Avalokitesvara 1 - Unconditional Love

Avalokitesvara a.k.a. Guan Yin a.k.a. The Goddess of Mercy is one of the most famous deities under the heaven. Many have acknowledged her position and role, even dramatized her in countless literatures. And what does she do anyway to deserve such devotion from many beings?

As the name might suggest, Avalokitesvara is the goddess of mercy and compassion. She actually is one of the bodhisattva, a being close enough to perfection, a step away from reaching mokhsa. However, most bodhisattvas are delaying their perfection in order to help other creature to reach the same state with them. Even more, Avalokitesvara gave an unconditional love, which is giving away her state of purity to save other beings. This role places her as the highest bodhisattva, the saviour of the world from impurity and corruption.

She is willing to take any karmic consequences of her action in helping other. Her consideration of striking is based on compassion, not on the basis of profit for herself.

The greatest story of Guan Yin’s sacrifice came from one of its origin stories, Princess Miao Shan. It was told that she wanted to devote her life for esotheric journey, to leave earthly matters behind her. Her father, the emperor, was furious with her decision. In order to prevent her leaving the castle, he threw her to do dirty works in kitchen, thus degrading her status as royal princess. She successfully did those tasks and lived at a monastery as bikhuni. Feeling annoyed and degraded, the king sent his envoy to burn down the monastery, effectively killed hundreds bikhuni. Miao Shan herself was saved by the tiger and brought into the mountain.

During her stay at the mountain, she kept training and meditating. Away from the earthly matter, Miao Shan finally reached the enlightenment.

Meanwhile, the king was burnt by his fury. This in time turned into a mysterious disease. The only medicine involved eyes and hand of a living being, given voluntarily without any force. The royal family tried to find a donator for that, and they ended up with a female hermit in the mountain. She agreed to donate her eyes and hands. When the royal court saw her, they recognized her as Princess Miao Shan. The king and queen bowed down to ask for forgiveness from her, having exiled and tried to kill her out of rage. Miao Shan nodded gracefully and started to plug out her eyes and cut her hands. When her parents received it, she then transformed into thousand-handed Avalokitesvara for a moment. In the following moment, she turned back into a female hermit and died.

This action is interpreted by many people as Miao Shan’s effort to protect her father, to cast away all causes of pain, namely hatred, attachment to the worldly things, misunderstanding, and blinding rage. Her piety towards her parents was manifested infinitely, by accepting the seemingly impossible tasks, murdering effort, without any hard feeling. She even gave her life to save her father unconditionally. This in turn, made sure that her father repent and follows the path of mercy and compassion.

The imagery of Avalokitesvara with thousand hands and eyes given in Miao Shan’s story symbolized her all-knowing trait. This figurative is also related closely with his eleven heads. The heads and eyes mean her watching over us from many angles, aspects, and condition. Her hands indicate her willingness to give us a hand, to help us, to assist us in time of most unfortunate.

Avalokitesvara a.k.a. Guan Yin doesn’t limit herself only to Buddhist people. She is not only a deity for Buddhist. She in fact is the manifestation of pure compassion. She is the unconditional love, the universal mercy, reflected in many religions before us. This love is given name Avalokitesvara by Mahayana, manifested as Virgin Mary in Christianity, known as Sarasvati in Hinduism, taking form of Kerridwen in Druidism, and Mother Earth in many paganism beliefs.

This thus ends the first part of Avalokitesvara, Om Mani Padme Hum……..