Buddhist Protector: Mahakala (Video Transcript)
Buddhist Protector: Mahakala VideosVideo: Mahakala, Buddhist Deity
'The topic is the deity Mahakala. Mahakala is a Sanskrit word, it means the great black one. Kala is black, maha is great. It can also mean, kala, here can also refer to time but generally it's acknowledged as being Great Black One because in the Tibetan language it's translated as 'nagpo' which means black. So the Tibetans are taking the name to mean Great Black One.
So, Mahakala has two primary functions, that of a protector deity and then that of a meditational deity of the highest, the fourth level of tantra, classification. So we have two different functions that need to be discussed.
Now in terms of the appearance, Mahakala typically has the Raksha appearance which is what is the foundation, the basis for wrathful appearance in Himalayan art. Of the 11 different types of appearances, Mahakala is typically wrathful. So, Mahakala actually comes out of three basic texts, one is the Fifty Chapter Tantra, another is the Twenty-five Chapter Tantra and then the Eight Chapter Tantra.
There are a number of different forms of Mahakala. Mahakala is not a single entity, he's not a person that appears in different guises of different numbers of faces or different numbers of arms. Mahakala can be an emanation of Akshobhya Buddha, Vajradhara Buddha. He can be an emanation of the tantric cycle that he is linked to such as Panjarnatha Mahakala as the protector form, the wrathful form of Hevajra. Hevajra is a wrathful form of Vajrasattva and coming from Akshobhya Buddha. So it's the same with other cycles like Chakrasamvara where you have the one faced four armed form of Mahakala and he comes out of the wrathful form of the semi-peaceful, semi wrathful Chakrasamvara form functioning as a protector.
So, with this sort of category of this large category of [Mahakala] deities we have really only about six that are most common in art. Panjarnatha Mahakala is one of the common forms, [as is] Chaturbhuja. So, Panjarnatha is one faced two armed. Chaturbhuja is the one faced four armed, Chaturmukha one faced - oh sorry four faced four armed. The Chaturbhuja Mahakala is one face, six armed. Then we have the Bhagavan forms. These have one face two arms and they're most commonly found in Nyingma and also in the Karma Kagyu with [forms such as] Bernagchen. And then we have the Raudrantika forms and often they are found riding on a horse and they wear more clothing than is typical of the standard Indian forms of Mahakala.
So we have these standard six forms and then we have many different variations of them. So, we just need to understand that Mahakala is a category of primarily protector figures, wrathful in appearance, typically black in color, and they are emanations of all different deities. But we can say primarily Vajradhara and Akshobhya and then major Tantric cycle deities after that. So Mahakala is a big subject and it very much has to do, and works very closely with, the different Tantric systems, the early Tantric systems, Hevajra, Guhyasamaja, Chakrasamvara, Tantric systems like that. So that's Mahakala.' (Jeff Watt, September 11th, 2020).
HAR Team [added 12-2023]
