Vajrakilaya

Vajrakilaya (dark blue) with consort Diptachakra (light blue). Two demons lie crushed under his feet
Painting on the wall of Gaden Tharpa Choorling Gompha, Monastery at Kalimpong, West Bengal, India

In Tibetan Buddhism, Vajrakilaya (Sanskrit: वज्रकीलाय, romanized: Vajrakīlāya, lit. 'Diamond-dagger', also वज्रकील, Vajrakīla; Tibetan: རྡོ་རྗེ་ཕུར་པ, Wylie: rdo rje phur pa, THL: Dorje Phurba or Vajrakumara (Sanskrit: वज्रकुमार, romanized: Vajrakumāra, lit. 'Diamond-youth'; Tibetan: རྡོ་རྗེ་གཞོན་ནུ, Wylie: rdo rje gzhon nu, THL: Dorje Shönnu) is a wrathful heruka yidam deity who embodies the enlightened activity of all the Buddhas. His practice is known for being the most powerful for removing obstacles and destroying the forces hostile to compassion. Vajrakilaya is one of the eight deities of Kagyé. [citation needed]

Vajrakilaya is a wrathful form of the Buddha Vajrasattva. His distinctive iconographic trait is that he holds the dagger called phurba or kīla. Vajrakilaya is commonly represented with three faces of different colors in a crown of skulls. The central face is blue, the left is red and the right is white. He also has six arms: two holds the phurba, two hold one vajra each, one holds a flaming snare, and one a trident. He crushes under his feet demons representing the obstacles to spiritual realization.[1]

  1. ^ Dorjee (2018), p. 59.