84000 Glossary of Terms

Our trilingual glossary combining entries from all of our publications into one useful resource, giving translations and definitions of thousands of terms, people, places, and texts from the Buddhist canon.

སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག | Glossary of Terms

  • འཕགས་པ་སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག

  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་།
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་པོ།
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་པོ།
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • ཨ་བ་ལོ་ཀི་ཏེ་ཤྭ་ར།
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang po
  • ’phags pa spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang phyug
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang po
  • a ba lo ki te shwa ra
  • avalokiteśvara
  • āryāvalokiteśvara
  • avalokita
  • Note: this data is still being sorted
  • Person
Publications: 64

One of the “eight close sons of the Buddha,” he is also known as the bodhisattva who embodies compassion. In certain tantras, he is also the lord of the three families, where he embodies the compassion of the buddhas. In Tibet, he attained great significance as a special protector of Tibet, and in China, in female form, as Guanyin, the most important bodhisattva in all of East Asia.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་པོ།
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang po
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
This is an addendum to the general definition from the 84000 Glossary:

A bodhisattva great being present in the audience of this sūtra.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the Buddha Śākyamuni, praised for his compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvatī­vyūha Sūtra (The Display of the Pure Land of Sukhāvatī, Toh 115). The name has been variously interpreted. In its meaning as “the lord of avalokita,” avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsāṃghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the Buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in South India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not feature in the Kāraṇḍa­vyūha Sūtra (The Basket’s Display, Toh 116), which is the most important sūtra dedicated to Avalokiteśvara.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

A well-known bodhisattva featured in a number of Mahāyāna sūtras; in this sūtra, mentioned as one of the bodhisattvas in the audience.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The bodhisattva of compassion; one of the bodhisattvas in the retinue of the Buddha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the most popular bodhisattvas in the Mahāyāna Buddhist pantheon and one of the eight “close sons” of the Buddha, he is the embodiment of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

A bodhisattva.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the buddha Śākyamuni, praised for his compassion.

  • Avaloki­teśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • འཕགས་པ་སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • ’phags pa spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avaloki­teśvara
  • āryāva­loki­teśvara
Definition in this text:

The bodhisattva who embodies compassion, also mentioned in this text as Āryāva­loki­teśvara, the noble Avaloki­teśvara.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvati Sūtra. The name has been variously interpreted. In “The lord of Avalokita,” Avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsāṃghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in southern India became important in southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not yet feature in the Kāraṇḍa­vyūha Sūtra, which emphasized the premeninence of Avalokiteśvara above all buddhas and bodhisattvas and introduced the mantra oṁ maṇi­padme hūṁ.

  • Avaloki­teśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avaloki­teśvara
Definition in this text:

Bodhisattva embodying the compassion of all the buddhas.

For the reason why he received this name, see UT22084-051-002-40.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvativyūha. The name has been variously interpreted. “The lord of Avalokita,” Avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsamghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in South India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not feature in the Kāraṇḍavyūha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • avalokita
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvatī Sūtra. The name has been variously interpreted. In “The lord of Avalokita,” Avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsamghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he is one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in southern India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not yet feature in the Kāraṇḍavyūha Sūtra (Toh 116), which emphasized the preeminence of Avalokiteśvara above all buddhas and bodhisattvas and introduced the mantra oṃ maṇipadme hūṃ.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the eight “close sons” of the Buddha, the embodiment of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the bodhisattvas who attends the Buddha’s teachings in this text.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The bodhisattva who is the epitome of compassion.

  • Avaloki­teśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avaloki­teśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

A bodhisattva who first appears in the Sukhāvatī­vyūha sūtra (Toh 115) and then in a number of other Mahāyāna sūtras such as the Sad­dharma­puṇḍarīka (Toh 113). Avalokiteśvara develops into a great bodhisattva who embodies compassion with multiple forms in Indian, Chinese, and Tibetan Buddhism.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The bodhisattva of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

Name of a bodhisattva.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་པོ།
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang po
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་པོ།
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang po
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the eight “close sons” of the Buddha, the embodiment of compassion. He first appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvatī Sūtra. The name has been variously interpreted. In his name meaning “the lord of avalokita,” avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsamghika tradition, not translated into Tibetan, was the Avalokita Sūtra, in which the word is a synonym for awakening, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he is one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

A bodhisattva emblematic of the great compassion; of great importance in Tibet as special protector of the religious life of the country and in China, in female form, as Kwanyin, protectress of women, children, and animals.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the eight main bodhisattvas, the heart sons of the Buddha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The name of a bodhisattva.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • འཕགས་པ་སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • ’phags pa spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • āryāvalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
This is an addendum to the general definition from the 84000 Glossary:

One of the bodhisattvas attending the delivery of this teaching and main interlocutor.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

Bodhisattva embodying the compassion of all the buddhas.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvati­vyūha. The name has been variously interpreted. “The lord of Avalokita,” Avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahā­sāṃghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in South India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not feature in the Kāraṇḍa­vyūha.

  • Avalo­kiteś­vara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalo­kiteś­vara
Definition in this text:

A great bodhisattva.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the Buddha Śākyamuni, praised for his compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in The Display of the Pure Land of Sukhāvatī (Sukhāvatīvyūha, Toh 115). The name has been variously interpreted. In its meaning as “The Lord of Avalokita,” avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsāṅghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in South India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not feature in The Basket’s Display (Kāraṇḍavyūha, Toh 116), which is the most important sūtra dedicated to Avalokiteśvara.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

Bodhisattva of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the Buddha Śākyamuni, praised for his compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The deified bodhisattva of compassion; one of the original sixteen bodhisattvas.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the most popular bodhisattvas in the Mahāyāna Buddhist pantheon and one of the eight “close sons” of the Buddha, the embodiment of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the bodhisattvas attending the delivery of the MMK.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara AD
  • 觀自在
Definition in this text:

First appeared as a bodhisattva beside Amitābha in the Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra ( The Display of the Pure Land of Sukhāvatī , Toh 115). The name has been variously interpreted. In its meaning as “the lord of avalokita,” avalokita has been interpreted as “seeing,” although, as a past passive participle, it is literally “lord of what has been seen.” One of the principal sūtras in the Mahāsāṃghika tradition was the Avalokita Sūtra, which has not been translated into Tibetan, in which the word is a synonym for enlightenment, as it is “that which has been seen” by the buddhas. In the early tantras, he was one of the lords of the three families, as the embodiment of the compassion of the Buddhas. The Potalaka Mountain in South India became important in Southern Indian Buddhism as his residence in this world, but Potalaka does not feature in the Kāraṇḍavyūha Sūtra ( The Basket’s Display , Toh 116), which is the most important sūtra dedicated to Avalokiteśvara.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་ཀྱི་དབང་།
  • spyan ras gzigs kyi dbang
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the most popular bodhisattvas in the Mahāyāna Buddhist pantheon and one of the eight “close sons” of the Buddha. He is regarded as the embodiment of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The name of one of the most important bodhisattvas of the Mahāyāna pantheon.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

An important bodhisattva in the Mahāyāna pantheon.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • ཨ་བ་ལོ་ཀི་ཏེ་ཤྭ་ར།
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • a ba lo ki te shwa ra
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

The bodhisattva of compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས་དབང་ཕྱུག
  • spyan ras gzigs dbang phyug
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the eight main bodhisattvas, the heart sons of the Buddha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the Buddha Śākyamuni, he is renowned for his compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

Bodhisattva of compassion. One of the eight main bodhisattvas, the heart sons of the Buddha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

Bodhisattva of compassion. One of the eight main bodhisattvas, the heart sons of the Buddha.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

One of the main bodhisattva disciples of the Buddha Śākyamuni, he is renowned for his compassion.

  • Avalokiteśvara
  • སྤྱན་རས་གཟིགས།
  • spyan ras gzigs
  • avalokiteśvara
Definition in this text:

A prominent bodhisattva and buddha of the Mahāyāna pantheon, he is considered the embodiment of compassion. In esoteric literature, he presides over the lotus clan (padmakula).