Kīla (Buddhism)

The kīla (Sanskrit Devanagari: कील; IAST: kīla; Tibetan: ཕུར་བ, Wylie: phur ba, pronunciation between pur-ba and pur-pu, alternate transliterations and English orthographies: phurpa, phurbu, purbha, or phurpu) is a three-sided peg, stake, knife, or nail-like ritual implement traditionally associated with Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, Bön, and Indian Vedic traditions. The kīla is associated with the meditational deity (Sanskrit: ishtadevata, Tibetan yidam) Vajrakīla (वज्रकील) or Vajrakīlaya (Tibetan Dorje Phurba) according to the means for attainment Mahayoga class. Vajrakilaya is the Buddha's activity natural expression representation.

Most of what is known of the Indian kīla lore has come by way of Tibetan culture. Scholars such as F. A. Bischoff, Charles Hartman and Martin Boord have shown that the Tibetan literature widely asserts that the Sanskrit for their term phurba is kīlaya (with or without the long i). However, as Boord describes it, "all dictionaries and Sanskrit works agree the word to be kīla (or kīlaka). I suppose this [discrepancy] to result from an indiscriminate use by Tibetans of the dative singular kīlaya. This form would have been familiar to them in the simple salutation namo vajrakīlaya (homage to Vajrakīla) from which it could easily be assumed by those unfamiliar with the technicalities of Sanskrit that the name of the deity is Vajrakīlaya instead of Vajrakīla. It should also be noted that the term (vajra)kīlaya is frequently found in Sanskrit texts (as well as in virtually every kīlamantra) legitimately used as the denominative verb 'to spike,' 'transfix,' 'nail down,' etc."

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