Vidya-raja ( Skt. विद्याराज Vidyarāja , "Lord of Secret Knowledge"; Chinese Exercise , pinyin : Míngwáng , pall .: Minwan ; jap. 明王 My: -o:) - in Vajrayana, deities protecting intelligent beings from demons. In the Buddhist pantheon are on the third stage, after the buddhas and bodhisattvas . According to Buddhist beliefs, vidya rajas are the wrathful persons of the buddhas and protectors of Buddhism. In particular, the five vidya-rajas are protective manifestations of the five buddhas of higher wisdom [1] . They are usually depicted with angry faces, often have blue skin, many hands, and sometimes several faces or legs. They hold arms in their hands, snakes or flames twine around them.
In the Buddhist school of Shingon, the protectors and wrathful forms of the buddhas of higher wisdom are distributed as follows:
| Trilokavijaya (north, Amoghasiddhi form) | ||
| Yamantaka (west, Amitabha form) | Achalanath (center, form of Vairochana ) | Vajrayxa (east, Akshobhya form) |
| Kundali (south, Ratnasambhava form) |
There are other vidya-rajas, for example, Hayagriva , Ragaraja , Mahamayuri .
Notes
- ↑ Helen Josephine Baroni. The illustrated encyclopedia of Zen Buddhism. - New York: Rosen Pub. Group, 2002. - 100 p. - ISBN 0-8239-2240-5 .
Literature
Brown, Steven T. (2001), Theatricalities of power: the cultural politics of Noh , Stanford University Press , p. 85, ISBN 0-8047-4070-4 , < https://books.google.com/books?id=60YGrJVUrPMC&pg=PA85 >