Bhaiṣajyasamudgata is attested in Mahāyāna sūtras: he is named in chapter 23 of the Lotus Sūtra (which recounts the Medicine King/Bhaiṣajyarāja narrative) and is co-featured with Bhaiṣajyarāja in a dedicated Guan (contemplation/visualization) sūtra. The Lotus Sūtra chapter tells the story of the Medicine King, who in a past life burned his body as the supreme offering and was reborn over numerous lifetimes to heal illnesses; Bhaiṣajyasamudgata is recorded in the tradition as the paired bodhisattva in the contemplative sutra devoted to the two, thereby situating him within the same healing/salvific narrative complex and the contemplative practices that invoke those figures (sources: Lotus Sūtra chapter reference; Guan sutras listing; Wikipedia summary).
The provided sources do not supply a detailed iconographic or physical description of Bhaiṣajyasamudgata. He is presented in the textual record as a bodhisattva to be visualized in contemplative practice (the Guan literature), but specific conventional iconographic attributes or East Asian visual types are not given in the cited excerpts (sources: Guan sutras listing; Lotus Sūtra chapter reference; Wikipedia summary).
Scriptural material and sūtra listings associate Bhaiṣajyasamudgata with healing and with being an object of visualization practice. The Contemplation Sutra named for Bhaiṣajyarāja and Bhaiṣajyasamudgata functions as a guide for meditators cultivating samādhi by visualizing these bodhisattvas, and the Lotus Sūtra narrative about the Medicine King emphasizes rebirths dedicated to curing disease; by association Bhaiṣajyasamudgata participates in that therapeutic/contemplative register. The sources describe him as embodying the Buddha's healing activity and as a focus for devotional-meditative practices rather than as the performer of unrecorded miraculous feats (sources: Guan sutras listing; Lotus Sūtra chapter reference; Wikipedia summary).
Apsara
Celestial dancers and water nymphs of Hindu cosmology — beautiful semi-divine beings who dance at the court of Indra and, by his command, descend to earth to distract sages from excessive asceticism.
Samantabhadra
Samantabhadra is a sacred name used across Indian-origin traditions. In Mahāyāna Buddhism it denotes a major bodhisattva associated with practice, vows, and the transfer of merit; in Tibetan Buddhism the name (Tibetan: Kuntu Zangpo) is also used for an Adi‑Buddha or primordial principle in Dzogchen contexts; separately, Samantabhadra is the name of a historical second‑century Digambara Jain monk and author of works such as the Ratnakaranda Gaurav.
Maitreya
Maitreya (Pali: Metteyya) is the bodhisattva prophesied in Buddhist traditions to be the next fully awakened Buddha who currently resides in Tushita heaven and will be reborn on earth to re-establish the Dharma. In modern esoteric/Theosophical literature he is also depicted as an advanced spiritual teacher in a hidden hierarchy, a distinct framing from the classical Buddhist accounts.
Acala
Acala (Sanskrit: अचल, 'The Immovable') is a wrathful protective deity (dharmapala) in Vajrayāna and East Asian esoteric Buddhism, classed among the Wisdom Kings (Vidyārāja). He functions as a ritual focus for visualization and mantra practice intended to remove obstacles and bind or destroy hostile forces.
Acalanātha (Acala / Achala)
Acalanātha (also Acala or Achala) is a wrathful deity and dharmapāla — a protector of the Dharma — prominent in Vajrayana and East Asian Mahayana Buddhist contexts. Presented as a fierce, non‑human or semi‑divine protector-figure, Acalanātha functions to defend the teaching and practitioners by removing obstacles and confronting threats to the transmission and practice of Buddhism.
Agni
Agni is the Vedic personification of fire in Hindu tradition: a sacred, mediating principle that manifests as terrestrial fire, atmospheric lightning, and celestial sun, and that receives and conveys sacrificial offerings. Prominent in the Rigvedic corpus, Agni functions as sanctifier, witness of rites of passage, and a transformational inner principle in later Upanishadic literature.
Aizen Myō-ō (Rāgarāja)
Aizen Myō-ō corresponds to the deity Rāgarāja, a wrathful/transformation-oriented figure venerated in Esoteric and Vajrayāna Buddhist traditions. The figure is especially revered in Chinese Esoteric Buddhism in Chinese communities and in the Japanese Esoteric schools Shingon and Tendai.
Akhu Tönpa
A Tibetan trickster figure, sent by Chenrezig to teach the art of being shrewd and witty, while championing the common man against social hierarchies. (Note: - Power tier should be Lesser or Minor Spirit, not Ancient, as it's more aligned with local spirit level of trickster figures. - The ability to outwit those in positions of power suggests Greater or P)
Akshobhya
Akshobhya is a transcendent buddha of Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna Buddhism, one of the Five Wisdom (Dhyāni) Buddhas. He personifies 'mirror knowledge' (ādarśa-jñāna), is conventionally placed in the East, and is lord of the eastern Pure Land Abhirati; in esoteric texts he is associated with the eastern Vajra division and invoked in mantra/mandala ritual contexts.
Akuma
Akuma (悪魔／あくま) in Japanese sources is an evil spirit, devil, or demon associated with misfortune and mental disturbance. The term appears in Buddhist texts and Heian-period literature and was later used to translate the Christian figure of Satan, as well as the Buddhist Mara.
Amanojaku
Amanojaku (天邪鬼 / あまのじゃく) is a Japanese yōkai-type being portrayed as a contrarian, heart-reading trickster. Treated in different contexts as a small ogre (ko-oni), a wicked demon (jaki) in Buddhist iconography, and a folkloric spirit that provokes human vice, it appears across regional tales with variable roles from malicious kidnapper to household oddity.
Amida Nyorai
Amida Nyorai (Amitābha / Amitāyus) is a principal Mahayana Buddha venerated across East Asia as the embodiment of Infinite Light and Infinite Life who presides over a Western Pure Land and is invoked as the savior who receives the dying into rebirth there.
Amitābha
Amitābha is a central celestial Buddha of Mahayana Buddhism who presides over the western Pure Land called Sukhāvatī. Devotional practices invoking his 'measureless' light and life (nianfo/nembutsu) are presented in Pure Land traditions as a path by which beings may be reborn in his buddhafield and quickly attain Buddhahood.
Amitābha Buddha
Amitābha is a principal Mahayana Buddha who presides over the Western Pure Land (the Land of Ultimate Bliss). Devotional practices—most centrally recitation of his name and chanting of Pure Land sutras—are presented in sources as the means by which Amitābha welcomes practitioners for rebirth in his hindrance-free realm.
Amoghapāśa
Amoghapāśa is recorded in the supplied sources as a named manifestation or form of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara/Lokeśvara attested in Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna contexts. The evidence in the provided material is archival and bibliographic (sūtra/dhāraṇī/maṇḍala filenames and database entries) rather than descriptive narrative or doctrinal exposition.
Community Record
- [1]Bhaiṣajyasamudgata. Wikipedia, 'Bhaiṣajyasamudgata' page summarywiki
- [2]The Visualization Contemplation Sutra Pure Land Sutra 3 Of 3 Amida Amitabha Buddhism AUDIOBOOK (listing of Guan sutras). Archive.org summary listing the six visualization/contemplation sutras including the 'Sutra on the Contemplation of the Two Bodhisattvas Bhaiṣajyarāja and Bhaiṣajyasamudgata (Guan Yaowang Yaoshang erpusa jing 觀藥王藥上二菩薩經)'other
- [3]Ancient Accounts of King Śubhavyūha [Chapter XXVII] (Lotus Sūtra chapter reference). Wisdom Library listing for Lotus Sūtra chapter 23 (The Bodhisattva Bhaiṣajyarāja) which situates the Medicine King narrative of burning his body and subsequent rebirths healing diseases; Bhaiṣajyasamudgata is associated in the tradition and named in the separate contemplation sūtraliterary