Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 Arranges Eight Perils for Bodhisattva Padmapani

Summary: Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 in Maharashtra, India, artistically assembles a Buddhist litany of eight perils for the compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani.

closeup of pillar patterning in Ellora Buddhist Cave 3; Saturday, March 4, 2017, 22:56: Photo Dharma from Sadao, Thailand, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons

Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 in Maharashtra state, western peninsular India, accumulates in its chapel artwork awful actions, adversities and animals as eight perils that afflict humankind and anguish the compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani.

The fourth-oldest Ellora Buddhist dormitory after Ellora Buddhist Caves 6, 5 and 2 broaches, like the chronologically and numerically later Ellora Buddhist Cave 9, the Buddhist litany. The Buddhist litany in the third cave calls upon compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani (from Sanskrit बोधि, "enlightenment" and सत्त्व, "sentient being"; and पद्म, "lotus" and पाणि, "holder"). The ninth cave divulges female counterparts in Tara (from Sanskrit तारा, "to cross"), compassionate bodhishakti (from Sanskrit बोधि, "enlightenment" and शक्ति, "[female] energy") and merciful goddess.

The Buddhist litany in the third-cave verandah's (from Portuguese varanda, "balcony") left end enumerates the ashtamahabhaya (from Sanskrit अष्टा, "eight"; महा, "great"; and भय, "dread") experiences.

Chapel artwork in Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 features the compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani flanked by four frights on his left and by four frights on his right.

The group graven left of bodhisattva Padmapani, who guards each and every Buddha's (from Sanskrit बुद्ध, "awakened") karuna (from Sanskrit करुणा, "compassion"), generates fiery, physical violence. Even not so hot fires and not so huge hurts harbor, harvest and help their respectively harmful holding of anger and hatred and of fanatical happenings. The India That Was blog identifies the two injured intervals left of bodhisattva Padmapani as involving the intense iniquities of involuntary service and of sea storms.

All bondage, captivity, enslavement and servitude and any floods and storms join the Buddhist litany because of respectively juxtaposing avarice with miserliness and attachment with desire.

Perhaps trade routes and trading networks kindled, left of compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani, the last four perils of eight perils in Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 chapel artwork.

Perhaps trader patrons of the third Ellora Buddhist vihara (from Sanskrit विहार, "walking [hall]") dormitory cave lived through, or lost loved ones to, lunging lions and snakes. Maddened, mistreated lion (Panthera leo) prides and menacing serpents, such as Asian, binocellate, Indian and spectacled cobra (Naja naja) snakes, manifest respectively proud and jealous misbehaviors. The Buddhist litany notes among its eight perils enraged wild elephants and, as an evil demon and spirit, Kali (from Sanskrit कलि, "black"), goddess of death.

Elephants (Elephas maximus indicus) in ostentatiously wild urban interfaces (WUI) and Kali organizing sentient deaths occasion delusion, respectively occurring and overlapping with ignorance and with doubts.

Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 no longer possesses right parts of front walls or verandah portions put up under Kalachuri (from Sanskrit कलचुरि) patronage (550?-before 687 C.E.?).

The third cave from the south end of the 34-cavern Ellora Caves qualifies as an almost perfect square, what with four approximately 45-foot- (13.72-meter-) long sides. Itinerant artisans, merchants and monks under Kalachuri dynasts realized an 11-foot- (3.35-meter-) high reach for the cave temple's 12 columns, each with circular or octagonal necks. Their cave temple supported passerby and repeat pilgrims, such as area traders, through 10 side-wall sleeping quarters and two on either side of the back-wall shrine.

Trading communities perhaps thanked compassionate bodhisattva Padmapani for safe transits, through territories teeing with eight perils, to Ellora Buddhist Cave 3 and its talismanic Buddhist litany.

view of some of Ellora Buddhist Cave 3's cells (sleeping quarters); Saturday, March 4, 2017, 23:04: Photo Dharma from Sadao, Thailand, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

closeup of pillar patterning in Ellora Buddhist Cave 3; Saturday, March 4, 2017, 22:56: Photo Dharma from Sadao, Thailand, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:155_Cave_3,_Pillar_Patterning_(34023908381).jpg; Anandajoti Bhikkhu (Anandajoti), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/anandajoti/34023908381/

view of some of Ellora Buddhist Cave 3's cells (sleeping quarters); Saturday, March 4, 2017, 23:04: Photo Dharma from Sadao, Thailand, CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:140_Cave_3,_Pillars_and_Cells_(34154734625).jpg; Anandajoti Bhikkhu (Anandajoti), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/anandajoti/34154734625/

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