RÃÂgarÃÂja () is a deity venerated in the Esoteric and Vajrayana Buddhist traditions. He is especially revered in Chinese Esoteric Buddhism in Chinese communities as well as Shingon and Tendai in Japan.
RÃÂgarÃÂja is known to transform sexual desires, especially lust, into pathways to spiritual awakening. When scriptures related to him reached China during the Tang dynasty, his Sanskrit name was translated as ÃÂirÃÂn MÃÂngwáng "Love-stained Wisdom King". In Japanese, the same Kanji characters are read Aizen Myà Â'à Â.
RÃÂgarÃÂja, also known as Aizen-Myà Âà Â, is one of many Wisdom kings, (but not in the traditional grouping of the five great Myoo, or Godai Myoo) Wisdom Kings like Acala (Fudo-Myà Âà Â). There are four different mandalas associated with RÃÂgarÃÂja: The first posits him with thirty-seven assistant devas, the second with seventeen. The other two are special arrangements: one made by Enchin, fourth Tendai patriarch; the other is a Shiki mandala which represents deities using their mantra seed syllables drawn in bonji. RÃÂgarÃÂja is also depicted in statuary and thangka having two heads: RÃÂgarÃÂja and Acala or RÃÂgarÃÂja and Guanyin, both iterations symbolizing a commingling of subjugated, complementary energies, typically male/female but also male/male. There are two, four or six armed incarnations of RÃÂgarÃÂja but the six-armed one is the most common. Those six arms bear a bell which calls one to awareness; a vajra, the diamond that cuts through illusion, an unopened lotus flower representing the power of subjugation, a bow and arrows (sometimes with RÃÂgarÃÂja shooting the arrow into the heavens), and the last one holding something that we cannot see (referred to by advanced esoteric practitioners as "THAT".) RÃÂgarÃÂja is most commonly depicted sitting in full lotus position atop an urn that ejects jewels showing beneficence in granting wishes.
He is portrayed as a red-skinned man with a fearsome appearance, a vertical third eye and flaming wild hair that represents rage, lust and passion. RÃÂgarÃÂja was also popular among Chinese tradesmen who worked in the fabric-dying craft, typically accomplished with sorghum. He is petitioned by devotees for a peaceful home and fortune in business. There is usually a lion's head on top of his head in his hair, representing the mouth into which thoughts and wishes may be fed. Some of these are the wishes of local devotees who make formal requests for success in marriage and sexual relations. According to the Pavilion of Vajra Peak and all its Yogas and Yogins Sutra, or Yogins Sutra (attributed, likely apocryphally, to the great Buddhist patriarch Vajrabodhi), RÃÂgarÃÂja represents the state at which harnessed sexual excitement or agitationâÂÂwhich are otherwise decried as defilementsâÂÂare seen as equal to enlightenment, and passionate love can become compassion for all living things.
RÃÂgarÃÂja is similar to the red form of Tara, called KurukullÃÂ, in Tibetan Buddhism. Appropriately, RÃÂgarÃÂja's mantras are pronounced in either Chinese or Japanese transliterations of Sanskrit; the cadences depending upon the respective region where his devotees reside and practice, and whether in the Shingon or Tendai schools. His seed vowel, as written in bonji, is pronounced "HUM," usually with a forceful emphasis coming from the use of lower belly muscles. This is part of the syncretic practice of mixing Tantra and Buddhism as was popular during the Heian period courts and amongst the lower classes of both China and Japan. His popularity in Japan reached an apogee when a Shingon priest used magical chants and rituals to call up the Kamikaze that protected the Japanese from sea-born invaders.
At various periods throughout Japanese history, RÃÂgarÃÂja was invoked as a patron and symbol of homoerotic male desire. While it is ahistorical to ascribe a "gay" self-identification to historical figures, clear examples of RÃÂgarÃÂja's patronage of men having intimate sexual relations with other men appear in the historical record. Male kabuki actors placed love letters to the men they desired on the wall of RÃÂgarÃÂja's temple at Naniwa in hopes of attaining success in love. In a story from the Ashikaga era, a man praises his male lover by comparing him to RÃÂgarÃÂja. RÃÂgarÃÂja's dharani was also included in the preparatory prayers performed by the young male consorts of Japanese Buddhist monks in some kanjo rituals.