Shingon Mandala

Shingon became one of the principal Buddhist sects of the Heian period (794-1185) supplanting earlier sects and enjoying more popular support than its great rival, Tendai Buddhism. It reached an accommodation with Shintô, the native Japanese religion, by promoting the system of Ryôbu-Shintô ("Dual Aspect Shinto"), whereby Vairocana was held to be identical with the Shinto goddess Amaterasu. Shingon lost some of its popularity at the end of the Heian era as it grew rich and worldly, and evangelistic movements such as Pure Land Buddhism supplanted it in public affection. It remains one of Japan's most important sects, at present claiming some 12 million adherents.

Kûkai expounded and systematized Shingon doctrine in some 50 treatises, most notably the Sokushin-jobutsugi (The Doctrine of Becoming a Buddha with One's Body During One's Earthly Existence). Subsequent Shingon thought seldom went beyond this initial canon. The sacred religious texts, or sutras, of Shingon had supposedly been dictated directly by Vairocana, known in Shingon as Dainichi, and kept in an iron stupa used to store Buddhist relics until 800 years after the death of the founder of Buddhism, Gautama Buddha. The historical Buddha and his teachings were held to be merely one manifestation of Vairocana.

Mandala (Sanskrit for "circle"), in Hinduism and Buddhism, a diagram used as a focus and guide for meditation. Each mandala represents the universe pictorially. The worshiper imaginatively enters the mandala, focusing successively on each of its stages and absorbing the logic of its form as the worshiper approaches the center. The Buddhist religious texts known as tantras provide descriptions of a great number of mandalas, supposedly intended for different types of people. Practically every major tantra has one or more associated mandalas, each with specific sets of deities or abstract symbols. Although every mandala has its own individual characteristics, the basic concept and structure of all mandalas is fundamentally the same. Japanese esoteric Buddhism uses two basic kinds of mandalas, the Womb World and the Diamond World. The Womb World broadens the worshiper's attention, and the Diamond World concentrates it. Mandalas of the Buddha Vairocana are particularly common in one category of Buddhist tantras, and show the large number of celestial Buddhas and the Buddha-nature of all reality. Artistic representations of mandalas range from painted scrolls to the sand paintings of Tibetan Buddhism. The enormous monument at Borobudur in Java is essentially a giant stone mandala.

Vairocana or Mahavairocana (Sanskrit for "Resplendent Light" or "Great Resplendent Light"), in Mahayana Buddhism, the deification of the founder of Buddhism, the Buddha. In the Mahayana doctrine of the threefold nature of the Buddha, there exists the body of essence (dharmakaya), the cosmic and absolute form of the Buddha (known as Vairocana); the body of communal bliss (sambhoga-kaya), which manifests itself as a heavenly being to the worshipper during meditation; and the body of transformation (nirmana-kaya) which consists of the Buddha preaching on Earth in human form. Of these three bodies, Vairocana is regarded as the highest form, a god of light whose reflection throughout the universe is represented as endless.

The Shingon sect of Buddhism in Japan refers to Vairocana as Dainichi Nyorai and regards him as the source and sustainer of the universe. Shingon Buddhists worship Vairocana by contemplating mandalas, geometric designs representing the universe. The mandalas show Vairocana enthroned at the center of the cosmos, where he is thought to embody all other buddhas. When represented in art, he usually appears in white or blue, seated in contemplation on a lotus flower, which rests on a disc. In Japan, he is depicted as the fierce defender of Shingon Buddhism, Fudo Myo-o.