Green Tara- Buddhist GodDeity

Born from a Tear

The origin narrative most widely told in Tibetan Buddhism holds that Tārā was born from a tear shed by Avalokiteśvara. The bodhisattva of compassion, looking out at the suffering of the world, wept, and from the tear that fell from his eye a lotus bloomed, and from the lotus arose Tārā. In her green form (Śyāma Tārā), she embodies the active, swift aspect of compassion, the aspect that does not merely observe suffering but moves to intervene.

Green Tārā's iconography expresses this quality directly. She sits on a lotus throne but her right foot extends downward, stepping off the seat, ready to rise to the aid of anyone who calls upon her. Her right hand is in the varada mudrā (gesture of giving), while her left hand holds the stem of a blue lotus (utpala) at her heart. Her body is emerald green, the color associated in Buddhist symbolism with the wind element and with activity. She is young, beautiful, and alert, her posture poised between meditation and motion.

The Twenty-One Praises

The foundational liturgical text for Tārā worship is the Praise to the Twenty-One Tārās, preserved in the Kangyur (the Tibetan Buddhist canon). The text enumerates twenty-one forms of Tārā, each with specific colors, attributes, and functions, from pacifying obstacles to destroying enemies to granting prosperity. Green Tārā is the root form from which all others emanate.

The praise is recited daily across Tibetan Buddhist traditions. Each of the twenty-one verses invokes a different aspect: Tārā who destroys enemies with the syllable HŪṂ, Tārā who shakes the three worlds by stamping her foot, Tārā who dispels poison, Tārā who grants all wishes. The repetition of the praise is believed to protect from the eight great fears: lions, elephants, fire, snakes, bandits, imprisonment, water, and demons.

Stephan Beyer's comprehensive study The Cult of Tārā (1973) documents the extraordinary breadth of Tārā devotion in Tibet, Nepal, and Mongolia, from elaborate tantric rituals to simple recitation of her mantra (OṂ TĀRE TUTTĀRE TURE SVĀHĀ) by ordinary laypeople seeking her immediate help.