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水天

Pronunciations

Basic Meaning: Varuṇa

Senses:

  • One of the oldest Vedic gods, the personification of the heavens, who is the creator and preserver of the universe. "He is often regarded as the supreme deity, being then styled 'king of the gods' or 'king of both gods and men.' No other deity has such grand attributes and functions assigned to him, as he is described as fashioning and upholding heaven and earth, as possessing extraordinary power and wisdom, sending his spies or messengers throughout both worlds, as numbering the very winkings of menʼs eyes, as hating falsehood, as seizing transgressors with his noose, as inflicting diseases, especially dropsy, as pardoning sin, as the guardian of immortality. He is also invoked in the Veda together with Indra, and in later Vedic literature together with Agni, with Yama, and with Viṣṇu." (M-W) He later became the lord of the sun gods, and still later became the god of the oceans and rivers; also translated as 水神, 河神, and 水王. Thus he is the water-deva, or dragon-king, who rules the clouds, rains, and water generally. As one of the deities of the four elements 四大神 in the esoteric maṇḍalas he rules the west; his consort is the 水天妃 represented on his left, and his chief retainer 水天眷屬 is placed on his right. Transliterated as 婆樓那, 縛嚕拏. He is one of the twenty protector deities 二十天 of the vajradhātu-maṇḍala 金剛界曼荼羅. (Skt. Varuṇa-deva, Varuṇa-datta, Varuṇo nāga-rājā, Toya-daivata) [Charles Muller, Cate Pearce; source(s): Ui, Nakamura, Hirakawa, Iwanami]
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    [Dictionary References]

    Bukkyō jiten (Ui) 613

    Bulgyo sajeon 494a

    Iwanami bukkyō jiten 477

    Bukkyōgo daijiten (Nakamura) 805a

    Fo Guang Dictionary 1484

    Ding Fubao

    Buddhist Chinese-Sanskrit Dictionary (Hirakawa) 0702

    Bussho kaisetsu daijiten (Ono) ⑥271d

    Bukkyō daijiten (Mochizuki) (v.9-10)497a,705a

    Bukkyō daijiten (Oda) 935-3-15*1007-3

    (Soothill's) Dictionary of Chinese Buddhist Terms 159

    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: 2001-09-08

    Updated: 2015-02-23