Quan Yin, Kwannin, Guan Yin

[RindaR]

I'm wondering about this beautiful archetype, and hope you would share your ideas here about her... I'm thinking this image in particular might be the feminine counterpart to the image of the great man dancing with the tiger that we've seen here before? (I've tried to find it again, with no luck...)

How does she relate to Yi?

 

[bradford_h]

Hi Rinda
She is the Buddhist goddess of mercy and compassion, the one who hears the prayers of the world
http://www.geocities.com/zennun12_8/kuan-yin.html
She has nothing directly to do wth the Yi, except that the word Guan is the same character as the title of Hexagram 20. Yin is a musical note and radical 180 in the Chinese language. I don't know how she got the name.

 

[bradford_h]

Oops
The link answered the question of name origin:
"Attends to (Guan) the cries (Yin)"

 

[candid]

How beautiful, Rinda.

This topic has come up before here, and you may find it in search under Kuan Yin.

Brad's background information on her is in perfect harmony with my personal experience with her. I've been in love with Kuan Yin almost as long as I've been into the Ching, though only indirectly related.

I learned much later from my eldest son, a dedicated Tibetan Buddhist, that she is the female counterpart to the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara.

Each of these appeared in meditation when I was around 26. First Kuan Yin, who came softly, gradually, gently, maternally. Then Avolokitesvara, who came suddenly, powerfully, relentlessly, yet compassionately. Scared me right out of my meditation.

I think the dancing figures, represented in the tiger/monk (LiSe 10, btw) image you mention, if that?s the one you meant, is also from a Hindu Shiva and Parvati motif, which isn?t all that unlike Avolokitesvara and Kuan Yin.

 

[candid]

what happened to the image?

 

[candid]

ahhh

 

[RindaR]

Nice job! Thank you Candid!!

Rinda

 

[anita]

Hi Rinda,

Kwannon stands on the right hand of the Maitreya Buddha (Laughing Buddha), on the altar of my temple. the tiger may be an allusion to the story of Kwannon riding a tiger. According to the story she was -- before her elevation to this title -- an Indian princess much abused by her father. She however saved his life despite his atrocities, endangering her own. She is said to have a thousand eyes and hands, and also incarnated as Avalokisteswara. She has always helped Maitreya in his incarnations, as she does today. that's how i see her.

 

[hilary]

She also responds with her own oracle. I have a copy but I've never tried using it regularly. Anyone?

 

[RindaR]

Thank you Anita, I'm looking forward to listening to "City of Victory" on BBC next week... I've kept Hilary's announcement.

Thank you too, Hilary, I've ordered Karcher's book.

Rinda

 

[tashij]

Candid, I am sincerely curious, did you continue meditation practice after this exp?

Anita, thanks for that story. Never heard that before.

 

[tashij]

I hope Kwan Yin hears the cries of this baby kitten someone dropped off on my doorstep. Not weaned yet, too small, and someone left it in a box. It cries to have a mother and bros & sisters.. .. I try feeding it with an eyedropper, but it still cries and thinks i could be it's mother and i wish i WAS a tiger so it would be happy and STOP CRYING. This poor little thing is crying and crying and it is heartbreaking. It's horribe to hear the cries and only be able to assuage, not stop them. How does Kwan Yin deal with the cries???? It is very painful to hear them. WHO STOPS the cries is what i want to know.

 

[hilary]

oh Tash... I wonder if your local vet knows someone who has a cat with kittens? Or maybe even a kindly bitch that would adopt this one? I think all us female mammals are wired the same way for small things crying...

 

[tashij]

Hilary, thank you. I will look into this. It's a horrible situation for this little kitten.

 

[tashij]

answer to my own question (in this case of the kitten): who stops the crying. a chain of events do. here's the deal with this kitten:

someone dropped it off. i brought it to my mother's house next door and kept it there cause i cant own any pets cause i go on the road a lot. i fed it there. sometimes my mom pitched in, sometimes someone else. but still it cried.

yesterday it was crying and it was killing me. i had to go to nyc and had to leave it.

this morning, i saw this kwan yin thread here, saw the word 'cry' and thought of the kitten. it killed me again. so i posted. hilary anwered. i called my mom to see how the kitten was.

my sister in law, had done, in essense, exactly what hilary said to do.

i dont know for sure if the kitten took to the mother cat yet, but i betcha it did.

so a chain of people and events helped stop this kitten's sorrow.

 

[tashij]

Candid i hope my question did not seem rude or prying, i just genuinely have a theory about what happens when people see a bodhisattva and then stop meditation practice for a while. Sorry if i offended didnt mean to.

 

[cheiron]

I wonder if there was a reason why the kitten came to you Tashij?

It was quite painful even from here... (not a complaint - It is good for me to be reminded of compassion).

Synchronicity ? When will it ever leave me in peace!

I have not been properly around for a while (very busy re. work) and have just spent some time reflecting on my own meeting with five beings who I am fairly sure were what you refer to as Bodhisattvas I have not thought about that experience for many years? then I saw this thread?

Tashij ? I would very much like to hear you theory if you are willing to put it forward.

And

Candid, are you able to say a little more of your experience and what it was about?

Thanks

--Kevin

 

[jte]

I think compassion can take many forms.

An example?

Link

Was it synchronicity, fate, intervention (of some form or another), a miracle, or just a dog happening to be in the right place at the right time?

I don't know. Does anyone, really?

- Jeff

 

[cheiron]

Thanks Jeff

Hmm... I only see one form for compassion... many different expressions... leading to many ends... but thats me.

Synch, as has recently been ecplored on this site, is perhaps only in the eye of the beholder... but...

Liked the story

Cheers

--Kevin

 

[candid]

Tash, why would I take offense? I didn't stop meditating but I did back way off on the deep probing stuff. I had never seen these images before the visions (two separate occasions, actually several occasions with Kuan Yin), but I discovered the images in the local library. I had never heard of either deity but recognized the images instantly. Kuan Yin is easy to be with, but Avolokitesvara knocked me over like a bolt of lightening, BAM! Too vivid for me to handle. I still meditate but less formally, and with no real objective, other than to just relax and center up energy.

Please share your observation.

 

[anita]

Thanks Rinda, so we meet finally!

Candid, interesting experience there. Reminds me of my mediations so long ago on the Egyptian Isis who suddenly stuck out her tongue at me like Kali! Scared me too. I read somewhere that one must start with the black and then progress to the white. anyway, my form of meditation is entirely different now. No visuals, only an awareness of my open third eye. The prayer I do is called dynamic meditation. There is much movement of the hands in it.

Best for your Quest

Anita

 

[candid]

Anita, it wasn't the visual so much as the presence. Was your experience like this also?

 

[tashij]

Kevin,

Hi! I'm laughing! I think someone put it on my doorstep so they could have a good night's sleep! I will check on the kitten today, and let you know how he is doing so you can have a rest as well!!!

Hi Candid.

OK, here's an idea about it. Only because I've had the bodhisattva appear to me as well, (years ago) while in deep meditation, when I, like you, never knew the bodhisattva. This exp. was an experience like no other in my life. Was born a rock, a refuge, an appreciation and a love for the Buddha's dharma in me, and i was not a buddhist at the time, haha, no way.

After seeing the bodhisattva, I could never go deeply into meditation again. Instead, after seeing the bodhisattva, I started looking for the dharma, whatever it was, in life. I went all over the world even, trying to understand the Dharma. Then I met my teacher, and of course, the trouble REALLY started. (lol)

People who enter deep meditation encounter many marvellous things, including dieties etc etc. It could be however, that the encountering the bodhisattva is a little different. Not a deva or god, or demon or 'pastlife' whatever. I think now, in retrospect, that encountering the bodhisattva was a gateway for me to resolve so much karma and so many confusions, but that what I solved was also beginning of REALLY understanding dharma in nuts and bolts life.

It is the most wonderful thing to meditate deeply, but it is equally most wonderful thing to know how to deal with life in a very practical manner. Like how to help the kitten. Cant say it was me, cause I am no mother Theresa, but understood where to help, where to let go, how to let others, not only myself, involve in this kitten's life.

All i wish i would do, really, with my life, is to be able to go back to meditating deeply. And I must and can and will. But have not been able to since seeing the bodhisattva. But maybe soon. Now, even.

I read a yahoo group of meditators, and the important thing is when one encounters devas, gods, whatever, remarkable exp., is to KEEP MEDITATING. Acknowledge, smile, Dont get involved with their story. But I wonder that when the bodhisattva comes to you, it is a little different. If you see their face, well, that is REALLY wonderful. They have such power in their face. You may never be the same. You may not be perfect paragon of virtue or whatever (even if you try), (lol), but you sure will love the bodhisattva.

I never got 'involved' with the bodhisattva, but she stays with me as an enigma always. As Candid says, a presence: no word or explanation can resolve. The dharma stays for me a rock, a refuge, an utter joy of certainty - an existential release. It is just that way. It is not an intellectual decision. It is an experience. The Buddha taught that the dharma is to be cultivated and realized - experienced.

 

[candid]

Tash,

Thanks for sharing your experience. I relate well to it. Yes, after that experience I began leaving the searching inwardly type meditation, and focused more on applying the impartation outwardly. I never called it the Dharma, but I imagine its the same or similar.

Unlike yourself, I have no desire or calling to go there again, but I don't regard this as a loss. I can never say whether the manifestation was a literal being or a proverbial archetype image. But I can say that the details of his appearance were very specific, and that the picture I found at the library was unmistakably the same exact image.

The most striking thing to me was the difference between the male and female counterparts of the deity. This has helped me to understand better the nature of universal yin and yang.

Kuan Yin was more of a courtship. A gradual familiarization over a period of months. Avalokitesvara was a one time thing. I had set up a sort of alter, lit candles and incense. It was late night and I had just received an inspiring Yi reading. Then I entered the meditative state. My focus was clear and extreme, when he appeared. Like I?ve said, I was really shaken. I blew out the candles and went to bed, then laid there with my eyes wide open, wondering what the heck that was all about. I still don?t really know, but I know it changed me.

Thanks again.

 

[cheiron]

Tashij

Re. Moggie...

Just got in from work and it is very late - will read your Bodhisattva post when I am more present.

--Kevin

 

[anita]

Candid,

For me it was visual as well as otherwise. visual, I think because of teh painter in me. I saw Isis, for eg. as a lovely woman her skin oozing the silver light of the moon, and bedecked in pearls.

anita

 

[candid]

Anita,

Do you 'see' Isis and Kuan Yin as being the same, other than cultural origin?

 

[willow]

I have the second Kwan Yin book on that link (the Diane Stein one). S Marshall dismisses it colorfully - something-or-other twaddle. It doesn't have a lot to do with Kwan Yin but it tries really hard to synthesize a bunch of stuff - I ching, Hopi, Wicca, astrology, tarot. It works a little better than you would think it would.

The intro says, "[This] book stands the I ching side by side with the tarot as an aspect of women's spirituality, and is a re-membering of the submerged skills of women's matriarchy and culture."

re seeing boddhisatvas - I caught a glimpse, a glint, once, just a spark, and that left the same feeling of inexpressable changed-ness and assurance you each describe.

 

[candid]

Hi Willow, ltns.

The wooden (or plastic) dashboard idols leave all kinds of room to become personalized deities. Kuan Yin suddenly transforms into a feminist symbol. She is loosely linked with an archetypal thread with Mary, or whatever else suits a person's fancy. But other than both being Yin symbols, they have less in common than they share.

I don't know much about Isis, which is why I asked Anita about her experience. I suspect Isis and Kuan Yin have more in common than Isis and Mary though.

 

[candid]

woops, than Kuan Yin and Mary rather.