasiddhi on a garuda, lotus and sun throne; with a body green in colour the right hand in the gesture of giving refuge." (Dragpa Gyaltsen, 1147-1216).
Ratnasambhava Buddha has been added to the Masterworks Main Page.
Ratnasambhava, Buddha: a principal buddha within Vajrayana Buddhism representing the qualities of enlightenment and residing in the southern quarter of a mandala.
"Arising in the southern direction is Ratnasambhava on a horse, lotus and sun throne; with a body yellow in colour the right hand is placed in the mudra of supreme generosity." (Dragpa Gyaltsen, 1147-1216).
Only nine paintings from this set of Twenty-one Taras are currently accounted for. It is however commonly believed that all twenty-one paintings arrived in North America some 20 or 30 years ago.
The set follows the iconography of the Twenty-one Taras according to the system of Dipamkara Atisha. There are at least five different iconographic systems for depicting the Twenty-one Taras with the Atisha and Suryagupta being the two most popular. The set of compositions follow an easy to read formulaic iconographic composition. The center depicts one of the twenty-one forms of Tara. The top left corner of each composition depicts a major meditational deity of the Gelug Tradition. Often the deities are depicted in a simplified version rather than with multiple heads and arms. The top right corner depicts a previous or post incarnation of the Panchen Lama incarnation line, beginning with the 3rd Panchen, Lobzang Palden Yeshe in the first composition. At the bottom of each composition are one, two or three of the major and minor protector deities of the Gelug Tradition.
The Panchen Lamas, closely associated with the monastery of Tashi Lhunpo in Shigatse, are a line of successively re-incarnating teachers in the Gelug Tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. The first Panchen Lama, Lobzang Chokyi Gyaltsen (1570-1662), was a principal teacher of the 5th Dalai Lama, Ngagwang Lobzang Gyatso (1617-1682). Lobzang Chokyi Gyaltsen was also the most important and powerful Gelug teacher of his time. It is believed that the institution of the Dalai Lama, Panchen Lama and the Desi (regent) were a political strategy formulated initially by the 3rd Desi, Sanggye Gyatso (1653-1705), considered by some to be the illegitimate son of the 5h Dalai Lama and the sister of the 2nd Desi.
There are two main differences between the Charya Tantra form of Bhutadamara Vajrapani and the Anuttarayoga form of the deity. First, the Charya iconography has Bhutadamara standing atop an elephant headed Vighnantaka. In the Anuttarayoga iconography he stands atop the wrathful rakshasa headed Aparajita. The principal Charya form of Bhutadamara, also popularized in the Vajravali compendium of Abhayakara Gupta, describes a thirty-three deity mandala. The Anuttarayoga form is a solitary deity without a detailed mandala or any attendant retinue figures.
Occupying a central role in Vajrayana Buddhism, Akshobhya, by some accounts, is Lord of the 2nd of the Five Buddha Families of tantra and found throughout all 4 tantra classifications most notably in the anuttarayoga class. Akshobhya is also mentioned in several Mahayana sutras, the Vimalakirti Nirdesa being the most famous. It was in Abhirati, the pureland of Akshobhya, attainable only by 8th level bodhisattvas, where the famous Tibetan yogi Milarepa and the scholar Sakya Pandita are said to have obtained complete buddhahood.
The Four-armed Lokeshvara (Chaturbhuja) is certainly the most popular and most common form of Avalokiteshvara found in art. As a sub-group amongst the different forms there is also the additional context of the Potalaka Pureland with Lokeshvara seated at the center of the composition.
Potalaka is an island believed to be located somewhere in the Indian ocean off the coast of Western India. In China, Potalaka is found as Puto Island just two hours south of Shanghai. Puto Island was visited in the past by Tibetan teachers such as Karma Pakshi and Zangpo Pal as early as the Yuan period.
The Nartang Monastery Printing House blockprint composition of the Panchen Lama incarnation line was created in the 18th century with 13 prints including the 3rd Panchen Lama in total. It was likely commissioned originally as a painting set in the late 17th or early 18th century first and then adapted to a wood block format. Since the 18th century there have been dozens, if not scores, or hundreds of sets, either directly produced from the wood block prints or painting sets patterned after the block prints. Following the popularity of the prints, in the early 20th century the set was re-produced in Hangzhou, China, as a woven textile set of compositions, easily produced and cheaply sold.
