Sankaie Bosatsu

The name and role of Sankaie Bosatsu

This bodhisattva is listed as one of the Twenty-Five Bodhisattvas. It is described as a being who guides living beings with wisdom and virtue likened to the deep sea and high mountains.

Source: 飛不動尊 正宝院・飛不動尊 正宝院・飛不動尊 正宝院

Tracing the form and the traditions

The object held is a kugo (箜篌), with a note that it is a kind of harp-like instrument.

Source: 飛不動尊 正宝院・飛不動尊 正宝院・飛不動尊 正宝院

Protecting those who wish for rebirth in the Pure Land

The Twenty-Five Bodhisattvas are bodhisattvas who protect those who wish to be reborn in the Pure Land of Amida Buddha. A Jōdo Shū dictionary explains the protection of practitioners taught in the Jū Ōjō Amida Bukkoku Kyō as the basis of this faith. Rather than assigning separate effects such as luck with money or success in study to each, they can be understood first through their work of salvation as a group.

Source: 浄土宗

Raigō paintings and the bodhisattvas of the Nerikuyō

As Pure Land faith spread, the Twenty-Five Bodhisattvas came to be depicted in raigō paintings, in which they come with Amida Nyorai to welcome the dying, and in the Nerikuyō procession. This is explained as a development from the understanding that bodhisattvas who protect practitioners in daily life would also protect them at the moment of death. Objects held, such as musical instruments and lotus pedestals, differ by source; the individual forms shown here are mainly based on Shōhōin's materials, which introduce the Butsuzō Zui.

Source: 浄土宗・飛不動尊 正宝院

Related kami and buddhas

• Nijūgo Bosatsu (the Twenty-Five Bodhisattvas)二十五菩薩