Yama- Buddhist GodDeity"Lord of Death"

The Mirror and the Messengers

In the Devaduta Sutta, the Buddha describes Yama's court. The dead arrive, and Yama asks each one whether they noticed five messengers sent into the world: a newborn baby, an old person bent and broken, a sick person lying in filth, a criminal being punished, and a bloated corpse. "Did you not see these?" he asks. "Did it not occur to you that you too are subject to birth, aging, sickness, and death?" Those who ignored the messengers are sent to the hell realms. Yama takes no pleasure in the sentencing. He reads what the Mirror of Karma shows and dispatches the dead to the rebirth their actions have earned.

The Wheel of Life, clutched in his jaws and claws, depicts all six realms of rebirth with the twelve links of dependent origination around its rim. Nothing born escapes his grip.

Emma-O in Japan

In Japan, Yama became Emma-O, the Great King Emma, who presides over a court where demon-officials present the evidence of each person's life. Temple paintings show him with a fierce red face and an imposing crown, seated behind the judgment desk. Emma-O is stern but not beyond mercy. When Jizo Bosatsu descends into the underworld to intercede for condemned souls, even Emma-O yields. The dead are pulled from the cauldrons of hell on Jizo's authority alone.

Death's Limits

For all his power over the dead, Yama remains trapped in samsara himself. The Buddha told his monks that those who have achieved enlightenment will never appear before the judgment seat. They have stepped off the Wheel entirely. Yama judges every being's karma but remains subject to his own.