{"id":82,"date":"2014-03-16T18:37:33","date_gmt":"2014-03-16T08:37:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/2014\/03\/16\/recognising-the-seven-buddhas-of-this-age\/"},"modified":"2019-11-12T20:50:17","modified_gmt":"2019-11-12T10:50:17","slug":"recognising-the-seven-buddhas-of-this-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/2014\/03\/16\/recognising-the-seven-buddhas-of-this-age\/","title":{"rendered":"Recognising the Seven Buddhas of this Age"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">When the Dharma is forgotten in the world another Buddha arises to renew it. The earliest version seems to have 7 buddhas in this age, of whom <i>gOtama<\/i> is the current. These are mentioned in the Pali canon in the <i>dIg<sup>h<\/sup>anikAya<\/i> (ii, pp 5ff) and <i>sa~yuttanikAya<\/i> (ii, pp. 5f) of the <i>suttapiTaka<\/i>, and in the <i>vinayapiTaka<\/i> (ii, p. 110). S. Beal (<i><a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/stream\/catenaofbuddhist00beal#page\/158\/mode\/2up\">A Catena of Buddhist Scriptures from the Chinese<\/a><\/i>, London:Trubner &amp; Co., 1871, pp. 158f) notes that these names are also found in the <i>pATimokk<sup>h<\/sup>a<\/i> of the Chinese <i>tripiTaka<\/i>. According to R. Mitra (<i><a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/stream\/sanskritbuddhis00mitrgoog#page\/n299\/mode\/2up\">Sanskrit Buddhist Literature of Nepal<\/a><\/i>, Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1882, pp. 249ff) they are also found in the <i>sayamb<sup>h<\/sup>U purAna<\/i>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The seven <a href=\"http:\/\/www.buddhanet.net\/pdf_file\/icon_nepbud_txt.pdf\">with their iconography<\/a> are:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>vIpassI<\/i>(<i>vipaxyin<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> Usually he is depicted in <i>b<sup>h<\/sup>umisparsa<\/i> (earth-touching) <i>mudra<\/i> with left hand palm up in his lap and right hand touching the earth; and with yellow or golden color.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>sik<sup>h<\/sup>I<\/i> (<i>xik<sup>h<\/sup>in<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> He is usually depicted in <i>ab<sup>h<\/sup>ayamudra<\/i>, with the open palm of the right hand extending outwards at the chest level or slightly higher.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> <i>ab<sup>h<\/sup>aya<\/i> = no fear<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>vessab<sup>h<\/sup>U<\/i> (<i>vixvab<sup>h<\/sup>u<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> He is depicted in <i>d<sup>h<\/sup>armacakramudra<\/i><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> <i>d<sup>h<\/sup>arma cakra<\/i> = wheel of the law<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> Note: Usually, in this <i>mudra<\/i> the hands are placed at the heart level with the thumbs and index fingers forming circles. JC Huntingdon observes that \u201cThe Gandharan version of the \u201c<i>d<sup>h<\/sup>armacakramudra<\/i>\u201d is highly specific and virtually ubiquitous in the region. The left hand is palm up with all the five fingers brought together above the palm while the right hand encloses encloses the tips of the fingers (or in some permutations, seen mostly in the Kapisa region, e.g. Shotorak, etc., the whole left hand, which is flat against the chest, is enclosed by the right.)\u201d (\u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/huntingtonarchive.osu.edu\/resources\/downloads\/jchArticles\/Maitreya%201.pdf\">The Iconography and Iconology of Maitreya Images in Gandhara<\/a>\u201d, <i>Journal of Central Asia<\/i>, July 1984, p 155) He suggests this is not a real <i>DC mudra<\/i> but is a gesture referring to the unity of 5 whatevers.)<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>kakusand<sup>h<\/sup>a<\/i> (<i>krakucchanda<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> Through his miraculous utterance issued forth a stream of water and hence the name <i>Bagmati<\/i>. He is depicted in <i>varadamudra<\/i>, right hand pendant with palm facing outwards, and with the left hand holding the fold of the robe<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>konAgamana<\/i> (<i>Kanakamuni<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> Generally represented as yellow in colour. His right hand has <i>ab<sup>h<\/sup>ayamudra<\/i> and his left hand is in <i>d<sup>h<\/sup>yanamudra<\/i>, palm up in his lap with thumb separated.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>kassapa<\/i> (<i>Kashyapa<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> Always depicted as yellow in colour. His right hand shows <i>Varadamudra<\/i> and the left hand is in <i>dhyanamudra<\/i>. He always sits on a lion throne with a lotus.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><i>gotama<\/i> (<i>gOtama<\/i>, aka <i>xakyamuni<\/i>)<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #000000;\"> In this context look for <i>b<sup>h<\/sup>umisparsamudra<\/i> with yellow robe.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When the Dharma is forgotten in the world another Buddha arises to renew it. The earliest version seems to have 7 buddhas in this age, of whom gOtama is the current. These are mentioned in the Pali canon in the dIghanikAya (ii, pp 5ff) and sa~yuttanikAya (ii, pp. 5f) of the suttapiTaka, and in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,20],"tags":[38,37],"class_list":["post-82","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-religion","tag-buddhism","tag-iconography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":459,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions\/459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevewatson.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}