The Book of Buddhas

I am not a practicing Thevardian Buddhist but I found this book on Tibetan Iconography & Symbolism to be very interesting. It has helped me to understand the ancient Tibetan symbols and gave me a lot of information. Although it can be read in a few ways, the topics offer powerful insights into intercultural understanding and cosmic mind development. The book could be beneficial to people of different religions and cultures. It can be spread over time and used with meditation, applied imagination and other methods. A reader may find internal contradictions in different statements or between the book’s Buddhist sources and the book. It might be worthwhile to ask these questions as unwritten koans. –By Maurice Blair 6 September 2009
Students who are interested in Buddhism today may not be able to grasp the symbolism of the different types of statuary that are associated with this philosophy. Every symbol in Buddhism has a meaning. This book examines the symbolism behind statues and paintings, as well as the ritual meanings of objects associated with Buddhism. This book is intended to be an introduction for Western students. It is not an exhaustive and tedious study. However, it provides an introduction to Buddhism and a thorough overview of the most popular symbols and figures. The author discusses the Three Mysteries and mudras as well as asanas. He also covers Transcendental Buddhas (Adibuddha), Tara, Manjushri, and Avalokiteshvara. Yidams, Gods, Goddesses, Yoginis, and Dakinis are also discussed.