1812

thub dbang

Comment: Buddhaguhya (sangs rgyas gsang ba) explains that the term muni (thub pa) means that the person has restrained body, speech, and mind (lus la sogs pa sdams pa ni thub pa zhes bya'o). Tibetan oral traditions also take thub pa as referring to one who has overcome the enemy that is the afflictive emotions. Many translators render muni as "sage," but I choose "subduer" because it conveys the sense of conquest that the term has in Tibetan, for thub pa means "able," with a sense of being able to overcome someone else. (ShAkya, the name of this Buddha's clan, also means "able" or "potent," this probably being the reason why the name ShAkyamuni was translated into Tibetan as zAkya thub pa, with the first part of the compound in transliterated Sanskrit and the second in Tibetan.) The term dbang po (indra) means "supreme one," "powerful one," "lord," and more loosely "king"; ShAkyamuni is depicted as the supreme among Subduers.

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