Aizen Myō-ō

Ragaraja
Ragaraja at Tokyo National Museum, Japan
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese	愛染明王
Simplified Chinese	爱染明王
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Àirǎn Míngwáng Wade–Giles Ai4-jan3 Ming2-wang2 IPA [âiɻàn mǐŋwǎŋ]
Japanese name
Kanji	愛染明王
Transcriptions Romanization Aizen Myō'ō
Sanskrit name
Sanskrit	Rāgarāja

Rāgarāja (Sanskrit: रागाराजा; simplified Chinese: 爱染明王; traditional Chinese: 愛染明王; pinyin: Àirǎn Míngwáng, Japanese Aizen Myō'ō) is a dharmapala deity from the Esoteric and Vajrayana Buddhism. He is especially venerated in the Tangmi schools and its descendants, particularly Shingon Buddhism and Tendai in Japan.

Rāgarāja is known to transform worldly lust into spiritual awakening. Originally a Hindu deity, he was adapted as a dharmapala and Wisdom King. When scriptures related to him reached China during the Tang dynasty, his Sanskrit name was translated as Àirǎn Míngwáng "Love-stained Wisdom King". In Japanese, it is written the same way in Kanji but pronounced as Aizen Myō'ō.

Rāgarāja, also known as Aizen-Myōō, is one of the five Wisdom Kings like Acala (Fudo-Myōō). There are four different mandalas associated with Rāgarāja: The first posits him with thirty-seven assistant devas, the second with seventeen. The other two are special arrangements: one made by Enchin, fourth Tendai patriarch; the other is a Shiki mandala which represents deities using their mantra seed syllables drawn in bonji. Rāgarāja is also depicted in statuary and thangka having two heads: Rāgarāja and Acala or Rāgarāja and Guanyin, both iterations symbolizing a commingling of subjugated, complimentary energies, typically male/female but also Male/male. There are two, four or six armed incarnations of Rāgarāja but the six-armed one is the most common. Those six arms bear a bell which calls one to awareness; a vajra, the diamond that cuts through illusion, an unopened lotus flower representing the power of subjugation, a bow and arrows (sometimes with Rāgarāja shooting the arrow into the heavens), and the last one holding something that we cannot see (referred to by advanced esoteric practitioners as "THAT".) Rāgarāja is most commonly depicted sitting in full lotus position atop an urn that ejects jewels showing beneficence in granting wishes.