Literary references

The starting point of all the later-developed traditions of the Buddha was the great Buddha myth. The early idea of a series of buddhas in time, first 7 and later 24, soon allowed for the idea of a future buddha Maitreya, whose cult became popular throughout the Buddhist world. Next came the tendency to focus attention on other buddhas in buddha lands distributed through endless space.

In the Indian context the most important of the new buddhas that came to be recognized were gradually systematized into a set of five Celestial or Dhyani Buddhas. The buddha who was usually placed at the centre of the group was Vairochana, the Illuminator, the universal sage or chakravartin buddha. He is often depicted using the gesture of preaching or by the symbol of the wheel of dharma. The buddha of the east, Akshobhya (the Imperturbable), is iconographically associated with Shakyamuni in the “earth-witness” posture. The cult of the Imperturbable buddha probably derives from the cult at Bodh Gaya, the historical place of the Buddha’s enlightenment. The buddha of the south was Ratnasambhava, the Jewel-Born, who represents the Buddha’s selfless giving, indicated by the gesture of giving gifts—right hand open, pointing outward and downward. Amitabha was the buddha of the western paradise, around whom an important devotional cult developed. The buddha of the north was Amoghasiddhi, “Infallible Success,” who represents the Buddha’s miraculous power to save, indicated by the hand gesture of giving protection—right hand raised, palm outward and pointing upward. These five celestial buddhas seem—in the early stages of their development—to have been celestial manifestations of various aspects of Shakyamuni.

Two of these buddhas developed an important mythology and cult of their own quite apart from their role in the group of five Dhyani Buddhas. The first of these was Amitabha, the great buddha who presided over the western paradise and became the central figure in the traditions of Pure Land Buddhism. The Pure Land tradition, which probably began in northwestern India about the beginning of the Common Era, was most successful in China and Japan, where it became the dominant Buddhist tradition. The second of the five great buddha figures with a very important independent history was Vairochana. This “central” buddha developed an important role throughout the Buddhist world and emerged as the central buddha figure in the Vajrayana traditions of Japan, particularly Shingon.

The Dhyani Buddhas prepared the way for the psychophysical theories of the tantras. The five were associated with the centre and four compass points, namely, the macrocosm, conceived as a unity of the Five Great Elements. They were also identified with the microcosm of the human personality understood in terms of the Five Components (skandhas)—rupa (materiality or form), vedana (feelings of pleasure or pain or the absence of either), samjna (cognitive perception), samskara (the forces that condition the psychic activity of an individual), and vijnana (consciousness)—and with the Five Great Evils (ignorance, wrath, desire, malignity, and envy), typifying normal phenomenal existence. At this stage mythology and psychological symbolization are inextricably bound together.

In the tantras, Buddhist mythology overlapped with Hindu mythology. Akshobhya, for example, acquires a fierce Tantric form that is reminiscent of the fierce form of the Hindu god Shiva; in this form he became known by the Buddhist names Heruka, Hevajra, or Samvara. He is known in Japan in this guise as Fudō (“Imperturbable”). The Indian god Bhairava, a fierce bull-headed divinity, was adopted by Tantric Buddhists as Vajrabhairava. Also called Yamantaka (“Slayer of Death”) and identified as the fierce expression of the gentle Manjushri, he was accorded quasi-buddha rank.

The bodhisattvas also developed manifold forms. Maitreya, the buddha-yet-to-come, was already known prior to the beginning of the Common Era and became the focus of a major devotional cult that spread across Asia. This early cult seems to have prepared the way for the Pure Land traditions involving Amitabha, which gradually superseded it. From the 1st century ce onward, a number of other celestial bodhisattvas were recognized, and cults of various kinds developed around them. Bodhisattvas who became popular included Manjughosha (“Gentle Voice”) or Manjushri (“Glorious Gentle One”), the representative of divine wisdom, and Vajrapani, “the one who wields the ritual thunderbolt [vajra]” and who, as lord of yakshas (a class of local Indian divinities), entered the pantheon as a great protector.

Avalokiteshvara, the lord of compassion, first appeared in India and subsequently became an important figure in virtually every Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhist tradition. He was recognized as the great patron of Tibet, who is believed to reincarnate in each of the Dalai Lamas. As Guanyin in China, Kannon in Japan, and Kwanseium in Korea, this bodhisattva coalesced with his feminine counterpart, Tara, and became a kindly madonna.

The bodhisattva Kshitigarbha (“Womb of the Earth”), who had hardly any significance in India, Nepal, or Tibet, attracted a cult as lord of the underworld in Central Asia. Kshitigarbha and his cult spread to China and other areas of eastern Asia. Known as Dizang in Chinese and Jizō in Japanese, he is lord of hell and therefore became the central figure in important and popular after-death liturgies.

Art and archaeology

It is mainly from artistic and archaeological remains that scholars have been able to trace the remarkable spread of Mahayana Buddhist mythology throughout Asia from the 1st century ce onward. The main points of departure for this mythology were northwestern India and the Bay of Bengal, especially the port of Tamralipti. Early Mahayana developments also affected South India, Sri Lanka, and Southeast Asia.

In India itself Bihar and Bengal remained Buddhist, largely late Mahayana and Vajrayana, until the 13th century. In Java and Sumatra there is iconographic evidence of the popularity of the buddhas, bodhisattvas, and fierce quasi-buddha figures mentioned above. There are even traces in Myanmar, Thailand, and Cambodia of images and paintings of late Mahayana and Vajrayana divinities. In Southeast Asia the island of Bali retains a living but mixed Hindu-Vajrayana Buddhist culture.

Paintings and figures unearthed during the 20th century in Central Asia (Chinese Turkistan) revealed the manner in which Buddhist architecture, iconography, and painting passed from northwestern India to China and East Asia. Especially important are the paintings of buddhas and bodhisattvas in the caves of Dunhuang (4th to 10th century ce). These paintings reveal the popularity in China, Japan, and Korea of Amitabha-Amitayus, Vairochana, Maitreya, Manjushri, Kshitigarbha, and Avalokiteshvara (as the goddess Guanyin).

The main repository of Indian Mahayana and Vajrayana iconographic traditions is Tibet, where Buddhism was introduced from the 8th to the 13th century. Until the communist takeover of 1959, the Tibetans preserved and developed Indian (Pala) styles of iconography. They also preserved ancient techniques and styles of Indian Buddhist painting that were modified and enriched in some schools by much later influence from China.

Mythic figures in the Three Worlds cosmology

In the early Buddhist tradition, Gautama is represented as denying the importance of questions concerning the nature of the universe. It was enough to realize that normal existence consists of a process of continual birth, death, and rebirth, a process from which, by following the path the Buddha discovered, one might achieve release. If the early texts are correct, however, such an ordinance did not prevent the Buddha, and certainly did not prevent his followers, from accepting the general cosmological beliefs of the time, modified by conclusions drawn from the Buddha’s own teachings.

The cosmology, as it was systematized in the Buddhist tradition, included an infinite number of cosmos, all of which have the same structure. Each cosmos has three different realms, each of which is within the confines of samsara (the ongoing cycle of birth, death, and rebirth) and is regulated more or less strictly by the law of karma, according to which good and pious deeds are rewarded while evil and impious deeds are punished.

At the top of the cosmos is the arupa-loka (Pali and Sanskrit: “realm of formlessness”), in which the most-exalted brahma deities live and in which there are neither material qualities nor mythological activity. The brahma deities who are associated with the next-lower level, called rupa-loka (Pali and Sanskrit: “realm of material form”), do have a role in Buddhist mythology, particularly in the cosmogony through which the lower strata of the cosmos are restored after the eschatological cataclysms that periodically destroy them. According to an influential version of the primary creation myth, found in the Agganna-sutta, certain brahma deities whose abode was above the destruction begin—as the waters that are left from the old cataclysm start to coagulate below them—to savour the taste of the matter that constitutes these lower strata. As the strata take form, these brahma deities gradually descend into the lower realms and eventually become the first inhabitants of the new earth, from whom all humans descend.

Below the realms of the brahma deities is the kama-loka (Pali and Sanskrit: “the realm of desire”). This realm includes a set of six gatis (“destinies”) that have played an important role as a setting for mythology in virtually all Buddhist traditions in Asia. The highest of these six destinies is that of the devatas (though both gods and goddesses are included among the devatas, the goddesses generally have a secondary role). Within this destiny there are many heavens, each inhabited by many deities. Mythologically, the most important are the Tushita Heaven, where the future buddha Maitreya awaits the time for his coming to earth; the Heaven of the Thirty-three Gods, which is presided over by Inda (Sanskrit: Indra; sometimes called Sakka [Sanskrit: Shakra], a deity who plays a significant mythological role); and the Heaven of the Four Guardian Kings, protective deities who are found in many Buddhist myths.

The second of the gatis is the destiny occupied by human beings. The Agganna-sutta continues the story of creation by recounting the process through which the primal people devolved from their original idyllic earthly situation. Human vices and human conflicts emerge until a king called Mahasammata (“Great Elect”) is chosen to keep the peace and slow the pace of decline. Beyond this story of the beginnings of social life, the human realm is the locus for a myriad of widely diversified mythic stories about pious monks, nuns, kings, and other laypersons.

The third gati is the destiny of the asuras (“demons”), who in Indian mythology are the traditional enemies of the devas or devatas, though in the Buddhist mythology they generally play a limited role. (In fact, in some contexts the gati of the asuras is omitted from the system.) The fourth gati—the destiny of the animals—provides the setting for stories about many fabulous creatures, including nagas (mythical snakes), Garuda (a mythical bird), lions, and elephants.

The two remaining gatis, those of the pretas (“hungry ghosts”) and the hell beings, are mythically important in two respects. The descriptions provided of the punishments that are inflicted in these realms are very vivid indeed. In addition, there are widely distributed and well-known mythic stories of compassionate bodhisattvas and Buddhist saints who make journeys to these gatis to assuage the torment of those who suffer and to secure their release.

In different areas of Asia, new gods, goddesses, and demons were incorporated into the cosmology (for example, in Southeast Asia the great Hindu gods Vishnu and Shiva were often depicted as devas). Despite these new mythic contents, however, the classic cosmological structure was kept remarkably intact.