The Cakrasaṃvara Tantra, Khorlo Déchok or Khorlo Demchok is considered to be of the mother class of the Anuttarayoga Tantra in Vajrayana Buddhism. It is also called the Discourse of Sri Heruka and the Samvara Light. David B. Gray dates this tantra to the late eight or early ninth century. The Cakrasamvara Tantra is mostly dedicated to describing rituals and meditations which produce either mundane siddhis such as flight and the supramundane siddhi of awakening. These are achieved through deity yoga and the use of mantras.
Deity and mandala
The central deity of the mandala, Saṃvara, is a form of Heruka, one of the principal yidam or meditational deities of the Sarma schools of Tibetan Buddhism. Saṃvara is typically depicted with a blue-coloured body, four faces, and twelve arms, and embracing his consort, the wisdom dakiniVajravārāhī in Yab-Yum. Other forms of the deity are also known with varying numbers of limbs. According to the Buddhist Tantric scholar Abhayakaragupta, the deity's mandala is described thus:
In the Samvara mandala there is a variegated lotus atop Mount Sumeru within an adamantine tent. Placed on it is a double vajra, which sits as the base of a court in the middle of which is the Blessed Lord. He stands in the archer stance on Bhairava and Kalaratri who lie on a solar disk atop the pericarp of the lotus. He is black and has four faces which are, beginning with the front , black, green, red, and yellow, each of which has three eyes. He has a tiger skin and has twelve arms. Two arms holding a vajra and a vajra-bell embrace Vajravarahi. Two of his hands hold up over his back a white elephant hide dripping with blood. His other a damaru drum, an axe, a flaying knife, and a trident. His remaining left a khatvangastaff marked with a vajra, a skull-bowl filled with blood, a vajra noose, and the head of Brahma. A garland of fifty moist human heads hangs about his neck. He has the six insignia, and a sacred thread made of human sinew. He has a row of five skulls above his forehead, and a crest of black dreadlocks topped by a left-oriented crescent moon and a double vajra. He is endowed with a fierce meditative state and bears his fangs. He brings together in one the nine dramatic sentiments.
Saṃvara and Vajravārāhī are not to be thought of as two different entities, as an ordinary husband and wife are two different people; in reality, their divine embrace is a metaphor for the union of great bliss and emptiness, which are one and the same essence. In Western meditation texts his name is often translated to mean "Highest Bliss". Meditation on Cakrasaṃvara is an advanced practice transmitted by one's lama, and binds the mind of the meditator to enlightenment itself.
Influence of Saivism
The Samvara texts adopted the pitha list from the Saiva text Tantrasadbhava, introducing a copying error where a deity was mistaken for a place.
