Note on Vajrapani-Indra
By Sten Konow
Acta Orientalia
1930, pp. 311-317
p. 311
Those who take an interest in Buddhist art are
well acquainted with the constant companion of the
Buddha, who is pictured in various ways and without
any constant type, but who is nevertheless easily
recognized by means of his attribute, the vajra or
thunderbolt, wherefore it has become customary to
speak of him under the name of Vajrapani, "he in
whose hand is the vajra."
The figure has been explained in various ways.
After Cunningham he was usually identified with
Devadatta, the Buddha's cousin, because his attitude
sometimes seemed to indicate animosity towards the
Buddha.
Professor Grunwedel(1) justly objected to this
explanation, because the figure occurs in scenes
where there cannot be any question of Devadatta. He
agreed with Burgers,(2) that the thunderbolt-carrier
was originally Indra, but thought that he was
subsequently in many cases identified with Mara, of
whom we read in the Nidanakatha that he approached
the Bodhisattva when he left the palace and thence
"followed after him, like an ever-present shadow,
ever on the watch for some slip." The vajra is, he
says, simply the old attribute of Indian gods. The
ensuing uncertainty resulted in a now ncutral,
denomination, Vajrapani, perhaps taken from some
stotra, which led to the conception of a separate
being, who later on came to play a considerable role
especially in Mahayana.
_______________________
1. Buddhistische Kunst in Indien. 2. ed. Berlin 1900,
pp. 84ff. The first edition is not accessible in
Oslo.
2. Journal of Indian Art and Industry, No. 62-63,
1898, p.30; not accessible to me.
p. 312
M. Foucher, who was at first inclined to accept
Professor Grunwedel's explanation, later on(1)
identified the figure with Vajrapani, the guhyaka or
yaksa chief mentioned in the Lalitavistara,(2) and
this same identification was also proposed by M.
Senart in his important paper, Vajrapani dans les
sculptures du Gandhara.(3)
A new explanation was given by Professor
Vogel, (4) who explained the figure as a
representation of the Buddhist dharma, and, finally,
Mrs. Elizabeth Colton Spooner(5) tried to prove that
the underlying idea was that of the Avestan fravashi.
I am not going to add a new theory to those
advocated by these scholars. I think that the
explanation of Messrs. Foucher and Senart is right,
and my object in writing these lines is mainly to
draw attention to an indication contained in a
Mahayana sutra which has not, so far as I know,
hitherto been noticed.
About the existence of a yaksa called Vajrapani
in Buddhist tradition there cannot be any doubt. As
pointed out by the two French savants, he is
mentioned in the Lalitavistara and elsewhere, and in
the Mahamayuri(6) we read that he resided on the
Grdhrakuta in Rajagrha.(7)
In Indian mythology, however, Vajrapani is an
epithet of Indra, who is characterized as vajrabahu,
vajrahasta, in the Rgveda, the designation vajrapani
being met with for the first time in the
Sadvimsabrahmana.(8) In Buddhist literature(9) Indra
is repeatedly mentioned as a yaksa, and we may
therefore reasonably put the question whether the
Vajrapani of Gandhara art is not simply a duplicate
of Indra.
______________________
1. L'art greco-bouddhique du Gandhara, I, p.358, II,
pp. 48ff.
2. ed. Lefmann, p. 66, cf. p. 219.
3. Actes du XIV Congres international des orientalistes
Alger 1905, I, pp.121ff.
4. Bulletin de l'Ecole francaise d'Extreme Orient, IX,
1909, PP. 523ff.
5. JRAS. 1916, pp. 497ff.
6. cf. Sylvain Levi, Le catalogue geographique des
Yaksa dans la Mahamayuri, JA. XI. v, 1915, pp. 19ff.
7. Cf. v.3 Vajrapani Rajagrhe Grdhrakute krtalayah.
8. Cf. Weber, Zwei vedische Texte uber Omina und
Portonta, Abhandlungen der Kgl. Akademie der
Wissenschaften zu Berlin 1888, p. 316.
9. e.g. the Mahamayuri v. 29: Indra's cEndrapure; Digha
Nikaya III, p. 204.
p. 313
M. Senart(1) and M. Foucher(2) draw attention to
the explanation given by Buddhoghosa(3) on the
passage in the Ambattha Sutta(4) where we read how
the yakkha Vajirapani appears in the air, with a
flaming ayokuta in his hand, and frightens the proud
Ambattha: vajiram panimhi assati Vajirapani; yakkho
ti, na yo va so va yakkho, Sakko devarajati
veditabbo, i.e. "he is called Vajirapani, because the
vajira is in his hand; as to 'yakkha,' not an
indefinite yakkha he should be understood to be Sakka,
the king of the gods."
Here it is evident that to Buddhaghosa the yaksa
Vajrapani was Indra.
A similar state of affairs must be inferred from
the Samghatasutra, a Mahayana text which is found in
Chinese and Tibetan translations, and which was
evidently very popular with the Buddhists of Chinese
Turkestan, where several fragments of a Saka version
have been found.
There are two passages in the Samghatasutra which
would seem to be of interest in the present
connexion.(5)
Fol. 357ff. we read about an encounter between
the Buddha and numerous nirgranthas, who had gathered
in the hope of defeating him in argument. The Buddha
rebukes them, but they only get angry. Then we read:
dehi. tshe. dehi. dus. na. lhahi. dban. po. Brgya.
byin. gyis. rdo. rje. gsor. ba. dan | de. nas. gcer.
bu. pa bye. ba. phrag. bco. brgyad. po. de. dag.
dnans. bskrag. nas. sdug. bsnal. chen. pos. nam. thag
. ste. nu. mchi. ma. zag. pa. dan | de. bzin gsegs.
pas. kyan. sku. mi. snan. bar. mdzad. do | " at that
time, at that epoch, the ruler of the gods,
Satakratu, flourished the thunderbolt, and forthwith
the eighteen ten-million nirgranthas, in fear and
terror, tormented with great misery, crying, shed
tears, and the Tathagata made his body invisible."
Here accordingly Brgya-byin, i.e. Satakratu or
Indra, plays exactly the same role as the yakkha
Vajirapani in the Digha Nikaya.
______________________
1. P. 123. 2. II, p. 52.
3. Sumangala Vilasini I, p. 264.
4. Digha Nikaya I, 95.
5. I quote from the Kanjur, Mdo na fol. 346ff.
p. 314
Again on fol. 382 we read how various beings come
together in Rajagrha, where the Buddha is going to
preach the law. We hear how the town was agitated how
divine sandal-dust and divine flowers fell down from
the air as rain, and further: dehi. tshe. de bzin.
gsegs. pahi. spyan. snar. lhahi. dban. po. Brgya.
byin. gyis. rdo. rje. gsor. ba. dan | de. nas. dehi.
tshe. phyogs. bzi. nas rlun. gi. rgyal. po. bzi.
hkhrugs. te. lans. nas. gan. Rgyal. pohi khab. kyi.
gron. khyer. chen. pohi. nal. nil. dan | phyag. dar
dan | bye. ma. de. rnams. gron. khyer. gyi. phi. rol.
tu. bor. nas | phyogs. bcuhi. hjig. rten. gyi. khams.
rnams. su. spos. chuhi char rab. tu. phab | " at that
time the ruler of the gods, Satakratu, flourished the
thunderbolt before the Tathagata, and forthwith, at
that time, four wind-kings, tumultuously rising from
the four quarters, swept out of the town what dust
and sweepings and sand there was in the great town of
Rajagrha, and in the regions of the four quarters
perfumed water rained down."
We are involuntarily reminded of the Vajrapani of
the sculptures, who accompanies the Buddha, sometimes
terrifying his adversaries, sometimes serving him in
other ways. But to the author of the sutra it was
Indra, the king of the gods, who acted in this way.
Now it might be urged that these passages in the
Samghatasutra, as also Buddhaghosa's remark quoted
above, bear witness to the conception originally
underlying the Gandhara representation of Vajrapani:
we have to do with Indra, and the yaksa is only a
secondary development, evolved out of the multiform
notions connected with him, perhaps in consequence
of the use of the term vajrapani about Indra. This
is, as will be seen, the same trend of argument which
was adduced by Professor Grunwedel.
Methodically, however, it would hardly be
admissible to draw such far-reaching conclusions from
the above texts. They are both too young. Buddhaghosa
came to Ceylon during the reign of king Mahanama
(458-480 A.D.), i.e. his time coincides with the
flourishing of Brahmanism and brahmanized literature
under the Guptas. And the Samghatasutra cannot be an
old work. The fragments of the
p. 315
Saka version are written in the upright form of
Central Asian Gupta which cannot be older than the
fourth or fifth century A.D. According to Professor
Leumann(1) there are two Chinese translations of the
text. The oldest is due to Urdhvasunya, and Professor
O. Franke has been good enough to let me know that,
according to Bunyiu Nanjio's Catalogue, which is not
accessible to me, it was completed in 538 A.D. The
work is further mentioned in the Mahavyutpatti 65.
61, but none of these sources points to a high age
for the Samghatasutra.
The probable explanation of the role played by
Indra-Vajrapani in the Samghatasutra as well as of
Buddhaghosa's remark about the yakkha Vajirapani of
the Digha Nikaya is therefore that they are not the
result of a vague recollection of the conceptions
originally underlying the Vajrapani figure of
Gandhara art, but rather that they are due to the
reaction of orthodox Brahmanism which is noticeable
during and after the Gupta period: Buddhist
traditions and Buddhist art were then liable to be
interpreted in the light of Brahmanic lore, and to
the Brahmins the real Vajrapani could only be Indra.
In other words, we here have before as a secondary
interpretation, or rather, misinterpretation,
belonging to a time when, as M. Foucher aptly
remarks,(2) the tradition about Vajrapani had been
lost. And it is quite possible that the author of the
Samghatasutra had in his mind scenes which he knew
from Buddhist art.
And, as pointed out by Messrs. Senart and
Foucher, there are strong reasons for not identifying
Vajrapani with Indra, even if we abstract from the
fact that both are sometimes pictured side by side.
Indra was evidently well known to the artists of
Gandhara, and he is pictured with certain
characteristic features, evidently borrowed from
national Indian art, which make the identification of
his figure certain. These features are missing in the
case of Vajrapani, and his representation in Gandhara
art shows so much variety that we must evidently
accept M. Senart's conclusion:(3) "que nous
______________________
1. ZDMG, 61, p. 655; 62, p. 105.
2. l.c. II, 52.
3. p. 125.
p. 316
sommes en presence d'une creation nouvelle, propre a
1'ecole du Gandhara, que, dans l'art au moins, le
personnage est de date recente."
That does not imply that Vajrapani himself, as
separate from Indra, is not older than the art of
Gandhara. On the contrary, M. Senart is of opinion
that the figure occupies an intermediate position
between a pre-Gandhara yaksa chief and the Vajrapani
of Mahayana, in a terrific form, as the guardian of
Buddhist dharma. And in art itself, the figure may be
connected with older Indian representations. of
yaksas.(1)
It is even conceivable that the yaksa Vajrapani
should be traced back to conceptions which are as old
as, or even older than, Indra.
It has often been pointed out that new deities
may develop out of some epithet of an older god, and
Professor Grunwedel, as we have seen, is inclined to
adapt this explanation to our case.
I feel convinced that exactly the opposite is
just as often the case, and I think that most
scholars hold a similar view, e.g. when we find long
lists of thousand or more names of gods such as Siva.
In the pantheon of the Rgveda we have, in my opinion,
an evident instance of this syncretism, in the case
of Indra himself, who absorbed such vague
representatives of force and power as Vrtrahan in
the days when he became the supreme god of the Indian
Aryans.
It seems to me that Indra's association with the
vajra is of a similar kind. The vajra is the Indian
representative of the thunderbolt, and a comparison
of corresponding ideas with other Indo-European
peoples leads to the conclusion that even in the
Indo-European period there was some idea of a vaguely
personified independent wielder of the thunderbolt.
With the Germanic tribes he became the "Thunderer,"
the porr of Old Norse mythology, in Hellas and Rome
he was associated with Zeus-Juppiter, and in India he
became Indra. But a vague recollection of his
original independence had left its impression on the
religious mind of the Aryans, and he was never quite
absorbed
________________________
1. cf. the interesting monography by Ananda K.
Coomaraswamy. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections.
Vol.80, No.6. Washington 1928.
p. 317
by Indra. Even in the Rgveda, our chief document for
the period when Indra, rose to the rank of supreme
god, we also find Rudra designated as vajrabahu (II,
33. 3); in the Atharvaveda Bhava and Sarva are asked
to use their Vajra against evil-doers (IV.28.6), and
Soma smites with the vajra (VI. 6. 2), &c.; in the
Bhagavatapurana (X. 159. 20) Visnu wields the
thunderbolt, and so forth.
It seems to me that it is necessary to explain
the yaksa Vajrapani from such subconscious or
semi-conscious reminiscences of an older conception,
and to assume that he had developed long before he
was introduced into Buddhist art by the artists of
Gandhara. His association with Indra, the Indian
vajradhara xxs is secondary and due to the increasing
influence which Brahmanic notions come to exercise in
India.