Yab-yum I
Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia is now 14 years old
Our Encyclopedia recently received a wonderful opportunity for a major renewal on its 14th birthday . After many years of growing our Encyclopedia had become bit slow and sometimes even decided not to answer when people knocked on the door.
A very big thank you and blessings to Dmytro Rudiy (rudiy.nl) for his great work in upgrading the server, website and all of the infrastructure and helping make TBE fast and reliable again for everyone!
We kindly ask our readers to help us cover the cost of this important upgrade and also help with the ongoing costs of keeping the Encyclopedia alive and freely available.
or card
Every little donation helps and every one is deeply appreciated. 🙏🙏🙏
OM AH HUM VAJRA GURU PADMA SIDDHI HUM 🙏🙏🙏
May blessings shower down on all of yous 🙏🙏🙏
Yab-yum, (Tibetan: “father-mother”), in Buddhist art of India, Nepal, and Tibet, the representation of the male deity in sexual embrace with his female consort.
The pose is generally understood to represent the mystical union of the active force, or method (upaya, conceived of as masculine), with wisdom (prajna, conceived of as feminine)—a fusion necessary to overcome the false duality of the world of appearances in the striving toward spiritual Enlightenment.
The use of sexual union as a symbol of mystical union evolved from Indian Tantric thought. It was never fully accepted by the Buddhists of China and Japan. Even in Tibet the yab-yum images are not intended for general use but are meant to be viewed only by those who have received proper instruction concerning their esoteric significance.
In Tibet, entreaties are considered more efficacious when made to a deity in the company of his consort, and the tutelary deities (yi-dam) adopted by monks and priests are invariably represented in the yab-yum attitude.