Within the Mahayana tradition of the Buddhist faith, it refers to any figure who has renounced society and is on the path of enlightenment. The term is a combination of sattva, meaning “sentient being,” and bodhi, meaning “enlightenment.” In the Theravada tradition, however, it refers specifically to stories from the life of the Buddha before he achieved enlightenment.
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Section of the Sanskrit epic Mahabharata, composed as a dialogue between the Pandava prince Arjuna and his charioteer and companion…
The mythical king of the Sagara Dynasty who performed several years of penance in the Himalayas. He is known to…
An epithet for one of Alokiteshwara’s forms, it is Sanskrit for "the one with eleven heads." The tenth face represents…
The conception of man according to Hindu philosophy as established in the Vedas and the Upanishads. The purusha is a…
The first of the ten Sikh gurus, Guru Nanak (b. 1469, d. 1539) was the founder of Sikhism. Born in…
In Hinduism, Kama is the god of love and desire. Some of his iconographical attributes are a bow made from…
A sixteenth-century Tamil text attributed to Paranjothi Munivar, which comprises sixty four stories narrating the miracles of the Hindu deity,…
In Jaina religious art, a yakshi (nature spirit) who is an attendant of Mahavira, the twenty-fourth Tirthankara. Her iconographical attributes…