3/29/2023 0 Comments Magical warfare![]() Pehar’s significance increased dramatically during the seventeenth century, when he became intimately linked with the Fifth Dalai Lama and his administration. According to popular legend, Pehar was subjugated by the great Indian tantric exorcist Padmasambhava in the eighth century and assigned as a protector deity of Samyé Monastery (Bsam yas dgon pa), Tibet’s first Buddhist monastery. Pehar is one of the most significant of such Dharma protectors since he possesses multiple forms and is venerated within all major Tibetan Buddhist sects. Perhaps the most fascinating type of such beings is the hybrid figure of the Tibetan Dharma protector (chos skyong), each of which has complex histories, profoundly local associations, and yet resolutely Buddhist characteristics. A central dynamic of Tibetan Buddhism is its extensive pantheon of supernatural beings, which collectively function as key players in religious practices across time, space, institutional histories, and sectarian intersections. Given his centrality in Tibetan religious history, a sustained examination of Pehar’s cult at Nechung Monastery and its influence in later centuries will act as a case study that will significantly enhance our understanding of deity cults within Buddhism and within religious traditions more broadly. ![]() Deity cults are ubiquitous in world religions, but the precise form that they take in Tibetan Buddhism and the dynamics driving the changing popularity of specific deities over the centuries has been inadequately studied. This study explores Pehar’s mythic and iconographic characteristics, liturgical development, and monastic and institutional deployment at this crucial juncture in Tibetan history. Gnas chung dgon) in seventeenth-century Lhasa under the auspices of the Fifth Dalai Lama’s burgeoning government. Pe har) as it grew to prominence at Nechung Monastery (Tib. This is a detailed historical study of the cult of the Tibetan Buddhist protector deity named Pehar (Tib.
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