Marichi

Every individual goes through a phase in their life where they try to escape the identity that they’re born into. When I went through that phase, I discovered Buddhism. Not only did I see many of my own morals be reflected onto Buddhism, but I saw myself agreeing with all of their traditions. What in Buddhism, there are gods, goddesses and deities that all represent a moral aspect. To me, there was no way one God could be controlling it all, especially for so many people. At a recent visit to the museum, I found this Buddhist statue.

This is Marichi. Marichi is known as the Buddhist Goddess of Dawn. It is said that she drives away all of the evil in the night, especially those that derive from ignorance and fear. Just like many other Buddhist gods, goddesses, and deities, Marichi is depicted with many hands and faces. Each hand holds something that is meaningful to her character while each face depicts a personality. Many statues of Marichi have different depictions. However, in this statue, Marichi has three faces with eight arms. The two hands that are on top on either side each hold a sun. It represents the light that forces the darkness away. I guess since the dawn is her symbol, she holds two of them to seem more empowering whereas she only holds one of everything else. Of the arms that are stretching out, the middle ones hold nothing but a pose of prayer. Of the arms that are stretching out, the lower left holds what seems to be a stamp while the lower right holds a bell. On the front, Marichi has a calm face while on the right is the face of a boar and the left holds a face that looks more aggressive. I think these faces represent the idea that Marichi can be gentle, destructive and defiant when need be.

I really love these deities because as said earlier, one God can’t handle everything for every single individual on this Earth. The responsibilities need to be split up. I really think that religion needs to be more thought of in this light--one individual, person, thing, cannot handle it all. I think having different gods and deities to look forward to helps the individual with their life in general because then the individual would have to focus on one problem at a time. In general, we worry too much. It’s kind of like when Liebman says we are suffering from ulcers because of our extreme worrying about everything and anything.

I think it’s also significant to note that name of the statue is the Buddhist Goddess of Dawn. The statue is claimed to a religion, which means that there must be interpretations of this statute in other religions that are similar but must represent different ideals that reflect their own respective religions. I think it makes this piece much bigger than I thought at first because of how influential it is across all religions. There must be something quite impressive about this if other cultures and especially if other religions want to adopt their own form of Marichi.