The Buddha Vairochana

Mandala Imagery and an Unsolved Mystery
Some mandalas, such as Borobudur, on the Indonesian island of Java, are monumental in scale; other mandalas can only be inferred and sometimes reconstructed from fragments. These mandalas are smaller in scale and made of multiple parts.

In the Vairochana bronze, we see a figure who might appear to be the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni, except that the hand gesture, the "lightning fist" (vajra-mushti), is characteristic of Vairochana. In this gesture, the right fist grasps the upraised left forefinger. The "lightning fist" symbolizes the oneness of seeming opposites, such as emptiness and substance, in Buddhist philosophy.