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毘沙門天

Pronunciations

Basic Meaning: Vaiśravaṇa

Senses:

  • Also referred to simply as 毘沙門. Associated with Kuvera, the Hindu god of wealth who appears in the Mahabharata and other works. In this sense, his name is also rendered as 施財天. One of the Four-Quarter Kings 四天王. He lives in the fourth layer of Mt. Sumeru 須彌山, and protects people living in the northern part of the world from yakṣas 夜叉 and rākṣasas 羅刹. He also protects the preaching place of the Buddha and hears the Dharma. In Japan during the Kamakura period he was regarded as one of the seven gods of good fortune 七福神. Since he is always guarding the site of enlightenment in hearing the Dharma, he is called as 多聞天. 〔翻譯名義集 T 2131.54.1076c17〕 Also transliterated as 稗沙門, and translated as 多聞, 普聞, and 種種聞. [Charles Muller; source(s): Yokoi, Nakamura, JEBD, Hirakawa, Iwanami]
  • In esoteric Buddhism, one of the twenty protector deities 二十天 of the vajradhātu-maṇḍala 金剛界曼荼羅. [Cate Pearce; source(s): MJ535]
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    [Dictionary References]

    Bukkyō jiten (Ui) 885

    Zengaku daijiten (Komazawa U.) 1043d

    Iwanami bukkyō jiten 675

    Japanese-English Buddhist Dictionary (Daitō shuppansha) 17b/19

    Bukkyōgo daijiten (Nakamura) 1134a

    Ding Fubao {Digital Version}

    Buddhist Chinese-Sanskrit Dictionary (Hirakawa) 0696

    Bukkyō daijiten (Mochizuki) (v.1-6)4304a,1914c,2335c,4037a, (v.9-10)404b

    Bukkyō daijiten (Oda) 935-3-24*1486-2

    Copyright provisions

    The rights to textual segments (nodes) of the DDB are owned by the author indicated in the brackets next to each segment. For rights regarding the compilation as a whole, please contact Charles Muller. Please do not reproduce without permission. And please do not copy into Wikipedia without proper citation!

    Entry created: 2003-05-31

    Updated: 2015-02-20