Can and are these figures in Buddhism, Aksobhya, Bhaisajyaguru, Sakyamuni, Vairocana etc spiritual entities?

Question

Are they not "gods"?

Namaste

Peace and Love

Answer 1

"Spiritual" is a euphemism for "non-existent"

Answer 2

Buddhism has a number of wonderful tales that involve the gods. In one the gods take notice of this new compassionate prince and decide to test him.

One of the gods comes to earth as a pigeon and lands on the Buddha's shoulder. The pigeon is frantic with fear from the hawk (another god) that is chasing him. The Buddha promises the pigeon refuge.

The Hawk comes down and says, "What are you doing?! I can only eat meat. That pigeon is my dinner, without it I will die."

The Buddha contemplates on this and has a sword brought to him. He cuts off a piece of his own leg and offers it, but the hawk says, "Not enough."

So, scales are used and the Buddha cuts off an amount of his leg equal to the weight of the pigeon. With this the gods are sufficiently impressed, show their true nature and heal the Buddha.

Like many things in Buddhism, this is a story to illustrate a point. It should not be taken as a sign of Buddhist belief in the supernatural or in gods. It also should not be taken as a sign that buddhists don't believe in the supernatural or in gods. Think of it as a fable.

I hope this helps!

Answer 3

They are not "gods" in the omnipotent sense, they are what we refer to as "deities" but they, unlike devas (from the god/goddess realm where it's just a nice place like heaven and a place where you go if you've accrued lots of good karma w/o enlightenment), they're attained enlightenment and are ASPECTS or EMANATIONS of the Buddha, which appear to various places as needed.

Also, we do not believe in "spirit" we believe that the MIND is what goes on, but also be careful because the Buddha, and various emanations are NOT "big mind" which is also another misconstrued thought. In order to really understand you have to delve into Buddhism more than superficially... www.buddhanet.net is a nice spot to start, which provides links into other sites and locations, etc.

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