Dharmacakrapravartana

dharmacakrapravartana (P. dhammacakkappavattana; T. chos 'khor bskor ba ཆོས་འཁོར་བསྐོར་བ་; C. zhuan falun 轉法輪) is translated "turning the wheel of dharma."

The "wheel of dharma" or "dharma wheel" (dharmachakra) is a traditional symbol for the teachings of the Buddha. The turning the "dharma wheel" is traditional metaphor for the Buddha's act of teaching the dharma.

"Turning the dharma wheel" is a key event in the life of Gautama Buddha; it is one of the twelve deeds of a buddha in the Tibetan tradition, and one of the eight episodes (baxiang) in the East Asian tradition.

The first teaching given by the Buddha after his awakening is called the Turning of the Dharma Wheel Sutra (Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta).

The Pali tradition speaks of a single turning of the dharma wheel, which began with the Buddha's first discourse. The Tibetan tradition identifies three turnings of the dharma wheel, to indicate different categories of the teaching of the Buddha.

Sources

• Pettit, John Whitney (1999), Mipham's Beacon of Certainty: Illuminating the View of Dzogchen, the Great Perfection, Wisdom Publications 

External links

• chos_%27khor_bskor_ba, Rangjung Yeshe Wiki
• ཆོས་འཁོར་བསྐོར་བ་, Christian-Steinert Dictionary