The Many Faces of Lokeśvara: Tantric Connections in Cambodia and Campā between the Tenth and Thirteenth Centuries

• Published in: History of religions Vol. 54; no. 1; pp. 69 - 93
• Main Author: Green, Phillip Scott Ellis
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chicago University of Chicago Press 01-08-2014; University of Chicago, acting through its Press
• Subjects: Bodhisattva; Bronzes; Buddhism; Deities; Empirical evidence; Epigraphy; Mahayana; Polities; Regions; Religious history; Religious icons; Religious rituals; Sculpture; Stanzas; Vajrayana; Cambodia
• ISSN: 0018-2710; 1545-6935
• DOI: 10.1086/676513

The bodhisattva is well attested in art historical and epigraphical sources coming from Cambodia. By examining the epigraphical and art historical records of early Cambodia, as well as some of the epigraphical records from Campa, Green argues that the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara goes from a relatively minor figure in Cambodia during the pre-Angkorian period to an increasingly important figure within an emerging tantric context beginning around the tenth century. Since it will be shown that Avalokitesvara's increased importance in tenth-century Cambodia arose amid newly emerging strains of tantric Buddhism in the region, it is within this tantric context that people must begin to reassess the various ways in which this bodhisattva was understood.