Prajnaparamita

At the start of the calendar year, we honor the perfection of wisdom in the Buddhist tradition. Although thangkas (sacred paintings) and statues depict Prajnaparamita as an embodied goddess, she defies conceptualization. Prajnaparamita, also known as Yum Chenmo or Great Mother, is the void nature of all phenomena. She is the embodiment of an ephemeral wisdom that teaches us the way of simply being, of surrendering to what is. She reveals to us that NOW is the holy moment. This is the Temple’s devotional representation of Prajnaparamita, situated in the Temple’s Siskiyou County landscape against the backdrop of the sky above Mt Shasta. Prajnaparamita, the Mother of the Buddhas, is the perfect wisdom of the dharma way. Depicted as a woman seated on a lotus throne, she floats above Mt Shasta, the symbolic axis of the world. The offerings before her are represented as clear crystals, both in acknowledgement of Mt Shasta’s popularity with gemstone enthusiasts, and representing the inherent