The Buddhist adept Virupa

Following its steep decline from roughly 850 to 1000, Buddhism was reintroduced to Tibet through a wave of spiritual masters who brought teachings from India and founded the New (Sarma)—as opposed to the Ancient (Nyingma)—orders. One such early master was Virupa, the ninth-century Indian originator of what became Tibet’s Sakya order. He left his prestigious post as a monastic official to become an adept (siddha), a spiritual eccentric with seemingly magical abilities to intervene in otherwise ordinary events. Flowers in his hair and a meditation band around his knees, Virupa raises his fingers to the sun, stopping it in its course with his magical powers (siddhi). This sculpture speaks of Tibetan religious and artistic influence at the Chinese imperial court, initiated with a political alliance between the Sakyas and the Mongols in the thirteenth century.