40 Origins of a Military Tradition
Golden chain armor of splendid luster;
Bright helmets and wind-blown sashes of silk.^66Guardian deities such as Vajrapâÿi have won their tutelary posts due to their
familiarity with the enemies of the faith. All too often they began their careers
as lowly demons who had been converted to Buddhism to fight their own kind.
As experts on evil, they were considered its most effective antidotes. “Figures
originally functioning as disease-demons,” writes Michel Strickmann, “have by
the early medieval period become homeopathic protectors against the very ail-
ments which previously, in their old, unenlightened, pre-Buddhist days, they
had themselves provoked.”^67 Vajrapâÿi’s murky origins of a fiend are betrayed
by his title of vajra-yakºa (jin’gang yecha), identifying him as a Hindu yakºa spirit.
His contradictory traits of a demon and a demon queller are suggested by the
ferociousness of his visual representations, the fire halo surrounding his head,
the wide-opened jaws, and the protruding fangs (compare figures 6, 7, and 8).
The notion that Vajrapâÿi’s vigor could be bestowed upon his devotees
was not the product of Zhang Zhuo’s literary imagination. Buddhist scrip-
tures attest that the god had been worshipped as a provider of strength, even
though they refer to him by one of his other names: Nârâyaÿa (Chinese: Na-
luoyantian, or Naluoyan). The latter had been used as an honorific of several
Indian deities, (including Vishnu). In Chinese Buddhist texts it was com-
monly applied to Vajrapâÿi, denoting either the single warrior, or, when he
assumed his dual form, the one standing guard on the right.^68
Originally, Nârâyaÿa’s powers were sought by magic means. The Sutra of
the Assembled Charms (Tuoluoni ji jing), which was compiled in China on the
basis of largely Indian materials in 654, includes two of his magic formulas,
complete with verbal spells (Sanskrit: mantra; Chinese: zhou) and hand sym-
bolisms (Sanskrit: mudrâ; Chinese: yinxiang). These charms guarantee the
practitioner the “boundless powers” (wubian li) of Nârâyaÿa, so much so that
he will be able to “move mountains and churn oceans.”^69
Magic gave way to supplication in at least some Chinese Buddhist texts.
In his Dictionary of the Buddhist Canon (Yiqie jing yinyi), Huilin (737–820) ex-
plains that Nârâyaÿa’s powers could be elicited through prayer. Much like
Zhang Zhuo, the Buddhist author emphasizes that earnestness is the key to
the god’s grace. “Those who wish to obtain great strength apply themselves
to the nourishment of all living beings. If they earnestly beseech [Nârâyaÿa],
they all obtain divine strength” (Ruo jingcheng qidao, duo huo shen li ye).^70
The Buddhist conception of Nârâyaÿa as provider of strength influenced
Shaolin religious practice. Archaeology proves that this deity had been wor-
shipped at the monastery for his might. A twelfth-century stele, still extant at
the monastery, depicts the powerful divinity brandishing his vajra (figure 8).
Commissioned by Shaolin’s abbot Zuduan (1115–1167), the stele features
one of Nârâyaÿa’s magic formulas, as copied from the Sutra of the Assembled
Charms. A brief explanation follows: