Vajrabodhi ( sa, वज्रबोधि, , 671–741) was an
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
n
esoteric Buddhist monk
A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...
from Kerala and teacher in
Tang China
The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdom ...
. He is one of the eight patriarchs in
Shingon
Shingon monks at Mount Koya
is one of the major schools of Buddhism in Japan and one of the few surviving Vajrayana lineages in East Asia, originally spread from India to China through traveling monks such as Vajrabodhi and Amoghavajra.
Kn ...
Buddhism. He is notable for introducing Vajrayana Buddhism in the territories of the
Srivijaya Empire which subsequently evolved into a distinct form known as
Indonesian Esoteric Buddhism
Indonesian Esoteric Buddhism or Esoteric Buddhism in Maritime Southeast Asia refers to the traditions of Esoteric Buddhism found in Maritime Southeast Asia which emerged in the 7th century along the maritime trade routes and port cities of the In ...
.
Biography
Vajrabodhi was the second of three Vajrayana
missionaries to eighth-century China. He was born in Kerala in South India, which was once a great homage of buddhism, and his father was a priest for the royal house. Vajrabodhi may have converted to Buddhism at the age of sixteen, although some accounts place him at the Buddhist institution of
Nālandā
Nalanda (, ) was a renowned ''mahavihara'' (Buddhist monastic university) in ancient Magadha (modern-day Bihar), India.[Dharmakīrti
Dharmakīrti (fl. c. 6th or 7th century; Tibetan: ཆོས་ཀྱི་གྲགས་པ་; Wylie: ''chos kyi grags pa''), was an influential Indian Buddhist philosopher who worked at Nālandā.Tom Tillemans (2011)Dharmakirti Stanfor ...]
. Under
Santijnana, Vajrabodhi studied
Vajrayāna
Vajrayāna ( sa, वज्रयान, "thunderbolt vehicle", "diamond vehicle", or "indestructible vehicle"), along with Mantrayāna, Guhyamantrayāna, Tantrayāna, Secret Mantra, Tantric Buddhism, and Esoteric Buddhism, are names referring t ...
teachings and was duly initiated into
yoga
Yoga (; sa, योग, lit=yoke' or 'union ) is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines which originated in ancient India and aim to control (yoke) and still the mind, recognizing a detached witness-consci ...
.
Leaving
Agastya Mala of the
Pothigai
The Pothigai Hills, also known as Agasthiyar Mountain is a 1,866-metre (6,122 ft)-tall peak in the southern part of the Western Ghats of South India. The peak lies in Tirunelveli District of Tamil Nadu near the border of Kerala.
The ar ...
mountain range of India, Vajrabodhi traveled to
Sri Lanka and
Sriwijaya
Srivijaya ( id, Sriwijaya) was a Buddhist thalassocratic empire based on the island of Sumatra (in modern-day Indonesia), which influenced much of Southeast Asia. Srivijaya was an important centre for the expansion of Buddhism from the 7th ...
(present-day
Palembang in the
south of Sumatra Island,
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
), where he apparently was taught a
Vajrayāna
Vajrayāna ( sa, वज्रयान, "thunderbolt vehicle", "diamond vehicle", or "indestructible vehicle"), along with Mantrayāna, Guhyamantrayāna, Tantrayāna, Secret Mantra, Tantric Buddhism, and Esoteric Buddhism, are names referring t ...
tradition distinct from that taught at Nālandā. This
Tamraparniyan route had been traversed by several scholars prior, and mirrored the reach of
Agastya. From Srivijaya he sailed to China via the escort of thirty-five
Persian
Persian may refer to:
* People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language
** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples
** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
merchant-vessels,
Iranian cultural impact on south-east Asia
/ref> and by AD 720 was ensconced in the Jianfu Temple at the Chinese capital, Chang'an
Chang'an (; ) is the traditional name of Xi'an. The site had been settled since Neolithic times, during which the Yangshao culture was established in Banpo, in the city's suburbs. Furthermore, in the northern vicinity of modern Xi'an, Qin S ...
(present-day Xian
Xi'an ( , ; ; Chinese: ), frequently spelled as Xian and also known by other names, is the capital of Shaanxi Province. A sub-provincial city on the Guanzhong Plain, the city is the third most populous city in Western China, after Chongqin ...
). Accompanying him was his soon-to-be-famous disciple, Amoghavajra.
Like Subhakarasimha, who preceded him by four years, Vajrabodhi spent most of his time in ritual activity, in translating texts from Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
to Chinese, and in the production of Esoteric art. Particularly important was his partial translation of the Sarvatathāgatatattvasagraha between the years 723 and 724. This Yoga
Yoga (; sa, योग, lit=yoke' or 'union ) is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines which originated in ancient India and aim to control (yoke) and still the mind, recognizing a detached witness-consci ...
Tantra
Tantra (; sa, तन्त्र, lit=loom, weave, warp) are the esoteric traditions of Hinduism and Buddhism that developed on the Indian subcontinent from the middle of the 1st millennium CE onwards. The term ''tantra'', in the Indian ...
- along with the Mahāvairocana Sutra, translated by Subhakarasimha the same year - provides the foundation of the Zhenyan school in China and the Shingon
Shingon monks at Mount Koya
is one of the major schools of Buddhism in Japan and one of the few surviving Vajrayana lineages in East Asia, originally spread from India to China through traveling monks such as Vajrabodhi and Amoghavajra.
Kn ...
and Esoteric branch of the Tendai
, also known as the Tendai Lotus School (天台法華宗 ''Tendai hokke shū,'' sometimes just "''hokke shū''") is a Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition (with significant esoteric elements) officially established in Japan in 806 by the Japanese m ...
school in Japan. Like Subhakarasimha, Vajrabodhi had ties to high court circles and enjoyed the patronage of imperial princesses; he also taught Korean monk Hyecho
Hyecho (; 704–787), Sanskrit: Prajñāvikrama; pinyin: Hui Chao, was a Buddhist monk from Silla, one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea.
Hyecho studied esoteric Buddhism in Tang China, initially under Śubhakarasiṃha and then under the famous In ...
; who went on to travel India and Umayyad Persia. Vajrabodhi died in 741 and was buried south of the Longmen Grottoes
The Longmen Grottoes () or Longmen Caves are some of the finest examples of Buddhist art#China, Chinese Buddhist art. Housing tens of thousands of statues of Shakyamuni Buddha and his disciples, they are located south of present-day Luoyang i ...
. He was posthumously awarded the title ''Guoshi'' ("Teacher of the Realm").
References
Bibliography
*Sundberg, Jeffrey; Giebel, Rolf (2011)
The Life of the Tang Court Monk Vajrabodhi as Chronicled by Lü Xiang (呂向): South Indian and Śrī Laṅkān Antecedents to the Arrival of the Buddhist Vajrayāna in Eighth-Century Java and China
Pacific World (3rd Series) 13, 129-222
{{Authority control
Indian Buddhist missionaries
7th-century Buddhists
8th-century Buddhists
Tang dynasty Buddhist monks
Vajrayana
Indian Buddhist monks
Converts to Buddhism
Shingon Buddhism
Tendai
Indian emigrants to China
671 births
741 deaths
7th-century Indian monks
8th-century Indian monks
Monks of Nalanda
Sanskrit–Chinese translators