lag na rdo rje

lag na rdo rje

First appeared in Buddhist literature as the yakṣa bodyguard of the Buddha, ready at times to shatter a person's head into a hundred pieces with his vajra if he speaks inappropriately to the Buddha. His identity as a bodhisattva did not take place until the rise of the Mantrayāna in such sūtras as the Kāraṇḍavyūha. However, although listed (paradoxically along with Avalokiteśvara) as being in the assembly that hears the teaching of this sūtra, in the sūtra itself he is grouped with the worldly spirits that Avalokiteśvara frightens.