A Dhyani Buddha statue with the Vara Mudra gesture
A Dhyani Buddha statue with the Vara Mudra gesture
The image shows a statue of Dhyani Buddha (Meditating Buddha) with the Vara Mudra gesture. In Sanskrit, mudra refers to the hand gesture and vara means boon. To perform the Vara Mudra gesture, a person, who can be in a sitting or standing position, holds the right-hand palm facing up in such a way that it points slightly downwards.
As you can see from the image, the Buddha is performing the Vara Mudra gesture. Seated gracefully with the padmasana pose, he has his right-hand palm on the knee facing up and pointing slightly downwards, and his left-hand palm is on the lap and is also facing up.
The Vara Mudra gesture represents charity and compassion, and the Buddha with this mudra is known as Ratnasambhava. In Borobudur, all the Buddha statues facing south have this mudra.
There are 432 Dhyani Buddha statues in the Rūpadhātu layer of the Borobudur. Although these statues look alike, they have different mudras. In Buddhism, there are five different mudras, which are: Bhumisparsha Mudra, Dhyana Mudra, Abhaya Mudra, Vara Mudra, and Vitāraka Mudra. The Buddha statues facing a particular cardinal direction have the same mudras.
Here are the statues with the other type of mudras:
– Bhumisparsha Mudra
– Dhyana Mudra
– Abhaya Mudra
– Vitāraka Mudra
Related Pages
– Borobudur, Prambanan, Prambanan Bas-Reliefs, Bali, Indonesia
– Angkor Wat, Angkor Wat Bas-Reliefs, Banteay Srei, Cambodia
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